diff --git a/Python/getargs.c b/Python/getargs.c
index 3ab59b3..a89ee6f 100644
--- a/Python/getargs.c
+++ b/Python/getargs.c
@@ -776,24 +776,18 @@
 		char *p = va_arg(*p_va, char *);
 		if (PyBytes_Check(arg) && PyBytes_Size(arg) == 1)
 			*p = PyBytes_AS_STRING(arg)[0];
-		else if (PyUnicode_Check(arg) &&
-			 PyUnicode_GET_SIZE(arg) == 1 &&
-			 PyUnicode_AS_UNICODE(arg)[0] < 256)
-			*p = (char)PyUnicode_AS_UNICODE(arg)[0];
 		else
-			return converterr("char < 256", arg, msgbuf, bufsize);
+			return converterr("a byte string of length 1", arg, msgbuf, bufsize);
 		break;
 	}
 
 	case 'C': {/* unicode char */
 		int *p = va_arg(*p_va, int *);
-		if (PyBytes_Check(arg) && PyBytes_Size(arg) == 1)
-			*p = PyBytes_AS_STRING(arg)[0];
-		else if (PyUnicode_Check(arg) &&
-			 PyUnicode_GET_SIZE(arg) == 1)
+		if (PyUnicode_Check(arg) &&
+                    PyUnicode_GET_SIZE(arg) == 1)
 			*p = PyUnicode_AS_UNICODE(arg)[0];
 		else
-			return converterr("char", arg, msgbuf, bufsize);
+			return converterr("a unicode character", arg, msgbuf, bufsize);
 		break;
 	}