The Harvesters

But you do not have the pleasure of killing, then?

What is that pleasure?

A R I A.

I always go into the plain
With a dozen
Fine and good rifles;
So that my deeds may shine,
Twenty valets beat up
The game of the countryside.
In the air above your head:
To you the King's shot.
Bang, bang, the King's shot,
It runs: stop, stop.
Brilliant, Diana, to me.
A quail; it is dead.
A young hare, bang, down.
A pheasant; bang, fetch.
Bang, bang, at every step.
Fetch, fetch, fetch
For an entire day,
(What pleasure the hunt is!)
I shoot and lay low
A hundred pieces of game.

A quail, it is dead:
Fetch, fetch, fetch
For an entire day, &c.

My dear nephew, I pity you and I love you;
But I feel sorry for your pleasures.
More delicate than you, I enjoy my own self.
The calm of my days is worth more than your desires.