assion, the jade, and she is more enthusiastic
than I am, the scold, seeing that all the mischief in this business is
her fault, as you will see immediately.

"I am strong and mild-tempered, without a pennyworth of malice in me.
But she! oh! la! la! she looks like nothing, she is short and thin; very
well, she does more mischief than a weasel. I do not deny that she has
some good qualities; she has some, and very important ones for a man in
business. But her character! Just ask about it in the neighborhood, and
even the porter's wife, who has just sent me about my business ... she
will tell you something about it.

"Every day she used to find fault with my mild temper: 'I would not put
up with this! I would not put up with that.' If I had listened to her,
Monsieur le President, I should have had at least three bouts of
fisticuffs a month...."

Madame Renard interrupted him: "And for good reasons too; they laugh
best who laugh last."

He turned towards her frankly: "Oh! very well, I can charge you, since
you were the cause of it."

Then, facing the President again he said:

"I will continue. We used to go to Passy every Saturday evening, so as
to be able to begin fishing at daybreak the next morning. It is a habit
which has become a second nature with us, as the saying is. Three years
ago this summer I discovered a place, oh! such a spot! Oh! there! in the
shade, eight feet of water at least and perhaps ten, a hole with
_retour_ under the bank, a regular nest for fish and a paradise for the
fisherman. I might look upon that hole as my property, Monsieur le
President, as I was its Christopher Columbus. Everybody in the
neighborhood knew it, without making any opposition. They used to say:
'That is Renard's place;' and nobody would have gone to it, not even
Monsieur Plumsay, who is well known, be it said without any offense, for
boning other peoples' places.

"Well, I returned to my place of which I felt certain, just as if I had
owned it. I had scarcely got there on Saturday, when I got into
_Delila_, with my wife. _Delila_ is my Norwegian boat, which I had built
by Fourmaise, and which is light and safe. Well, as I said, we got into
the boat and we were going to bait, and for baiting, there is nobody to
be compared with me, and they all know it. You want to know with what I
bait? I cannot answer that question; it has nothing to do with the
accident; I cannot answer, that is my secret. There are more than three
h