Book VII

recomposition; an obscure and rapid work which never pauses. It passes over more ground in ten years than a language in ten centuries. Thus le larton (bread) becomes le lartif; le gail (horse) becomes le gaye; la fertanche (straw) becomes la fertille; le momignard (brat), le momacque; les fiques (duds), frusques; la chique (the church), l’égrugeoir; le colabre (neck), le colas . The devil is at first, gahisto , then le rabouin , then the baker ; the priest is a ratichon , then the boar ( le sanglier ); the dagger is le vingt-deux (twenty-two), then le surin , then le lingre ; the police are railles , then roussins , then rousses , then marchands de lacets (dealers in stay-laces), then coquers , then cognes ; the executioner is le taule , then Charlot, l’atigeur , then le becquillard . In the seventeenth century, to fight was “to give each other snuff;” in the nineteenth it is “to chew each other’s throats.” There have been twenty different phrases between these two extremes. Cartouche’s talk would have been Hebrew to Lacenaire. All the words of this language