Peyrou’s first act was to scan the horizon with an anxious look, then to examine it with the aid of his telescope. Happily, he saw nothing suspicious, and his countenance took on rather a cheerful than a severe expression, when, roughly shaking the captain of _The Holy Terror to the Moors_, he called to him, in a loud voice: “Wake up, wake up! the pirates!” Luquin made a bound and stood on his feet, rubbing his eyes. “Ah, well, my boy,” said the watchman, “so your great activity has fallen asleep. To hear you talk, one would think a doree or a mullet could not have made a leap in the sea without you knowing it. Ah, young man, young man, the old Provençal proverb, _Proun paillou, prou gran_,--Much straw, little grain.” Luquin looked at the watchman with a bewildered expression, and was hardly able to collect his faculties; finally, reeling like a drunken man, he said, stretching his arms: “It is true, Master Peyrou, I slept like a cabin-boy on the watch, but I did keep my eyes open with all my strength.” “That is the reason, my boy, sleep got into them so easily. But I am here now, and you can go down into the city. There will be more than one bottle of wine emptied without your help at the tavern of the Golden Anchor.”, Luquin had not entirely come to himself, and he stood staring at the watchman with a stupid air. Peyrou, no doubt, trying to wake the captain entirely from his condition of torpor, added: “Come, come now, Stephanette, your betrothed, will be engaged to dance with Terzarol, the pilot, or with the patron Bernard, and you will not have her hand once the whole day long.” These words produced a magic effect on the captain; he straightened himself on his long legs, shook himself, tried to keep his equilibrium, and, finally stamping on the ground several times, said to the watchman: “Listen, Master Peyrou, if I were not sure of having swallowed only one glass of sauve-chrétien with that devil of a Bohemian, to make peace with him, because Stephanette wanted me to do it,--a base weakness for which I cannot forgive myself,--I should certainly think I was drunk,” said the captain. “That is strange, you drank only one glass of sauve-chrétien with the Bohemian, and you are overcome by it?” “Only one glass, and that only half full, because what you drink with a miscreant like him tastes very bitter.” “Is this Bohemian always at Maison-Forte, pray?” asked Peyrou, with a thoughtful and serious air.