United States or Djibouti ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
He drank some of it with Pécuchet in the evening, and both of them tried to persuade themselves that it was good. Besides, it was necessary not to let it go to waste. Bouvard's colic having got worse, Germaine went for the doctor. He was a grave-looking man, with a round forehead, and he began by frightening his patient.
"Oh, thanks," was Bouvard's answer. "I am disgusted with everything. Better for us to sell our barrack, and go in the name of God's thunder amongst the savages." "Just as you like." Mélie was drawing water out in the yard. The wooden pump had a long lever. In order to make it work, she bent her back, so that her blue stockings could be seen as high as the calf of her legs.
Mélie was working at a round table near the window by the light of a candle; from time to time she broke the threads with her teeth, then she half-closed her eyes while adjusting it in the slit of the needle. At first he asked her what kind of men she liked. Was it, for instance, Bouvard's style? "Oh, no." She preferred thin men. He ventured to ask her if she ever had had any lovers. "Never."
They enthusiastically took up the new question, especially Pécuchet. His need of truth became a burning thirst. Moved by Bouvard's preachings, he gave up spiritualism, but soon resumed it again only to abandon it once more, and, clasping his head with his hands, he would exclaim: "Oh, doubt! doubt! I would much prefer nothingness."
This put Bouvard's ideas out of order and, after a minute's reflection: "Science is constructed according to the data furnished by a corner of space. Perhaps it does not agree with all the rest that we are ignorant of, which is much vaster, and which we cannot discover."
Yet wrinkles gathered on Bouvard's forehead, and his eyes filled with tears. Pécuchet said in a stoical fashion, "One day we shall be like that." The idea of death had taken hold of them. They talked about it on their way back. After all, it has no existence. We pass away into the dew, into the breeze, into the stars.
Pécuchet, from his bed, saw all these things in a row, and sometimes he went as far as Bouvard's room to lengthen the perspective. One spot remained empty, exactly opposite to the coat of arms, that intended for the Renaissance chest. It was not finished; Gorju was still working at it, jointing the panels in the bakehouse, squaring them or undoing them.
The process was of little consequence in Bouvard's estimation. He wanted to get information to acquire a deeper knowledge of human nature. He read Paul de Kock again, and ran through the Old Hermits of the Chaussée d'Antin. "Why lose one's time with such absurdities?" said Pécuchet. "But they might be very interesting as a series of documents." "Go away with your documents!
"'But, though it be infinite, it is not the absolute infinite, for it contains only one kind of perfection, and the Absolute contains all." They frequently stopped to think it out the better. Pécuchet took pinches of snuff, and Bouvard's face glowed with concentrated attention. "Does this amuse you?" "Yes, undoubtedly. Go on forever."
They went upstairs, and who should they see in the middle of Bouvard's room but Madame Bordin, looking about her right and left! "Excuse me," she said, with a forced laugh, "I have for the last hour been searching for your cook, whom I wanted for my preserves." They found her in the wood-house on a chair fast asleep. They shook her. She opened her eyes. "What is it now?
Word Of The Day