red Benassis; "the wild goats
must feel envious of that fellow yonder! You will see."

The emergencies of warfare had accustomed the commandant to gauge the
real worth of men; he admired the wonderful quickness of Butifer's
movements, the sure-footed grace with which the hunter swung himself
down the rugged sides of the crag, to the top of which he had so boldly
climbed. The strong, slender form of the mountaineer was gracefully
poised in every attitude which the precipitous nature of the path
compelled him to assume; and so certain did he seem of his power to hold
on at need, that if the pinnacle of rock on which he took his stand had
been a level floor, he could not have set his foot down upon it
more calmly. He carried his fowling-piece as if it had been a light
walking-cane. Butifer was a young man of middle height, thin, muscular,
and in good training; his beauty was of a masculine order, which
impressed Genestas on a closer view.

Evidently he belonged to the class of smugglers who ply their trade
without resorting to violent courses, and who only exert patience and
craft to defraud the government. His face was manly and sunburned. His
eyes, which were bright as an eagle's, were of a clear yellow color, and
his sharply-cut nose with its slight curve at the tip was very much like
an eagle's beak. His cheeks were covered with down, his red lips were
half open, giving a glimpse of a set of teeth of dazzling whiteness. His
beard, moustache, and the reddish whiskers, which he allowed to grow,
and which curled naturally, still further heightened the masculine
and forbidding expression of his face. Everything about him spoke of
strength. He was broad-chested; constant activity had made the
muscles of his hands curiously firm and prominent. There was the
quick intelligence of a savage about his glances; he looked resolute,
fearless, and imperturbable, like a man accustomed to put his life in
peril, and whose physical and mental strength had been so often tried by
dangers of every kind, that he no longer felt any doubts about himself.
He wore a blouse that had suffered a good deal from thorns and briars,
and he had a pair of leather soles bound to his feet by eel-skin thongs,
and a pair of torn and tattered blue linen breeches through which his
legs were visible, red, wiry, hard, and muscular as those of a stag.

"There you see the man who once fired a shot at me," Benassis remarked
to the commandant in a low voice. "If