and if my friend the Judge had not hindered me, I should have
reconciled the two adversaries right at the table. For I should have liked
to tell a curious incident, similar to what occurred at our hunt
yesterday, which happened to the foremost sportsmen of my time, the deputy
Rejtan and the Prince de Nassau. The occurrence was as follows:--

"Prince Czartoryski,151 the general of Podole, was travelling from
Volhynia to his Polish estates, or, if I remember correctly, to the Diet
at Warsaw. On his way he visited the gentry, partly for amusement, and
partly to win popularity; so he called upon Pan Thaddeus Rejtan,152 to-day
of holy memory, who was later our deputy from Nowogrodek, and in whose
house I grew up from childhood. So Rejtan, on the occasion of the Prince's
coming, had invited guests, and the gentry had gathered in large numbers.
There were theatrical entertainments (the Prince was devoted to the
theatre); Kaszyc, who lives in Jatra, gave fireworks; Pan Tyzenhaus153
sent dancers; and Oginski154 and Pan Soltan, who lives in Zdzienciol,
furnished musicians. In a word, at home they offered entertainments
gorgeous beyond expectation, and in the forest they arranged a mighty
hunt. It is well known to you gentlemen that almost all the Czartoryskis
within the memory of man, though they spring from the blood of the
Jagiellos, are nevertheless not over keen on hunting, though certainly not
from laziness, but from their foreign tastes; and the Prince General
looked oftener into books than into kennels, and oftener into ladies'
alcoves than into the forests.

"In the Prince's suite was a German, Prince de Nassau,155 of whom they
related that, when a guest in the Libyan country, he had once gone hunting
with the Moorish kings, and there with a spear had overcome a tiger in
hand to hand combat, of which feat that Prince de Nassau boasted greatly.
In our country, at that time, they were hunting wild boars; Rejtan had
killed with his musket an immense sow, at great risk to himself, for he
shot from close by. Each of us admired and praised the sureness of the
aim; only the German, de Nassau, listened with indifference to such
compliments, and, walking off, muttered in his beard that a sure aim
proved only a bold eye, but that cold steel proved a bold hand; and once
more he began to talk big about his Libya and his spear, his Moorish kings
and his tiger. This began to be annoying to Pan Rejtan, who, being a
quick-tempered man, s