The World's Greatest Books_ Volume 3 Part 1

The World's Greatest Books.

Vol III.

by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.

ALPHONSE DAUDET

Tartarin of Tarascon

Alphonse Daudet, the celebrated French novelist, was born at Nimes on May 13, 1840, and as a youth of seventeen went to Paris, where he began as a poet at eighteen, and at twenty-two made his first efforts in the drama. He soon found his feet as a contributor to the leading journals of the day and a successful writer for the stage. He was thirty-two when he wrote "Tartarin of Tarascon," than which no better comic tale has been produced in modern times. Tarascon is a real town, not far from the birthplace of Daudet, and the people of the district have always had a reputation for "drawing the long bow." It was to satirise this amiable weakness of his southern compatriots that the novelist created the character of Tartarin, but while he makes us laugh at the absurd misadventures of the lion-hunter, it will be noticed how ingeniously he prevents our growing out of temper with him, how he contrives to keep a warm corner in our hearts for the bragging, simple-minded, good-natured fellow. That is to say, it is a work of essential humour, and the lively style in which the story is told attracts us to it time and again with undiminished pleasure. In two subsequent books, "Tartarin in the Alps," and "Port Tarascon," Daudet recounted further adventures of his delightful hero. His "Sapho" and "Kings in Exile" have also been widely read. Daudet died on December 17, 1897.

_I.--The Mighty Hunter at Home_

I remember my first visit to Tartarin of Tarascon as clearly as if it had been yesterday, though it is now more than a dozen years ago. When you had pa.s.sed into his back garden, you would never have fancied yourself in France. Every tree and plant had been brought from foreign climes; he was such a fellow for collecting the curiosities of Nature, this wonderful Tartarin. 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. Picture to yourself a large hall gleaming from top to bottom with firearms and weapons of all sorts: carbines, rifles, blunderbusses, bowie-knives, revolvers, daggers, flint-arrows--in a word, examples of the deadly weapons of all races used by man in all parts of the world. Everything was neatly arranged, and labelled as if it were in a public museum. "Poisoned Arrows. Please do not touch!" was the warning on one of the cards. "Weapons loaded. Have a care!" greeted you from another. My word, it required some pluck to move about in the den of the great Tartarin.

There were books of travel and adventure, books about mighty hunting on the table in the centre of the room; and seated at the table was a short and rather fat, red-haired fellow of about forty-five, with a closely- trimmed beard and a pair of bright eyes. He was in his shirtsleeves, reading a book held in one hand while he gesticulated wildly with a large pipe in the other--Tartarin! He was evidently imagining himself the daring hero of the story.

Now you must know that the people of Tarascon were tremendously keen on hunting, and Tartarin was the chief of the hunters. You may think this funny when you know there was not a living thing to shoot at within miles of Tarascon; scarcely a sparrow to attract local sportsmen. Ah, but you don't know how ingenious they are down there.

Every Sunday morning off the huntsmen sallied with their guns and ammunition, the hounds yelping at their heels. Each man as he left in the morning took with him a brand new cap, and when they got well into the country and were ready for sport, they took their caps off, threw then high in the air, and shot at them as they fell. In the evening you would see them returning with their riddled caps stuck on the points of their guns, and of all these brave men Tartarin was the most admired, as he always swung into town with the most hopeless rag of a cap at the end of a day's sport. There's no mistake, he was a wonder!

But for all his adventurous spirit, he had a certain amount of caution.

There were really two men inside the skin of Tartarin. The one Tartarin said to him, "Cover yourself with glory." The other said to him, "Cover yourself with flannel." The one, imagining himself fighting Red Indians, would call for "An axe! An axe! Somebody give me an axe!" The other, knowing that he was cosy by his fireside, would ring the bell and say, "Jane, my coffee."

One evening at Costecalde's, the gunsmith's, when Tartarin was explaining some mechanism of a rifle, the door was opened and an excited voice announced, "A lion! A lion!" The news seemed incredible, but you can imagine the terror that seized the little group at the gunsmith's as they asked for more news. It appeared that the lion was to be seen in a travelling menagerie newly arrived from Beaucaire.

