_] Painted jades, things of naught! [_All the fancy_
COCKS _draw aside, revealing the_ WHITE PILE GAME COCK, _who appears,
tall and lean and sinister at the further end of their double row._]
CHANTECLER
At last!
THE BLACKBIRD
It's time to climb up on the chairs!
CHANTECLER
[_To the_ WHITE PILE.] Sir--
THE PHEASANT-HEN
You are never going to challenge that giant?
CHANTECLER
I am! To appear tall it is sufficient to talk on stilts! [_To the_ GAME
COCK, _slowly crossing the stage toward him._] Know that such a remark
is not to be endured, and permit me to tell you--[_Finding a_ CHICK
_between himself and the_ GAME COCK, _he gently puts him aside, saying_]
Run to your mother, tot! [_To the_ WHITE PILE, _looking insolently at
his docked comb_]--that you look like a Fool who has mislaid
his coxcomb!
THE WHITE PILE
[_Astonished._] Fool? Coxcomb? What? What? What?
CHANTECLER
[_Beak to beak with the_ GAME COCK.] What? What? What? [_A pause. They
arch themselves, with bristling neck-hackle._]
THE WHITE PILE
[_Emphatically._] In America, during my grand tour, I killed three
Claybornes in a day. I have killed two Sherwoods, three Smoks, and one
Sumatra. I have killed--let me advise anyone fighting me to take
something beforehand to keep down his pulse!--three Red-game at
Cambridge and ten Braekels at Bruges!
CHANTECLER
[_Very simply._] I, my dear sir, have never killed anything.
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