"And fresher and lustier than ever! I am tempted to repeat the fable: 'How pretty you are! how handsome you look to me!'"
"You don't need to: I know it."
"That's a pretty cane you have there. It isn't the same one, is it?"
"No, monsieur; it certainly isn't the one you broke."
"Didn't you have it mended?"
"It wasn't mendable, monsieur."
"Nonsense! why, they even mend porcelain! This is cherry, I see; let me look at it."
Cherami put out his hand for the cane, but Monsieur Courbichon hastily put it behind his back.
"No, no," he cried; "I have no desire that you should break this one too; one was quite enough."
"Oh! mon Dieu! my excellent and worthy friend, who said anything about breaking your cane? There is nobody throwing skittles at your legs at this moment, and I fancy that this switch is worth quite as much as your cherry stick."