A lion at last, and here in Tarascon! Suddenly, when the full truth had dawned upon Tartarin, he shouldered his gun, and, turning to Major Bravida, "Let us go to see him!" he thundered. Following him went the cap-hunters. Arrived at the menagerie, where many Tarasconians were already wandering from cage to cage, Tartarin entered with his gun over his shoulder to make inquiries about the king of beasts. His entrance was rather a wet blanket on the other visitors, who, seeing their hero thus armed, thought there might be danger, and were about to flee. But the proud bearing of the great man rea.s.sured them, and Tartarin continued his round of the booth until he faced the lion from the Atlas Mountains.

Here he stood carefully studying the creature, who sniffed and growled in surly temper, and then, rising, shook his mane and gave vent to a terrible, roar, directed full at Tartarin.

Tartarin alone stood his ground, stern and immovable, in front of the cage, and the valiant cap-hunters, somewhat rea.s.sured by his bravery, again drew near and heard him murmur, as he gazed on the lion, "Ah, yes, there's a hunt for you!"

Not another word did Tartarin utter that day. Yet next day nothing was spoken about in the town but his intention to be off to Algeria to hunt the lions of the Atlas Mountains. When asked if this were true his pride would not let him deny it, and he pretended that it might be true. So the notion grew, until that night at his club Tartarin announced, amid tremendous cheering, that he was sick of cap-hunting, and meant very soon to set forth in pursuit of the lions of the Atlas.

Now began a great struggle between the two Tartarins. While the one was strongly in favour of the adventure, the other was strongly opposed to leaving his snug little Baobab Villa and the safety of Tarascon. But he had let himself in for this, and felt he would have to see it through.

So he began reading up the books of African travel, and found from these how some of the explorers had trained themselves for the work by enduring hunger, thirst, and other privations before they set out.

Tartarin began cutting down his food, taking very watery soup. Early in the morning, too, he walked round the town seven or eight times, and at nights he would stay in the garden from ten till eleven o'clock, alone with his gun, to inure himself to night chills; while, so long as the menagerie remained in Tarascon, a strange figure might have been seen in the dark, prowling around the tent, listening to the growling of the lion. This was Tartarin, accustoming himself to be calm when the king of beasts was raging.

The feeling began to grow, however, that the hero was shirking. He showed no haste to be off. At length, one night Major Bravida went to Baobab Villa and said very solemnly, "Tartarin, you must go!"

It was a terrible moment for Tartarin, but he realised the solemnity of the words, and, looking around his cosy little den with a moist eye, he replied at length in a choking voice, "Bravida, I shall go!" Having made this irrevocable decision, he now pushed ahead his final preparations with some show of haste. From Bompard's he had two large trunks, one inscribed with "Tartarin of Tarascon. Case of Arms," and he sent to Ma.r.s.eilles all manner of provisions of travel, including a patent camp-tent of the latest style.

_II.--Tartarin Sets off to Lion-Land_

Then the great day of his departure arrived. All the town was agog. The neighbourhood of Baobab Villa was crammed with spectators. About ten o'clock the bold hero issued forth.

"He's a Turk! He's wearing spectacles!" This was the astonished cry of the beholders, and, sure enough, Tartarin had thought it his duty to don Algerian costume because he was going to Algeria. He also carried two heavy rifles, one on each shoulder, a huge hunting-knife at his waist and a revolver in a leather case. A pair of large blue spectacles were worn by him, for the sun in Algeria is terribly strong, you know.

At the station the doors of the waiting-room had to be closed to keep the crowd out, while the great man took leave of his friends, making promises to each, and jotting down notes on his tablets of the various people to whom he would send lion-skins.

Oh, that I had the brush of an artist, that I might paint you some pictures of Tartarin during his three days aboard the Zouave on the voyage from Ma.r.s.eilles! But I have no facility with the brush, and mere words cannot convey how he pa.s.sed from the proudly heroic to the hopelessly miserable in the course of the journey. Worst of all, while he was groaning in his stuffy bunk, he knew that a very merry party of pa.s.sengers were enjoying themselves in the saloon. He was still in his bunk when the ship came to her moorings at Algiers, and he got up with a sudden jerk, under the impression that the Zouave was sinking. Seizing his many weapons, he rushed on deck, to find it was not foundering, but only arriving.

Soon after Tartarin had set foot on sh.o.r.e, following a great negro porter, he was almost stupefied by the babel of tongues; but, fortunately, a policeman took him in hand and had him directed, together with his enormous collection of luggage, to the European hotel.

