ot know whether to
rejoice at the deaths or regret the burials.

"You live on the dead, Lestiboudois!" the cure at last said to him one
day. This grim remark made him reflect; it checked him for some time;
but to this day he carries on the cultivation of his little tubers, and
even maintains stoutly that they grow naturally.

Since the events about to be narrated, nothing in fact has changed at
Yonville. The tin tricolor flag still swings at the top of the
church-steeple; the two chintz streamers still flutter in the wind from
the linendraper's; the chemist's foetuses, like lumps of white amadou,
rot more and more in their turbid alcohol, and above the big door of the
inn the old golden lion, faded by rain, still shows passers-by its
poodle mane.

On the evening when the Bovarys were to arrive at Yonville, Widow
Lefrancois, the landlady of this inn, was so very busy that she sweated
great drops as she moved her saucepans. To-morrow was market-day. The
meat had to be cut beforehand, the fowls drawn, the soup and coffee
made. Moreover, she had the boarders' meals to see to, and that of the
doctor, his wife, and their servant; the billiard-room was echoing with
bursts of laughter; three millers in the small parlor were calling for
brandy; the wood was blazing, the brazen pan was hissing, and on the
long kitchen table, amid the quarters of raw mutton, rose piles of
plates that rattled with the shaking of the block on which the spinach
was being chopped. From the poultry-yard was heard the screaming of the
fowls which the servant was chasing in order to wring their necks.

A man slightly marked with small-pox, in green leather slippers, and
wearing a velvet cap with a gold tassel, was warming his back at the
chimney. His face expressed nothing but self-satisfaction, and he
appeared to take life as calmly as the goldfinch suspended over his head
in its wicker cage: this was the chemist.

"Artemise!" shouted the landlady, "chop some wood, fill the water
bottles, bring some brandy, look sharp! If only I knew what dessert to
offer the guests you are expecting! Good heavens! Those furniture-movers
are beginning their racket in the billiard-room again; and their van has
been left before the front door! The 'Hirondelle' might run into it when
it draws up. Call Polyte and tell him to put it up. Only to think,
Monsieur Homais, that since morning they have had about fifteen games,
and drunk eight jars of cider! Why, they'll tear