I could not help finding the idea a very good one.

We were getting ready to leave the tavern, when we noticed some
people coming downstairs from the upper room, carrying carbines under
their dark cloaks. to me they had the look of thorough bandits; and
after they were gone I told Monsieur Trepof my opinion of them. He
answered me, very quietly, that he also thought they were regular
bandits; and the guides begged us to apply for an escort of gendarmes,
but Madame Trepof besought us not to do anything of the kind. She
declared that we must not "spoil her journey."

Then, turning her persuasive eyes upon me, she asked,

"Do you not believe, Monsieur Bonnard, that there is nothing in life
worth having except sensations?"

"Why, certainly, Madame," I answered; "but then we must take into
consideration the nature of the sensations themselves. Those which
a noble memory or a grand spectacle creates within us certainly
represent what is best in human life; but those merely resulting
from the menace of danger seem to me sensations which one should be
very careful to avoid as much as possible. For example, would you
think it a very pleasant thing, Madame, while travelling over the
mountains at midnight, to find the muzzle of a carbine suddenly
pressed against your forehead?"

"Oh, no!" she replied; "the comic-operas have made carbines absolutely
ridiculous, and it would be a great misfortune to any young woman
to find herself in danger from an absurd weapon. But it would be
quite different with a knife--a very cold and very bright knife blade,