On arriving at his hotel, he was so fatigued that his marvellous collection of weapons had to be taken from him, and he had to be carried to bed, where he snored very soundly until it was striking three o'clock. He had slept all the evening, through the night and morning, and well into the next afternoon!

He awakened refreshed, and the first thought in his mind was, "I'm in lion-land at last!" But the thought sent a cold shiver through him, and he dived under the bedclothes. A moment later he determined to be up.

Exclaiming, "Now for the lions!" he jumped on the floor and began his preparations.

His plan was to get out at once into the country, take ambush for the night, shoot the first lion that came along, and then back to the hotel for breakfast. So off he went, carrying not only his usual a.r.s.enal, but the marvellous patent tent strapped to his back. He attracted no little attention as he trudged along, and catching sight of a very fine camel, his heart beat fast, for he thought the lions could not be far off now.

It was quite dark by the time he had got only a little way beyond the outskirts of the town, scrambling over ditches and bramble-hedges. After much hard work of this kind, the mighty hunter suddenly stopped, whispering to himself, "I seem to smell a lion hereabouts." He sniffed keenly in all directions. To his excited imagination, it seemed a likely place for a lion; so, dropping on one knee, and laying one of his guns in front of him, he waited.

He waited very patiently. One hour, two hours; but nothing stirred. Then he suddenly remembered that great lion-hunters take a little young goat with them to attract the lion by its bleating. Having forgotten to supply himself with one, Tartarin conceived the happy idea of bleating like a kid. He started softly, calling, "Meh, meh!" He was really afraid that a lion might hear him, but as no lion seemed to be paying attention, he became bolder in his "mehs," until the noise he made was more like the bellowing of a bull.

But hush! What was that? A huge black object had for the moment loomed up against the dark blue sky. It stooped, sniffing the ground; then seemed to move away again, only to return suddenly. It must be the lion at last; so, taking a steady aim, bang went the gun of Tartarin, and a terrible howling came in response. Clearly his shot had told; the wounded lion had made off. He would now wait for the female to appear, as he had read in books.

But two or more hours pa.s.sed, and she did not come; and the ground was damp, and the night air cold, so the hunter thought he would camp for the night. After much struggling, he could not get his patent tent to open. Finally, he threw it on the ground in a rage, and lay on the top of it. Thus he slept until the bugles in the barracks near by wakened him in the morning. For behold, instead of finding himself out on the Sahara, he was in the kitchen garden of some suburban Algerian!

"These people are mad," he growled to himself, "to plant their artichokes where lions are roaming about. Surely I have been dreaming.

Lions do come here; there's proof positive."

From artichoke to artichoke, from field to field, he followed the thin trail of blood, and came at length to a poor little donkey he had wounded!

Tartarin's first feeling was one of vexation. There is such a difference between a lion and an a.s.s, and the poor little creature looked so innocent. The great hunter knelt down and tried to stanch the donkey's wounds, and it seemed grateful to him, for it feebly flapped its long ears two or three times before it lay still for ever.

Suddenly a voice was heard calling, "Noiraud! Noiraud!" It was "the female." She came in the form of an old French woman with a large red umbrella, and it would have been better for Tartarin to have faced a female lion.

When the unhappy man tried to explain how he had mistaken her little donkey for a lion, she thought he was making fun of her, and belaboured him with her umbrella. When her husband came on the scene the matter was soon adjusted by Tartarin agreeing to pay eight pounds for the damage he had done, the price of the donkey being really something like eight shillings. The donkey owner was an inn-keeper, and the sight of Tartarin's money made him quite friendly. He invited the lion-hunter to have some food at the inn with him before he left. And as they walked thither he was amazed to be told by the inn-keeper that he had never seen a lion there in twenty years!

Clearly, the lions were to be looked for further south. "I'll make tracks for the south, too," said Tartarin to himself. But he first of all returned to his hotel in an omnibus. Think of it! But before he was to go south on the high adventure, he loafed about the city of Algiers for some time, going to the theatres and other places of amus.e.m.e.nt, where he met Prince Gregory of Montenegro, with whom he made friends.

One day the captain of the Zouave came across him in the town, and showed him a note about himself in a Tarascon newspaper. This spoke of the uncertainty that prevailed as to the fate of the great hunter, and wound up with these words:

"Some Negro traders state, however, that they met in the open desert a European whose description answers to that of Tartarin, and who was making tracks for Timbuctoo. May Heaven guard for us our hero!"

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_