I must use violence," continued he,--"very certainly I must, but without compromising my loyalty.

With forty men I will traverse the country as a partisan.

But if I fall in with, not forty thousand English, as Planchet said, but purely and simply with four hundred, I shall be beaten.

Supposing that among my forty warriors there should be found at least ten stupid ones--ten who will allow themselves to be killed one after the other, from mere folly?
No; it is, in fact, impossible to find forty men to be depended upon--they do not exist.

I must learn how to be contented with thirty.
With ten men less I should have the right of avoiding any armed encounter, on account of the small number of my people; and if the encounter should take place, my chance is better with thirty men than forty.