After all, what matter! Supposing that the news of his presence on the Rigi should reach _down there_, no one would know what he had come to do in Switzerland. And besides, it would be so droll to see, to-morrow morning, the stupor of those “Inglichemans” when they should learn the truth... For that Swiss girl, of course, would not hold her tongue... What surprise, what excitement throughout the hotel!.. “Was it really he?.. he?.. himself?..” These reflections, rapid and vibrant, passed through his head like the notes of a violin in an orchestra. He took the pen, and with careless hand he signed, beneath Schwanthaler, Astier-Réhu, and other notabilities, the name that eclipsed them all, his name; then he went to his room, without so much as glancing round to see the effect, of which he was sure. Behind him the Swiss maid looked at the name: TARTARIN OF TARASCON, beneath which was added: P. C. A. She read it, that Bernese girl, and was not the least dazzled. She did not know what P. C. A. signified, nor had she ever heard of “Dardarin.” Barbarian, _Vaï!_ II. Tarascon, five minutes’ stop! The Club of the Alpines. Explanation of P. C. A. Rabbits of warren and cabbage rabbits. This is my last will and testament. The Sirop de cadavre. First ascension, Tartarin takes out his spectacles. When that name “Tarascon” sounds trumpetlike along the track of the Paris-Lyons-Mediterranean, in the limpid, vibrant blue of a Provençal sky, inquisitive heads are visible at all the doors of the express train, and from carriage to carriage the travellers say to each other: “Ah! here is Tarascon!.. Now, for a look at Tarascon.” What they can see of it is, nevertheless, nothing more than a very ordinary, quiet, clean little town with towers, roofs, and a bridge across the Rhone. But the Tarasconese sun and its marvellous effects of mirage, so fruitful in surprises, inventions, delirious absurdities, this joyous little populace, not much larger than a chick-pea, which reflects and sums up in itself the instincts of the whole French South, lively, restless, gabbling, exaggerated, comical, impressionable--that is what the people on the express-train look out for as they pass, and it is that which has made the popularity of the place.