In the evening, at preparation, he pulled out his pens from his desk,

arranged his small belongings, and carefully ruled his paper. We saw him

working conscientiously, looking up every word in the dictionary, and

taking the greatest pains. Thanks, no doubt, to the willingness he

showed, he had not to go down to the class below. But though he knew his

rules passably, he had little finish in composition. It was the cure

of his village who had taught him his first Latin; his parents, from

motives of economy, having sent him to school as late as possible.

His father, Monsieur Charles Denis Bartolome Bovary, retired

assistant-surgeon-major, compromised about 1812 in certain conscription

scandals, and forced at this time to leave the service, had taken

advantage of his fine figure to get hold of a dowry of sixty thousand

francs that offered in the person of a hosier's daughter who had fallen

in love with his good looks. A fine man, a great talker, making his

spurs ring as he walked, wearing whiskers that ran into his moustache,

his fingers always garnished with rings and dressed in loud colours,

he had the dash of a military man with the easy go of a commercial

traveller.

Once married, he lived for three or four years on his wife's fortune,

dining well, rising late, smoking long porcelain pipes, not coming in

at night till after the theatre, and haunting cafes. The father-in-law

died, leaving little; he was indignant at this, "went in for the

business," lost some money in it, then retired to the country, where he

thought he would make money.

But, as he knew no more about farming than calico, as he rode his horses

instead of sending them to plough, drank his cider in bottle instead of

selling it in cask, ate the finest poultry in his farmyard, and greased

his hunting-boots with the fat of his pigs, he was not long in finding

out that he would do better to give up all speculation.

For two hundred francs a year he managed to live on the border of

the provinces of Caux and Picardy, in a kind of place half farm, half

private house; and here, soured, eaten up with regrets, cursing his

luck, jealous of everyone, he shut himself up at the age of forty-five,

sick of men, he said, and determined to live at peace.

His wife had adored him once on a time; she had bored him with a

thousand servilities that had only estranged him the more. Lively once,

expansive and affectionate, in growing older she had become (after the

fashion of wine that, exposed to air, turns to vinegar) ill-tempered,

grumbling, irritable. She had suffered so much without complaint at

first, until she had seem him going after all the village drabs, and

until a score of bad houses sent him back to her at night, weary,

stinking drunk. Then her pride revolted. After that she was silent,

burying her anger in a dumb stoicism that she maintained till her death.

She was constantly going about looking after business matters. She

called on the lawyers, the president, remembered when bills fell due,

got them renewed, and at home ironed, sewed, washed, looked after the

workmen, paid the accounts, while he, troubling himself about nothing,

eternally besotted in sleepy sulkiness, whence he only roused himself

to say disagreeable things to her, sat smoking by the fire and spitting

into the cinders.




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