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Selected Writings-Part7_Guy De Maupassant(1850-1893)_Translated Works(翻译文学)-第2页

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"Tyrant! Tyrant! Here do you fall! Fall in the dust and in the

mire. An expiring country groans under your feet. Destiny has



called you the Avenger. Defeat and shame cling to you. You fall

conquered, a prisoner to the Prussians, and upon the ruins of the



crumbling Empire the young and radiant Republic arises, picking

up your broken sword."



He awaited applause. But there was no voice, no sound. The

bewildered peasants remained silent. And the bust, with its



pointed mustaches extending beyond the cheeks on each side, the

bust, so motionless and well groomed as to be fit for a



hairdressers sign, seemed to be looking at M. Massarel with a

plaster smile, a smile ineffaceable and mocking.



They remained thus face to face, Napoleon on the chair, the

doctor in front of him about three steps away. Suddenly the



Commander grew angry. What was to be done? What was there that

would move this people, and bring about a definitevictory in



opinion? His hand happened to rest on his hip and to come in

contact there with the butt end of his revolver, under his red



sash. No inspiration, no further word would come. But he drew his

pistol, advanced two steps, and, taking aim, fired at the late



monarch. The ball entered the forehead, leaving a little, black

hole, like a spot, nothing more. There was no effect. Then he



fired a second shot, which made a second hole, then, a third; and

then, without stopping, he emptied his revolver. The brow of



Napoleon disappeared in white powder, but the eyes, the nose, and

the fine points of the mustaches remained intact. Then,



exasperated, the doctor overturned the chair with a blow of his

fist and, resting a foot on the remainder of the bust in a



position of triumph, he shouted: "So let all tyrants perish!"

Still no enthusiasm was manifest, and as the spectators seemed to



be in a kind of stupor from astonishment, the Commander called to

the militiamen: "You may now go to your homes." And he went



toward his own house with great strides, as if he were pursued.

His maid, when he appeared, told him that some patients had been



waiting in his office for three hours. He hastened in. There were

the two varicose-vein patients, who had returned at daybreak,



obstinate but patient.

The old man immediately began his explanation: "This began by a



feeling like ants running up and down the legs."

THE ARTIST



"Bah! Monsieur," the old mountebank said to me; "it is a matter

of exercise and habit, that is all! Of course, one requires to be



a little gifted that way and not to be butter-fingered, but what

is chiefly necessary is patience and daily practice for long,



long years."

His modesty surprised me all the more, because of all performers



who are generally infatuated with their own skill, he was the

most wonderfully clever one I had met. Certainly I had frequently



seen him, for everybody had seen him in some circus or other, or

even in traveling shows, performing the trick that consists of



putting a man or woman with extended arms against a wooden

target, and in throwing knives between their fingers and round



their heads, from a distance. There is nothing very extraordinary

in it, after all, when one knows THE TRICKS OF THE TRADE, and



that the knives are not the least sharp, and stick into the wood

at some distance from the flesh. It is the rapidity of the



throws, the glitter of the blades, and the curve which the

handles make toward their living object, which give an air of



danger to an exhibition that has become commonplace, and only

requires very middling skill.



But here there was no trick and no deception, and no dust thrown

into the eyes. It was done in good earnest and in all sincerity.



The knives were as sharp as razors, and the old mountebank

planted them close to the flesh, exactly in the angle between the






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