His stock appeared to strangle him, and a diamond breast-pin
was stuck in a shirt of texture one degree removed from sail-cloth.
His blood, as I afterwards learned, was so crossed by Greek, Tsinsar,
and Wallachian varieties, that it would have puzzled the united
genealogists of Europe to tell his breed; and his language was a
mangled subdivision of that dialect which passes for French in the
fashionable centres of the Grecaille.
_Exquisite_. "Quangt etes vous venie, Monsieur?"
_Author_. "Il y a huit jours."
_Exquisite_ (looking at a large ring on his _fore_ finger). "Ce sont
de bons diables dans ce pays-ci; mais tout est un po barbare."
"Assez barbare," said I, as I saw that the exquisite's nails were in
the deepest possible mourning.
_Exquisite_. "Avez vous ete a Boukarest?"
_Author_. "Non--pas encore."
_Exquisite_. "Ah je wous assire que Boukarest est maintenant comme
Paris et Londres;"
_Author_. "Avez-vous vu Paris et Londres?"
_Exquisite_. "Non--mais Boukarest vaut cent fois Galatz et Braila."
During this colloquy, the gipsy music was playing; the first fiddle
was really not bad: and the nonchalant rogue-humour of his countenance
did not belie his alliance to that large family, which has produced
"so many blackguards, but never a single blockhead.
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