86 
PASSIONAL ZOOLOGY. 
curses on thee, traitor to royalty, to France, to the chase, who 
gave to my country the fox-hound, and caused the chase to de- 
generate into a butchery, and royal loves into ignoble debauches ! 
Curses on thee, degrader of the throne, who with thy regicidal 
hand preparedst the scaflPold for thy grandson ! 
The vengeance of heaven was not slow to follow. It is said 
that the English dog had scarcely touched the French soil with 
his pestilential paw, before the terrible disease known as the dog 
sickness, broke out for the first time in France, and destroyed 
two thirds of the species. And the invasion of this plague is 
recorded among the unlucky dates of our history, beside that of 
the shameful treaty of 1763, which, corresponding to that of 1815, 
of the last century, lost to France, India, America,, and her navy ; 
in fine, her honor ! Oh ! these English ideas — these odious lies — 
these abysses of corruption and venality called the fox-hound and 
the representative — the right of law-making, based upon wealth ! 
Oh, when will the sentiment of patriotism and of indignation 
that oppresses me at the sight of these scandals overflow at once 
from all hearts, demanding that these foreign idols be expelled 
from my country, to restore the worship of the true chase and of 
true liberty — to restore to intelligence and probity the precedence 
over money — to tear the protectiv^e power of society from the 
tyranny of capital ? It is full time that this transformation should 
be effected. 
For in this classic land of the chase, called France, hunters now 
wear the red livery, the livery of the English, the same as our 
ministers ! The principal rendezvous for our golden youth, gilded 
by the Ruolz process, is called the jockey-club 1 There they drink 
ale, they smoke, they box, they rob — and princes, too, as well as 
simple officers under the king’s orders. 
There they speak a particular tongue, called language of the 
sport or turf, or in good French, stable slang. Our wonders of 
the fashion have introduced the riding- whip with tobacco and grog 
at their select suppers, whence woman is excluded. The roues of 
the day, the scoundrels (coquins as they call themselves), brokers, 
merchants enriched by bankruptcies, instead of ruining themselves 
with dancing girls as was once the fashion, find it more noble to 
