r! more
water, _Boudiou!_.. after this, I 'll never in my life take another
bath."

Stupefied by a terror which still lasts, Pascalon, the banner between
his legs, sat back in his seat, looking to right and left like a hare
fearful of being caught again... And Tartarin?.. Oh! he, ever dignified
and calm, he was diverting himself by reading the Southern newspapers, a
package of which had been sent to the Pension Mueller, all of them having
reproduced from the _Forum_ the account of his ascension, the same he
had himself dictated, but enlarged, magnified, and embellished with
ineffable laudations. Suddenly the hero gave a cry, a formidable cry,
which resounded to the end of the carriage. All the travellers sat up
excitedly, expecting an accident. It was simply an item in the _Forum_,
which Tartarin now read to his Alpinists:--

"Listen to this: 'Rumour has it that V. P. C. A. Costecalde, though
scarcely recovered from the jaundice which kept him in bed for some
days, is about to start for the ascension of Mont Blanc; to climb higher
than Tartarin!..' Oh! the villain... He wants to ruin the effect of my
Jung-frau... Well, well! wait a bit; I 'll blow you out of water, you
and your mountain... Chamounix is only a few hours from Geneva; I'll do
Mont Blanc before him! Will you come, my children?"

Bravida protested. _Outre!_ he had had enough of adventures.

"Enough and more than enough..." howled Excourbanies, in his almost
extinct voice.

"And you, Pascalon?" asked Tartarin, gently.

The pupil dared not raise his eyes:--

"Ma-a-aster..." He, too, abandoned him!

"Very good," said the hero, solemnly and angrily. "I will go alone; all
the honour will be mine... _Zou!_ give me back the banner..."

XII.

Hotel Baltet at Chamonix. "I smell garlic!" The use of rope
in Alpine climbing. "Shake hands." A pupil of Schopenhauer.
At the hut on the Grands-Mulets. "Tartarin, I must speak to
you."

Nine o'clock was ringing from the belfry at Chamonix of a cold night
shivering with the north wind and rain; the black streets, the darkened
houses (except, here and there, the facades and courtyards of hotels
where the gas was still burning) made the surroundings still more gloomy
under the vague reflection of the snow of the mountains, white as a
planet on the night of the sky.

At the Hotel Baltet, one of the best and most frequented inns of this
Alpine village, the numerous travellers and boarders h