Page:The Writings of Prosper Merimee-Volume 2.djvu/20

4 COLOMBA in Corsica. " There are plenty of wild boars," said Captain Ellis. " And you have to learn to distinguish them from the domestic pigs, which are astonishingly like them. For if you kill a pig, you find yourself in difficulties with the swine-herds. They rush out of the thickets (which they call mdquis) armed to the teeth, make you pay for their beasts, and laugh at you besides. Then there is the mouflon, a strange animal, which you will not find anywhere else — splendid game, but hard to get — and stags, deer, pheasants, and partridges — it would be impossi- ble to enumerate all the kinds with which Corsica swarms. If you want shooting, colonel, go to Corsica! There, as one of my entertainers said to me, you can get a shot at every imaginable kind of game, from a thrush to a man! " At tea, the captain once more delighted Lydia with the tale of a vendetta transversale* even more strange than his first story, and he thor- oughly stirred her enthusiasm by his descriptions of the strange wild beauty of the country, the peculiarities of its inhabitants, and their primi- tive hospitality and customs. Finally, he offered her a pretty httle stiletto, less remarkable for its shape and copper mounting than for its origin. tion of the author of the original offence.
 * A vendetta in which vengeance falls on a more or less distant rela-