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He saw what his surprise had at first prevented him from seeing, a crowd of people which was gathered round the poor tame lion, which was blind, and the two big negroes, armed with cudgels, who led it about the town. Tartarin's blood boiled. "Wretches!" He cried "To debase this noble creature!"
The brave commandant, Bravida, honorary captain retired in the Military Clothing Factory Department called him a game fellow; and you may well admit that the warrior knew all about game fellows, he played such a capital knife and fork on game of all kinds. So was the legislature on Tartarin's side.
At last the old, time-worn village came in sight it lies about ten miles north-east of Tartarin's Tarascon and we entered it, as was proper, with the "Master's" words on our lips: "Maillane is beautiful, well-pleasing is Maillane; and it grows more and more beautiful every day. Maillane is the honour of the countryside, and takes its name from the month of May. "Who would be in Paris or in Rome?
Tartarin went red and white by turns as he read this, and realised that he was in for it. He very much wished to return to his beloved Tarascon, but to go there without having shot some lions one at least was impossible, and so it was Southward ho! III. Tartarin's Adventures in the Desert
Behind him marched the brave Commandant Bravida, Ladevese the Chief Judge, Costecalde the gunsmith next, and then all the sportsmen who pop at caps, preceding the hand-carts and the rag, tag, and bobtail. Before the station the station-master awaited them, an old African veteran of 1830, who shook Tartarin's hand many times with fervency.
While Tartarin was preparing himself by these strenuous methods, all Tarascon had its eyes on him. Nothing else was of interest. Hat shooting was abandoned, the ballads languished; in Bezuquet the chemist's the piano was silent beneath a green dust cover, with cantharides flies drying, belly up, on the top... Tartarin's expedition had brought everything to a halt.
All this swarm squeezed and jostled before our good Tartarin's door, who was going to slaughter lions in the land of the Turks. For Tarascon, Algeria, Africa, Greece, Persia, Turkey, and Mesopotamia, all form one great hazy country, almost a myth, called the land of the Turks. They say "Tur's," but that's a linguistic digression.
No matter.... For Tarascon it was quite splendid, and those citizens who were admitted, on Sundays, to have the privilege of inspecting Tartarin's baobab went home full of admiration. You may imagine my emotions as I walked through this remarkable garden... they were nothing, however, to what I felt on being admitted to the sanctum of the great man himself.
I wish that I was a painter, a really good painter, so that I could present to you a picture of the different positions adopted by Tartarin's chechia during the three days of the passage from France to Algeria. I would show it to you first at the departure, proud and stately as it was then, crowning that noble Tarascon head.
His garden boasted, for instance, an example of the baobab, that giant of the vegetable world, but Tartarin's specimen was only big enough to occupy a mignonette pot. He was mightily proud of it, all the same. The great sight of his place, however, was the hero's private den at the bottom of the garden.
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