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Un jeune herboriste frais émoulu de l'Université est envoyé en Grèce par le jardin des Plantes pour un voyage d'études. Logé dans une modeste pension en compagnie des individus les plus divers, il a ouï dire que des bandits sillonnent les routes grecques mais n'imagine pas la palpitante et effrayante aventure où va le mener son amour de la science.
En route pour le Parnès à la recherche de plantes rares, il se propose galamment d'accompagner deux Anglaises à cheval, une lady geignarde et sa fille délicate, dont il ne tarde pas à s'éprendre. À peine ont-ils chevauché quelque temps qu'une troupe de brigands leur barre la route. Leur chef n'est autre que le grand Hadgi-Stavros, surnommé le roi des montagnes . Célèbre pour s'être illustré pendant la guerre d'indépendance, mais aussi pour avoir pillé et brûlé des villages entiers, le vieux palicare tutoie les politiciens et fait trembler l'armée. Pris en otage par ces barbares, nos trois Occidentaux ne sont pas au bout de leurs surprises.
About the author
Edmond Francois Valentin About was a French author, writer, and journalist. He was born on February 14, 1828, and died on January 16, 1885. He was born in Dieuze, which is in the French department of Moselle and the Lorraine area. In 1848, he got into the École Normale by coming in second in the yearly competition to get in. Hippolyte Taine won the competition. Francisque Sarcey, Challemel-Lacour, and Prevost-Paradol were also in college with him at the same time as Taine. About was thought to be the most energetic, bright, and "undisciplined" of all of them. One of his teachers is said to have told him, "You will never be more than a little Voltaire," and About's work did tend toward witty humor and commentary on current events in the style of Voltaire. After he finished college, he went to the French school in Athens. He said that he had never planned to become a professor, which is what the École Normale was for, so he went back to France in 1853 and focused on writing and news.
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