42 
PASSIONAL ZOOLOGY. 
an insurmountable bar to the preservation and multiplication of the 
game. The duplicity of o.ction, though only the inverse pivot of 
the same plagues, does not lend them a less powerful aid. Du- 
plicity of action is the crime committed by the prefects, who con- 
trive to issue decrees contrary to the spirit of the laws made to 
protect the game. 
The prefect of the Oise, who classes the stag and the roebuck 
among pernicious creatures, which it is lawful to destroy at all 
seasons, while he forgets to place the magpie in this list ; the pre- 
fect of the North, who permits the chase in the field in time of 
snow ; the prefects who do not make decrees concerning the mode 
of hunting with snares ; and those who regulate the opening of the 
season ; and those who revive the edicts of the church by inter- 
dicting game during the carnival, are all culpable administrators, 
sinning by duplicity of action, and vieing with each other who 
shall make most enemies to their government. 
Prefects and crovernments are wrono*. not to choose to understand 
O 
what I repeat to them in every page — that successful revolutions 
are affairs of the fowling-piece ; proof, William Tell with his cross- 
how, and the event of July. Were I government, I would take 
care not to trifle with fire-arms. 
I have told what God had done for France in game, and what 
man had done with the munificence of God in regard to France. 
The same generosity on the part of Nature, the same folly of the 
civilizee, with respect to the vine. Barbaric France has shown 
itself more grateful than civilized France for the favors of the Sun. 
In its Salic law there is an article affixing the severest penalty to 
the destruction of a vine plant. The vine is a holy plant, and a 
favorite of the Lord, since Christ has chosen the generous blood 
of the vine to replace his own in the cup of communion. Moses 
caused only clear water to spring from the side of the rock ; the 
vine draws thence a perfumed nectar, which strengthens the laborer 
and consoles him for his troubles ; which makes his labor attractive, 
and twines delectable bowers on all the trees it meets with, offer- 
ing its shade and fruit to the traveler, overpowered by the burden 
and heat of the day. 
The country of the -vine is a blessed country, and no country of 
