Bouvard

“ Bouvard was clasping the hand of Madame Bordin. She very quickly loosed herself. Before them, open-mouthed and, as it were, petrified, was young Victor staring at them; a short distance away Victorine, stretched on her back, in the full light of day, was inhaling all the flowers which she had gathered.
The old horse, frightened by the peacocks, broke one of the lines with a kick, got his legs entangled in it, and, galloping through the farmyard, dragged the washed linen after him. ”

“ Meanwhile, the old, the young, the beggar women in rags, the mothers in high caps, the strong young fellows with tufts of fair down on their faces, were all praying, absorbed in the same deep joy, and saw the body of the Infant Christ shining, like a sun, upon the straw of a stable. This faith on the part of others touched Bouvard in spite of his reason, and Pécuchet in spite of the hardness of his heart. ”

“ Frequently they came to see each other at their respective offices. As soon as one made his appearance, the other shut up his writing-desk, and they went off together into the streets. Bouvard walked with long strides, whilst Pécuchet, taking innumerable steps, with his frock-coat flapping at his heels, seemed to slip along on rollers. In the same way, their peculiar tastes were in harmony. Bouvard smoked his pipe, loved cheese, regularly took his half-glass of brandy. Pécuchet snuffed, at dessert ate only preserves, and soaked a piece of sugar in his coffee. ”

“ But the three hammers attached to his belt began to press against his stomach; the stones with which he had crammed his pockets knocked against his sides; the peak of his cap blinded him; the wind increased in violence. At length he reached the upper ground, and there found Bouvard, who had ascended higher through a less difficult defile. A cart picked them up. ”

“ The museum was spread out like a catafalque. Three wax tapers burned at the side of the table pushed against the wall beneath the portrait of Père Bouvard, above which rose the death's-head. They had even stuffed a candle into the interior of the skull, and rays of light shot out through the two eyeholes.
In the centre, on a chafing-dish, incense was smoking. Bouvard kept in the background, and Pécuchet, turning his back to him, cast handfuls of sulphur into the fireplace.266
Before invoking a corpse the consent of the demons is required. ”

“ To protect himself from the sun Bouvard wore on his head a handkerchief, fastened so as to look like a turban. Pécuchet wore his cap, and he had a big apron with a pocket in front, in which a pair of pruning-shears, his silk handkerchief, and his snuff-box jostled against one another. Bare-armed, side by side, they dug, weeded, and pruned, imposing tasks on each other, and eating their meals as quickly as ever they could, taking care, however, to drink their coffee on the hillock, in order to enjoy the view. ”

“ His entire household gathered round him, all talking together, and he forbade them to knock down the stacks, begged of them to give him some help, called for water, and asked where were the firemen.
"We've got to get them first!" exclaimed the mayor.
"That's your fault!" replied Bouvard.
He flew into a passion, and made use of improper language, and everyone wondered at the patience of M. Foureau, who, all the same, was a surly individual, as might be seen from his big lips and bulldog jaw.
The heat of the stacks became so great that nobody could come close to them any longer. ”

“ Bouvard, always in a perspiration, had no garment on save his shirt and his trousers, drawn up to the pit of his stomach by his short braces; but, giddy as a bird, he would forget the opening in the centre of the cucurbit, or would make the fire too strong.
Pécuchet kept muttering calculations, motionless in his long blouse, a kind of child's smock-frock with sleeves; and they looked upon themselves as very serious people engaged in very useful occupations. ”

“ Bouvard viewed the conflagration with tears in his eyes, which were veiled by his moist lids, and his whole face was swollen with grief. Madame Bordin, while playing with the fringes of her green shawl, called him "Poor Monsieur!" and tried to console him. Since nothing could be done, he ought to do himself justice.
Pécuchet did not weep. Very pale, or rather livid, with open mouth, and hair stuck together with cold sweat, he stood apart, brooding. But the curé who had suddenly arrived on the scene, murmured, in a wheedling tone:
"Ah! really, what a misfortune! It is very annoying. ”

“ Finally, in 1829, Bouvard wrote Minoret asking him to come to Paris to assist in some conclusive tests of magnetism. As a result of these tests, Dr. Minoret, materialist and atheist that he was, became a devout Spiritualist and Catholic. In 1829 Dr. Bouvard lived on rue Ferou. [Ursule Mirouet.] He had been as a father to Dr. Lebrun, physician of the Conciergerie in 1830, who, according to his own avowal, owed to him his position, since he often drew from his master his own ideas regarding nervous energy. [Scenes from a Courtesan's Life.] ”

“ As for his uncle, who formerly had sent him the celebrated portrait as a memento, Bouvard did not even know his residence, and expected nothing more from him. Fifteen hundred francs a year and his salary as copying-clerk enabled him every evening to take a nap at a coffee-house. Thus their meeting had the importance of an adventure. They were at once drawn together by secret fibres. Besides, how can we explain sympathies? Why does a certain peculiarity, a certain imperfection, indifferent or hateful in one person, prove a fascination in another? ”

“ Bouvard considered that we know nothing of a man as long as we are ignorant of his passions; and in order to clear up these two points, they presented themselves at the château of Faverges. The count was not there; this retarded their work. They returned home annoyed.
The door of the house was wide open; there was nobody in the kitchen. 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." ”

“ Bouvard mused: "Hey! progress! what humbug!" He added: "And politics, a nice heap of dirt!"227
"It is not a science," returned Pécuchet. "The military art is better: you can tell what will happen—we ought to turn our hands to it."
"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. ”

