e had learnt to esteem the young couple, who knew how to make money,
and thus he had soon become reconciled with his sister. Perhaps he
thought he was making Francois some compensation by taking him into his
business; having robbed the mother, he would shield himself from remorse
by giving employment to the son; even rogues make honest calculations
sometimes. It was, however, a good thing for him. If the house of Rougon
did not make a fortune at this time, it was certainly through no fault
of that quiet, punctilious youth, Francois, who seemed born to pass his
life behind a grocer's counter, between a jar of oil and a bundle
of dried cod-fish. Although he physically resembled his mother, he
inherited from his father a just if narrow mind, with an instinctive
liking for a methodical life and the safe speculations of a small
business.

Three months after his arrival, Pierre, pursuing his system of
compensation, married him to his young daughter Marthe,[*] whom he did
not know how to dispose of. The two young people fell in love with
each other quite suddenly, in a few days. A peculiar circumstance had
doubtless determined and enhanced their mutual affection. There was a
remarkably close resemblance between them, suggesting that of brother
and sister. Francois inherited, through Ursule, the face of his
grandmother Adelaide. Marthe's case was still more curious; she was an
equally exact portrait of Adelaide, although Pierre Rougon had none of
his mother's features distinctly marked; the physical resemblance
had, as it were, passed over Pierre, to reappear in his daughter. The
similarity between husband and wife went, however, no further than
their faces; if the worthy son of a steady matter-of-fact hatter was
distinguishable in Francois, Marthe showed the nervousness and mental
weakness of her grandmother. Perhaps it was this combination of physical
resemblance and moral dissimilarity which threw the young people into
each other's arms. From 1840 to 1844 they had three children. Francois
remained in his uncle's employ until the latter retired. Pierre had
desired to sell him the business, but the young man knew what small
chance there was of making a fortune in trade at Plassans; so he
declined the offer and repaired to Marseilles, where he established
himself with his little savings.

[*] Both Francois and Marthe figure largely in _The Conquest
of Plassans_.

Macquart soon had to abandon all hope of dragging th