Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 14, 2025
Typhoid fever broke out in the neighbourhood. Bouvard declared that he would not have anything to do with it. But the wife of Gouy, their farmer, came groaning to them. Her man was a fortnight sick, and M. Vaucorbeil was neglecting him. Pécuchet devoted himself to the case.
They owed one bill to Beljambe for three hogsheads of wine, another to Langlois for two stone of sugar, a sum of one hundred francs to the tailor, and sixty to the shoemaker. Their expenditures were continuous, of course, and meantime Maître Gouy did not pay up.
The wheels, in grazing the flower borders, had bruised the box trees, broken a rhododendron, knocked down the dahlias; and clods of black muck, like molehills, embossed the green sward. Gouy was vigorously digging it up. One day Madame Bordin had carelessly said to him that she would like to have it turned up. He set about the job, and, in spite of her orders to desist, went on with it.
His principal farm-servant carried on the cultivation according to his directions, with a risky economy, to such an extent that the crops diminished and everything was imperilled; and they were talking about their embarrassments when Maître Gouy entered the laboratory, escorted by his wife, who remained timidly in the background.
The valuation of the chattels occupied fifteen days. Bouvard was dying of fatigue. He let everything go for a sum so contemptible that Gouy at first opened his eyes wide, and exclaiming, "Agreed!" slapped his palm.
"Besides," said the physician, "Gouy does not want food." The patient made a gesture of assent under his cotton nightcap. "No matter, he requires it!" "Not a bit! his pulse is at ninety-eight!" "What matters about his pulse?" And Pécuchet proceeded to give authorities. "Let systems alone!" said the doctor. Pécuchet folded his arms. "So then, you are an empiric?" "By no means; but by observing "
A dresser loaded with flowered crockery occupied the space in the middle of the wall; and the window-panes with their green bottle-glass threw over the tin and copper utensils a sickly lustre. The two Parisians wished to inspect the property, which they had seen only once and that a mere passing glance. Maître Gouy and his wife escorted them, and then began a litany of complaints.
"We're in time to see a barrage," remarked the colonel, pulling out his binoculars. "Our people are trying to secure the heights. I didn't know that Gouy was quite clear of Boche. There was fighting there yesterday." "There are some Boche in a trench near that farm on the left," he added a minute later, after sweeping the hills opposite with his glasses. "Can you see them?"
Dressed in blue blouses, with large-brimmed hats, gaiters up to their knees, and horse-dealers' cudgels in their hands, they prowled around cattle, asked questions of labourers, and did not fail to attend at all the agricultural gatherings. Soon they wearied Maître Gouy with their advice, and especially by their depreciation of his system of fallowing. But the farmer stuck to his routine.
Then his wife, seated near the door, with a big basket on her knees, made similar protestations, screeching in a sharp voice, like a hen that has been hurt. At last the lease was agreed on, the rent being fixed at three thousand francs a year a third less than it had been formerly. Before they had separated, Maître Gouy offered to buy up the stock, and the bargaining was renewed.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking