or having been taken
into his service. For twenty-eight years Nanon had worked early and late
for the Grandets, and on a yearly wage of seventy livres had accumulated
more money than any other servant in Saumur. She was one of the family,
spending her evenings in the sitting-room of her employers, where a
single candle was all that was allowed for illumination. M. Grandet also
decided that no fire must be lit in the sitting-room from April 1 to
October 31, and every morning he went into the kitchen and doled out the
bread, sugar, and other provisions for the day to Nanon, and candles to
his daughter.

As for Mme. Grandet, her gentleness and meekness could not stand up
against her husband's force of character. She had brought more than
300,000 francs to her husband, and yet had no money save an occasional
six francs for pocket-money, and the only certain source of income was
four or five louis which Grandet made the Belgian merchants, who bought
his wine, pay over and above the stipulated price. Often enough he would
borrow some of this money even. Mme. Grandet was too gentle to revolt,
but her pride forbade her ever asking a sou from her husband. With her
daughter she attended to the household linen, and found compensation for
the unhappiness of her lot in the consolations of religion, and also in
the company of Eugenie. It never occurred to M. Grandet that his wife
suffered, or had reason to suffer. He was making money; every year his
riches increased. He paid for sittings in church, and gave his daughter
five francs a month for a dress allowance. That his wife hardly ever
left the house except occasionally to go to church, that her dress was
invariably the same, and that she never asked him for anything, never
troubled M. Grandet. Avarice was his consuming passion, and it was
satisfactory to him that no one attempted to cross him.

Twice a year, on her birthday, and on the day of her patron saint,
Eugenie received some rare gold coin from her father, and then he would
take pleasure in looking at her store--for these coins were not to be
spent. Old M. Grandet liked to think that his daughter was learning to
appreciate gold, and that in giving her these precious coins he was not
parting with his money, but only putting it in another box.

_II.--Eugenie's Springtime of Love_

On Eugenie's twenty-third birthday, November, 1819, the three
Cruchots--the notary, the abbe, and the magistrate--and the three Des
Grassin