The arrival of these two persons in the stagnant town was
like the falling of a beam into a community of frogs.
After stowing his mother's things and his own into the two attic
chambers, which he examined as he did so, Joseph took note of the
silent house, where the walls, the stair-case, the wood-work, were
devoid of decoration and humid with frost, and where there was
literally nothing beyond the merest necessaries. He felt the brusque
transition from his poetic Paris to the dumb and arid province; and
when, coming downstairs, he chanced to see Monsieur Hochon cutting
slices of bread for each person, he understood, for the first time in
his life, Moliere's Harpagon.
"We should have done better to go to an inn," he said to himself.
The aspect of the dinner confirmed his apprehensions. After a soup
whose watery clearness showed that quantity was more considered than
quality, the bouilli was served, ceremoniously garnished with parsley;
the vegetables, in a dish by themselves, being counted into the items
of the repast. The bouilli held the place of honor in the middle of
the table, accompanied with three other dishes: hard-boiled eggs on
sorrel opposite to the vegetables; then a salad dressed with nut-oil
to face little cups of custard, whose flavoring of burnt oats did
service as vanilla, which it resembles much as coffee made of chiccory
resembles mocha. Butter and radishes, in two plates, were at each end
of the table; pickled gherkins and horse-radish completed the spread,
which won Madam Hochon's approbation.
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