ing, who are accustomed to see
and hear all without being startled, and to fathom the abysses which
self-interest hollows in the depths of the human heart.

Below the hair, which was less white than discolored, and worn flattened
to the head, was a fine, sagacious forehead, the yellow tones of which
harmonized well with the scanty tufts of thin hair. His face, with the
features set close together, bore some likeness to that of a fox,
all the more because his nose was short and pointed. In speaking,
he spluttered at the mouth, which was broad like that of most great
talkers,--a habit which led Goupil to say, ill-naturedly, "An umbrella
would be useful when listening to him," or, "The justice rains
verdicts." His eyes looked keen behind his spectacles, but if he took
the glasses off his dulled glance seemed almost vacant. Though he was
naturally gay, even jovial, he was apt to give himself too important
and pompous an air. He usually kept his hands in the pockets of his
trousers, and only took them out to settle his eye-glasses on his nose,
with a movement that was half comic, and which announced the coming of
a keen observation or some victorious argument. His gestures, his
loquacity, his innocent self-assertion, proclaimed the provincial
lawyer. These slight defects were, however, superficial; he redeemed
them by an exquisite kind-heartedness which a rigid moralist might call
the indulgence natural to superiority. He looked a little like a fox,
and he was thought to be very wily, but never false or dishonest. His
wiliness was perspicacity; and consisted in foreseeing results and
protecting himself and others from the traps set for them. He loved
whist, a game known to the captain and the doctor, and which the abbe
learned to play in a very short time.

This little circle of friends made for itself an oasis in Mironet's
salon. The doctor of Nemours, who was not without education and
knowledge of the world, and who greatly respected Minoret as an honor
to the profession, came there sometimes; but his duties and also his
fatigue (which obliged him to go to bed early and to be up early)
prevented his being as assiduously present as the three other friends.
This intercourse of five superior men, the only ones in Nemours who
had sufficiently wide knowledge to understand each other, explains old
Minoret's aversion to his relatives; if he were compelled to leave them
his money, at least he need not admit them to his society. W