Although at the memagerie he had said nothing more, he had already
said too much. The following day all the talk of the town was of the
impending departure of Tartarin for Africa, to shoot lions.
You will bear witness that the good fellow had not breathed a word
of this, but you know how it is... the mirage.... In short the whole of
Tarascon could talk of nothing else.
On the pavement, at the club, at Costecalde’s shop, people accosted one
another with an air of excitement.
“Et autrement, have you heard the latest, au moins?”
“Et autrement, what now, is Tartarin going, au moins?” For in Tarascon
every remark begins with “Et autrement” which is pronounced “autremain”
and ends with “au moins” which is pronounced “au mouain” and in these
days the sound of “autremain” and “au mouain” was enough to rattle the
windows.
The most surprised person in the town to hear that he was leaving for
Africa was Tartarin, but now see the effects of vanity. Instead of
replying that he was not going and had never intended to go, poor
Tartarin, on the first occasion that the subject was broached adopted a
somewhat evasive air, “Hé!... Hé!... perhaps... I can’t say.” On the
second occasion, now a little more accustomed to the idea, he replied
“Probably” and on the third “Yes, definitely.”
Eventually, one evening at the club, carried away by some glasses of
egg-nog, the public interest and the plaudits, he declared formally that
he was tired of shooting at hats and was going shortly in pursuit of the
great lions of Africa.
A loud cheer greeted this declaration, then came more egg-nog,
handshakes, embraces and torchlight serenades until midnight before the
little house of the baobab.
Tartarin-Sancho, however, was far from pleased. The idea of travelling
to Africa and hunting lions scared him stiff and when they went into the
house, and while the serenade of honour was still going on outside, he
made the most frightful scene with Tartarin-Quixote, calling him a crazy
dreamer, a rash triple idiot and detailing one by one the catastrophes
which would await him on such an expedition. Shipwreck, fever,
dysentery, plague, elephantiasis and so on... it was useless for
Tartarin-Quixote to swear that he would be careful, that he would dress
warmly, that he would take with him everything that might be needed,
Tartarin-Sancho refused to listen. The poor fellow saw himself already
torn to pieces by lions or swallowed up in the sands of the desert, and
the other Tartarin could pacify him only a little by pointing out that
these were plans for the future, that there was no hurry, that they had
not yet actually started.
Obviously one cannot embark on such an expedition without some
preparation. One cannot take off like a bird. As a first measure
Tartarin set about reading the reports of the great African explorers,
the journals of Livingstone, Burton, Caillé‚ and the like, there he saw
that those intrepid travellers, before they put their boots on for these
distant excursions, prepared themselves in advance to undergo hunger,
thirst, long treks and privations of all sorts.
Tartarin decided to follow their example and took to a diet of “Eau
bouillie”. What is called eau bouillie in Tarascon consists of several
slices of bread soaked in warm water, with a clove of garlic, a little
thyme and a bay leaf. It is not very palatable and you may imagine how
Tartarin-Sancho enjoyed it.
Tartarin de Tarascon combined this with several other sensible methods
of training. For instance, to habituate himself to long marches he would
go round his morning constitutional seven or eight times, sometimes at a
brisk walk, sometimes at the trot with two pebbles in his mouth. Then to
accustom himself to nocturnal chills and the mists of dawn, he went into
the garden and stayed there until ten or eleven at night, alone with his
rifle, on watch behind the baobab.
Finally, for as long as the menagerie remained in Tarascon, those hat
hunters who had stayed late at Costecalde’s could see in the shadows, as
they passed the Place du Château, a figure pacing up and down behind
the cages... it was Tartarin training himself to listen unmoved to the
roaring of lions in the African night.