to arms. Liberty was his passion,
an unreasoning, absolute passion, to which he gave all the feverish
ardour of his blood. Blinded by enthusiasm, he was both too ignorant and
too learned to be tolerant, and would not allow for men's weaknesses; he
required an ideal government of perfect justice and perfect liberty. It
was at this period that Antoine Macquart thought of setting him against
the Rougons. He fancied that this young enthusiast would work terrible
havoc if he were only exasperated to the proper pitch. This calculation
was not altogether devoid of shrewdness.

Such being Antoine's scheme, he tried to induce Silvere to visit him, by
professing inordinate admiration for the young man's ideas. But he
very nearly compromised the whole matter at the outset. He had a way
of regarding the triumph of the Republic as a question of personal
interest, as an era of happy idleness and endless junketing, which
chilled his nephew's purely moral aspirations. However, he perceived
that he was on the wrong track, and plunged into strange bathos, a
string of empty but high-sounding words, which Silvere accepted as a
satisfactory proof of his civism. Before long the uncle and the nephew
saw each other two or three times a week. During their long discussions,
in which the fate of the country was flatly settled, Antoine endeavoured
to persuade the young man that the Rougons' drawing-room was the chief
obstacle to the welfare of France. But he again made a false move by
calling his mother "old jade" in Silvere's presence. He even repeated to
him the early scandals about the poor woman. The young man blushed for
shame, but listened without interruption. He had not asked his uncle
for this information; he felt heart-broken by such confidences, which
wounded his feeling of respectful affection for aunt Dide. From that
time forward he lavished yet more attention upon his grandmother,
greeting her always with pleasant smiles and looks of forgiveness.
However, Macquart felt that he had acted foolishly, and strove to take
advantage of Silvere's affection for Adelaide by charging the Rougons
with her forlornness and poverty. According to him, he had always been
the best of sons, whereas his brother had behaved disgracefully; Pierre
had robbed his mother, and now, when she was penniless, he was ashamed
of her. He never ceased descanting on this subject. Silvere thereupon
became indignant with his uncle Pierre, much to the satisfaction of his