lied, the good lady! In
his exasperation, Monsieur Bovary the elder, smashing a chair on the
flags, accused his wife of having caused the misfortune of their son by
harnessing him to such a harridan, whose harness wasn't worth her hide.
They came to Tostes. Explanations followed. There were scenes. Heloise
in tears, throwing her arms about her husband, conjured him to defend
her from his parents. Charles tried to speak up for her. They grew angry
and left the house.

But the blow had struck home. A week after, as she was hanging up some
washing in her yard, she was seized with a spitting of blood, and the
next day, while Charles had his back turned to her drawing the
window-curtain, she said, "O God!" gave a sigh and fainted. She was
dead! What a surprise!

When all was over at the cemetery, Charles went home. He found no one
downstairs; he went up to the first floor to their room; saw her dress
still hanging at the foot of the alcove; then, leaning against the
writing-table, he stayed until the evening, buried in a sorrowful
reverie. She had loved him, after all!

III.

A LONELY WIDOWER.

One morning old Rouault brought Charles the money for setting his
leg--seventy-five francs in forty-sou pieces, and a turkey. He had heard
of his loss, and consoled him as well as he could.

"I know what it is," said he, clapping him on the shoulder; "I've been
through it. When I lost my dear departed, I went into the fields to be
quite alone. I fell at the foot of a tree; I cried; I called on God; I
talked nonsense to him. I wanted to be like the moles that I saw on the
branches, their insides swarming with worms, dead, and an end of it. And
when I thought that there were others at that very moment with their
nice little wives holding them in their embrace, I struck great blows on
the earth with my stick. I was pretty well mad with not eating; the very
idea of going to a cafe disgusted me--you wouldn't believe it. Well,
quite softly, one day following another, a spring on a winter, and an
autumn after a summer, this wore away, piece by piece, crumb by crumb;
it passed away, it is gone, I should say it has sunk; for something
always remains at the bottom, as one would say--a weight here, at one's
heart. But since it is the lot of all of us, one must not give way
altogether, and, because others have died, want to die too. You must
pull yourself together, Monsieur Bovary. It will pass away. Come to see
us; my daughter t