with it, then he chose helpers from the beardless
youth who chanted the responses at mass.
These he entrapped into his service by petty
gifts, by occasional draughts of his sour wine,
and by flattering, familiar jokes. As they
grew older he enlarged his presents, so that
they would include sometimes a pair of sabots,
or a ten-sous piece on a Sunday. He supplied
them also with more food, and warned them
against evil company, meaning, within
himself, the company of other youths likely to
ask "How much does that old hunks pay you
for your services?"

Friendly submission made on my part to
their love of gain when manifested at my own
expense, got me the close acquaintance of this
couple. The old lady, then in her sixty-sixth
year, sometimes set her cap at me, and went
so far as to send me little gifts of cream-
cheese, or fresh eggs, or short cakes, with bits
of apple laid upon them. "Can you not teach
me to read?" she asked one evening. "I
know the letters well, but except where it's a
prayer that I know by heart, I can't put
them together. I'd be glad to pay you for
teaching me to sign my name and understand
my leases. Come now, just for an example,
read me this bit of a page." The bit of a
page was a document just drawn up by her
notary, and the exactness of which I could
see by her fixed eye and pursed up lip that
she was verifying word for word while I was
reading. She must have had some notion
that the notary was capable of cheating her.

The husband seeing that I took a lively
interest in all his agricultural affairs, made
me an offer one day which I closed with
heartily. "I am going," he said, "to the sale
of a proprietor's farm and farming stock,
which takes place by adjudication. I have
purchases to make there, and to look after
the recovery of a debt. Will you go with
me, you shall have a seat in my charette and
only pay your own expenses, eh?"

It was agreed. The best horse from the
plough, beating his heavy iron shoes heavily
upon the soil, took us to the farm in about an
hour and a half, at a dull, pitiless trot. The
farm was not quite six miles distant.

We found the farm-yard crowded with
villagers of every sort, from the proprietor down
to the ploughboy. Farmers and farmers'
sons with long, white, flapped hats covering
their side faces chatted with farmers' wives
and daughters, capped with quilted towers,
trimmed with white satin ribbons, and fixed
with pins whose heads were golden bees. The
notary, in his black gown, drank wine at the
kitchen table while he turned over the leaves
of an inventory with an absent air. The
auctioneer and crier were already mounted
upon a platform of boards supported by two
empty wine barrels. Petty officers displayed
themselves in all directions, and the crowd
made itself heard. The sale commenced with
the disposal of the land, which was divided
into small lots and subjected to very eager
biddings. Then came the cattle. Troops of
oxen, cows and sheep, each headed by a
cowherd, or a shepherdess, defiled before the
assembled agriculturists, then followed the
horses, every one mounted by a carter, or a
carter's boy. The assembly crowding about
each beast, became critical on ages, points, and
vices, and the bidding went on tolerably fast.

As I was strolling on to another part of the
courtyard, I came unexpectedly upon a tall,
robust man, apparently of about forty, whose
swarthy countenance looked pale and grief-
worn. He was the proprietor whose home
was passing from him. Tears were in his
eyes: he was engaged in the struggle to
repress violent emotion. By his side stood a
young girl, whose sunburnt features were as
surely clouded by the present sorrow.
Unwilling to intrude on their distress I turned
back to the crowd about the auctioneer. Pots
and pans and household articles were being sold,
and upon these the women's tongues were at
work mightily. They were discussing, wrangling,
scandalising; each eager to get the
smallest article, though it were but a cracked
saucepan, in the shape of a decided bargain.
They displayed more fierceness and bitter
animosity—besides spending more time—over
the purchase of their skewers and pipkins,
than the men had shown whilst bidding for
cattle and lands of a thousand times their
value.

The sale was at last ended, and the
creditors entered a low room in the house,
where they held solemn conference with the
officials. Out of this room my ancient came,
rubbing his hands and exclaiming to me, "He
is a staunch fellow. We shall get every sous
after all."

"And do you leave the unfortunate man
nothing?"

"What would you have? Every one for
himself. Who knows whose turn it may be
next to go to wreck? He is not the first, and
will not be the last. Besides, it serves him
right. His wife wears a silk gown, and his
daughter has a watch and shoes from Paris."

I was admitted to the dinner wherewith
these proceedings closed. Dishes crowded
the table, wine was abundant, and the sale
having yielded twenty shillings in the pound,
the mirth of all the creditors was loud
and coarse. My landlord was treated, as a
rich man, with great respect, and every
one was silent when he made a speech. He
was sure to say nothing prejudicial to the
interests of Messieurs the small proprietors.
He attacked vigorously, however, Messieurs
the large proprietors, whose game devoured
the lands of little people, and proclaimed himself,
amid general applause, a helping friend
to poachers. Towards nightfall the conversation
became very heavy, and at night my
landlord and I reached home, both of us stupid.
As we entered, the old gentleman's wife
screamed out to him from the recesses of her
room, "Well, is there enough?"