84 14 se replie ... marabout: 'retreats as fast as he can to the marabout.' For à toutes jambes cf. 78 2.
84 17 hydres: the Hydra of classical mythology was a water serpent with many heads, each of which, when cut off, was replaced immediately by two new ones.
84 18 A moi: 'help!'
84 23 filer: here, 'scamper off.' Filer = 'to spin' (yarn), 'to uncoil,' and colloquially 'to take to one's heels,' 'to race'; cf. 88 27, 94 9.
85 2 au petit jour: 'at early dawn'; au grand jour 'in full daylight.'--qu'il: cf. note to 5 1.
85 6 chameau à bosse simple: 'one-humped camel,' dromadaire 93 6.
85 9 le Christ: pronounced [krist]; always with the article (the Anointed).
85 10 Gethsémani: in the words douta, pleurer, Daudet refers to Christ's moral and physical recoil at Gethsemane. A Frenchman is not offended as we are by the flippancy of this reference to one of the supreme moments of Christ's life. Cf. De Vigny's "Le Mont des Oliviers."