hold of it. From underneath this short
cap, on both sides, there bulged forth such a forest of curly fluffy
hair that the rim of the cap was quite overwhelmed. The face beneath was
clean-shaved, except that a moustache, pointed at each end, branched
upwards towards the sky like a pair of threatening horns, and the neck
was so compressed within a stiffly starched cravat, with two
sharply-pointed linen ends, that one could not so much as move one's
chin about in it. The body of this gentleman's dark green frock-coat lay
just beneath his armpits, but the tails reached to the ground, and the
collar was so large that you could scarce distinguish its wearer inside
it. He also had double and triple shirt frills, and while the brass
buttons of his coat were no larger than cherry pips, the monstrously
puffed sleeves rose as high as his shoulders. The wax-yellow waistcoat
was almost half concealed by the huge projecting ruffles. The whole
costume was set off by hose _a la cosaque_, which appeared to amplify
downwards, bulged over the boots, and were slit up in front so as to
allow them to be stuffed therein. Above the waistcoat dangled all sorts
of jingling-jangling trinkets, but the boots were provided with spurs of
terrible dimensions, so that if a fellow did not look out he might
easily have had his eyes poked out. Such was the martial mode of those
days, at the very time when no war was going on anywhere. The finishing
touch to this get-up was supplied by a thin tortoiseshell cane with a
bird's head carved in ivory, which a beau with any pretensions to _bon
ton_ used regularly to twiddle in his mouth.

"Eh, ventre bleu! eh, sacre bleu!" exclaimed the new-comer (so much, at
any rate, he had learnt from Beranger), as he kicked at the kitchen door
and shook his saturated mantle. "What sort of a country is this? Hie,
there, a light! Is there any one at home?"

This marvel brought forth Peter Bus with a light, and after gaping
sufficiently at the new-comer and his servant who had thus broken into
his kitchen, he asked, with an alacrity to oblige by no means
corresponding to his amazement, "What are your commands, sir?" His face
showed at the same time that he meant to give nothing.

The stranger murdered the Hungarian language terribly, and he had a
distinctly foreign accent.

"Milles tonnerres!" he cried, "can't you speak any other language here
but Hungarian?"

"No."

"That's bad. Then where's the innkeeper?"

"I am. An