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Updated: May 8, 2025
Although it was midnight, Pécuchet conceived the idea of taking a turn round the garden. Bouvard made no objection. They took up the candle, and, screening it with an old newspaper, walked along the paths. They found pleasure in mentioning aloud the names of the vegetables. "Look here carrots! Ah! cabbages!" Next, they inspected the espaliers. Pécuchet tried to discover the buds.
Almost immediately after this incident, they uncorked the champagne, whose detonations caused an additional sense of enjoyment. Pécuchet made a sign; the curtains opened, and the garden showed itself. In the twilight it looked dreadful.
He stretched himself on his back and went to sleep, while Pécuchet, with his head down and one knee between his hands, gave himself up to his own reflections. A border of moss stood on the edge of a hollow path overhung by ash trees, whose slender tops quivered; angelica, mint, and lavender exhaled warm, pungent odours.
Three others were put in along with it. The entire four behaved differently. After many reflections, Bouvard realised that he had made a mistake. His property required cultivation on a large scale, the concentrated system, and he risked all the disposable capital that he had left thirty thousand francs. Stimulated by Pécuchet, he began to rave about pasture.
Often it seemed to him that a force and, as it were, a cramp-iron drew it towards the ground; and Marcel very rapidly made a notch in the neighbouring trees, in order to find the place later. Pécuchet, however, slackened his pace. His mouth was open; the pupils of his eyes were contracted. Bouvard questioned him, caught hold of his shoulders, and shook him.
Their ideal was Cornaro, that Venetian gentleman who by the regulation of his diet attained to an extreme old age. Without actually imitating him, they might take the same precautions; and Pécuchet took down from his bookshelves a Manual of Hygiene by Doctor Morin. "How had they managed to live till now?" Their favourite dishes were there prohibited.
Salammbo is indeed a work of erudition; years were spent in getting up its archaeological details. But Madame Bovary is also a work of erudition, and Bouvard and Pecuchet is a work of enormous erudition; a thousand volumes were read for the notes of the first volume and Flaubert is said to have killed himself by the labor of his unfinished investigations.
They gradually revived; but one could not tell what might be the consequences. At a rather tart remark of Pécuchet, the farmer grasped his pitchfork tightly. "Clear out, in God's name, or I'll smash your head!" They scampered off. No matter! the problem was solved: ecstasy is dependent on material causes. What, then, is matter? What is spirit?
Heurtaux desired it as a soldier, the curé through hatred of the Protestants, and Foureau in the interests of commerce. "You are giving expression," said Pécuchet, "to the sentiments of the Middle Ages." "The Middle Ages had their good side," returned Marescot. "For instance, our cathedrals." "However, sir, the abuses " "No matter the Revolution would not have come."
Pécuchet had risen at dawn, and trembling lest he should be discovered, he had cut the two trees according to the measurement given in the written instructions sent him by Dumouchel. For six months the others behind the two above mentioned assumed the forms of pyramids, cubes, cylinders, stags, or armchairs; but there was nothing equal to the peacocks. Bouvard acknowledged it with many eulogies.
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