Sadly, however, there is a shortage of game...

in fact there is a total absence of game....

Animals may be dumb but they are not stupid, so for miles around Tarascon the burrows are empty and the nests abandoned.

There is not a quail, not a blackbird, not the smallest rabbit nor even the tiniest wheatear.
These pretty little Tarascon hills, scented with lavender, myrtle and rosemary are very tempting, and those fine muscat grapes, swollen with sugar, which line the banks of the Rhone, are wonderfully appetising...

yes, but there is Tarascon in he distance, and in the world of fur and feather Tarascon is bad news.