.
The Russians had a great taste for her, owing to her embonpoint. Then
Daguenet added a rapid word or two about the rest. There was Clarisse
Besnus, whom a lady had brought up from Saint-Aubin-sur-Mer in the
capacity of maid while the lady's husband had started her in quite
another line. There was Simonne Cabiroche, the daughter of a furniture
dealer in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, who had been educated in a large
boarding school with a view to becoming a governess. Finally there were
Maria Blond and Louise Violaine and Lea de Horn, who had all shot up to
woman's estate on the pavements of Paris, not to mention Tatan Nene, who
had herded cows in Champagne till she was twenty.

Georges listened and looked at these ladies, feeling dizzy and excited
by the coarse recital thus crudely whispered in his ear, while behind
his chair the waiters kept repeating in respectful tones:

"Pullets a la marechale; fillets of sole with ravigote sauce."

"My dear fellow," said Daguenet, giving him the benefit of his
experience, "don't take any fish; it'll do you no good at this time of
night. And be content with Leoville: it's less treacherous."

A heavy warmth floated upward from the candelabras, from the dishes
which were being handed round, from the whole table where thirty-eight
human beings were suffocating. And the waiters forgot themselves and
ran when crossing the carpet, so that it was spotted with grease.
Nevertheless, the supper grew scarce any merrier. The ladies trifled
with their meat, left half of it uneaten. Tatan Nene alone partook
gluttonously of every dish. At that advanced hour of the night hunger
was of the nervous order only, a mere whimsical craving born of an
exasperated stomach.

At Nana's side the old gentleman refused every dish offered him; he
had only taken a spoonful of soup, and he now sat in front of his
empty plate, gazing silently about. There was some subdued yawning, and
occasionally eyelids closed and faces became haggard and white. It was
unutterably slow, as it always was, according to Vandeuvres's dictum.
This sort of supper should be served anyhow if it was to be funny, he
opined. Otherwise when elegantly and conventionally done you might as
well feed in good society, where you were not more bored than here. Had
it not been for Bordenave, who was still bawling away, everybody would
have fallen asleep. That rum old buffer Bordenave, with his leg duly
stretched on its chair, was letting his neig