“ During the winter evenings they chatted in the museum at the corner of the fire, staring at the coals. The wind, whistling in the corridor, shook the window-panes; the black masses of trees swayed to and fro, and the dreariness of the night intensified the seriousness of their thoughts.
Bouvard from time to time walked towards the further end of the apartment and then came back. The torches and the pans on the walls threw slanting shadows on the ground; and the St. Peter, seen284 in profile, showed on the ceiling the silhouette of his nose, resembling a monstrous hunting-horn. ”

“ Then Pécuchet was free! With what impatience he waited for Bouvard to go out! What a throbbing of the heart he felt as soon as the door closed!
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.235 At first he asked her what kind of men she liked. Was it, for instance, Bouvard's style?
"Oh, no." She preferred thin men. ”

“ Langlois took a fit of coughing.
The captain exclaimed: "You are revolutionaries!"
Girbal: "Peace! peace!"117
The priest: "What materialism!"
Foureau: "Let us rather occupy ourselves with our chasuble!"
"No! let me speak!" And Bouvard, growing more heated, went on to say that man was descended from the ape!
All the vestrymen looked at each other, much amazed, and as if to assure themselves that they were not apes.
Bouvard went on: "By comparing the fœtus of a woman, of a bitch, of a bird, of a frog——"
"Enough!"
"For my part, I go farther!" cried Pécuchet. "Man is descended from the fishes!" ”

“ 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."
So they talked, standing on the hillock, in the light of the stars; and their conversation was interrupted by long intervals of silence.
At last they asked one another whether there were men in the stars. ”

“ However, Bouvard made himself agreeable to the innkeeper; he would attract a crowd around him; and, while he was waiting for the guests, he chatted familiarly with the barmaid.
He gave utterance to odd ideas on primary education. On leaving school, pupils ought to be capable of nursing the sick, understanding scientific discoveries, and taking an interest in the arts. The requirements of his programme made him fall out with Petit; and he offended the captain by maintaining that soldiers, instead of losing their time with drilling, would be better occupied in growing vegetables. ”

“ Then he had attempted many callings—apothecary's apprentice, usher,10 book-keeper in a packet-boat on the Upper Seine. At length, a head of a department in the Admiralty, smitten by his handwriting, had employed him as a copying-clerk; but the consciousness of a defective education, with the intellectual needs engendered by it, irritated his temper, and so he lived altogether alone, without relatives, without a mistress. His only distraction was to go out on Sunday to inspect public works.
The earliest recollections of Bouvard carried him back across the banks of the Loire into a farmyard. ”

“ Bouvard conceived the idea of converting the museum into the bridal chamber, unless Pécuchet objected, in which case he might take up his residence at his wife's house.
One afternoon in the following week—it was in her garden; the buds were just opening, and between the clouds there were great blue spaces—she stopped to gather some violets, and said as she offered them to him:
"Salute Madame Bouvard!"
"What! Is it true?"238
"Perfectly true."
He was about to clasp her in his arms. She kept him back. "What a man!" ”

“ Every morning carriages convey the workers into the country, and bring them back in the evening. Standards are carried, festivities are held, cakes are eaten. Every woman, if she desires it, can have three men—the husband, the lover, and the procreator. For celibates, the Bayadère system is established——'"
"That fits me!" said Bouvard. And he lost himself in dreams of the harmonious world.
"'By the restoration of climatures, the earth will become more beautiful; by the crossing of races, human life will become longer. ”

“ Sometimes Bouvard walked in the rear, making a halt half-way up the hill to dry the sweat off his forehead.
As they had confidence in nobody, they treated the animals themselves, giving them purgatives and clysters.
Serious irregularities occurred in the household. The girl in the poultry-yard became enceinte. Then they took married servants; but the place soon swarmed with children, cousins, male and female, uncles, and sisters-in-law. A horde of people lived at their expense; and they resolved to sleep in the farm-house successively. ”

“ Bouvard, who felt humiliated, had not a word to say.
She or some one else—what did it matter? The principal thing was to get out of their difficulties.
When they received the money (they were to get the sum for the Ecalles later) they immediately paid all their bills; and they were returning to their abode when, at the corner of the market-place, they were stopped by Farmer Gouy.
He had been on his way to their house to apprise them of a misfortune. The wind, the night before, had blown down twenty apple trees into the farmyard, overturned the boilery, and carried away the roof of the barn. ”

“ And Bouvard renewed his complaints about Madame Bordin.
Often had he surprised her before the Ecalles, in Marescot's company, having a gossip with Germaine. So many manœuvres for a little bit of land!
"She is avaricious! That's the explanation."241
So they ruminated over their disappointments by the fireside in the breakfast parlour, Pécuchet swallowing his medicines and Bouvard puffing at his pipe; and they began a discussion about women.
"Strange want!—or is it a want?" "They drive men to crime—to heroism as well as to brutishness." ”

“ From a corner of the stable comes the lowing of a cow. They yawned in each other's faces, consulted the almanac, looked at the clock, waited for meal-time; and the horizon was ever the same—fields in front, the church to the right, a screen of poplars to the left, their tops swaying incessantly in the hazy atmosphere with a melancholy air.
Habits which they formerly tolerated now gave them annoyance. Pécuchet became quite a bore from his mania for putting his handkerchief on the tablecloth. Bouvard never gave up his pipe, and would keep twisting himself about while he was talking. ”

“ According to Bouvard, however, these elements spoiled the story, and he asked for love-tales at the circulating library.
They read aloud, one after the other, La Nouvelle Héloïse, Delphine, Adolphe, and Ourika. But the listener's yawns proved contagious, for the book slipped out of the reader's hand to the floor.
They found fault with the last-mentioned works for making no reference to the environment, the period, the costume of the various personages. The heart alone is the theme—nothing but sentiment! as if there were nothing else in the world. ”