"I meant to say, turned into a statuette."
"Unfortunately, you've become very rare lately, Dodichet," said Rosa; "we hardly ever see you."
"It isn't my fault! I am not my own master since my intimate friend Count Miflorès came to Paris."
"Oh, yes! that Sicilian, who's so rich!"
"He doesn't know the amount of his fortune."
"Is he a relation of yours?"
"No; but I rendered him an important service in Sicily; he was on the point of falling into a volcano; did you know there were volcanoes in Sicily?"
"Yes, mountains that spit fire; I saw one in a play, at La Gaieté."
"My Sicilian, who is very inquisitive and very brave, had ascended Mount Ætna, and was looking into the mouth of the crater; suddenly he dropped his cane, and it fell into the fiery gulf. Count Miflorès thought a great deal of that cane, which he had inherited from his mother; he was going down into the crater to try to recover it, which would have been to go to certain destruction! Luckily, I was there—with my dog, a magnificent Newfoundland. I pointed to the hole, and to the cane, of which we could see one end, and said: 'Go, seek! go, seek!'—My dog understood me; he rushed down into the crater, and soon returned with the cane between his teeth and laid it at my feet. I gave it to the count, who was overjoyed, and who swore everlasting friendship to me from that day."
"Ah! the brave count! no, I mean the brave dog! You ought to have given him a good dinner when you got home!"