The Soil (La terre): A Realistic Novel

That morning Jean, with a seed-bag of blue linen tied round his waist, held its mouth open with his left hand, while with his right, at every three steps, he drew forth a handfu...

The house of Maître Baillehache, notary at Cloyes, was situated in the Rue Grouaise, on the left hand going to Châteaudun. A little white, one-storey house it was, at the corner...

The Fouans house was the first in Rognes, on the high-road from Cloyes to Bazoches-le-Doyen, which passes through the village. On Monday, the old man was going out at seven o'cl...

The following Sunday happened to fall just on All Saints' Day, the first of November; and, on the stroke of nine, the Abbé Godard, who was priest of Bazoches-le-Doyen, with subo...

At seven o'clock, after dinner, the Fouans, Buteau, and Jean went to share the cow-house with the two cows which Rose had decided to sell. The animals, fastened up at the farthe...

It was four o'clock; the dawn was barely breaking: the pink dawn of early May. Under the glimmering sky the buildings of La Borderie still slept, half in gloom: three long build...

One evening, some days later, Jean was walking back from Cloyes when, a mile or so before reaching Rognes, he was astonished by the mode of progress of a peasant's cart which wa...

A month passed by. Old Fouan, appointed guardian to Françoise, who was entering on her fifteenth year, induced the two girls--his ward and Lise, who was the elder by ten years--...

For the last two days Jean had been driving the mowing-machine over the few acres of meadow belonging to La Borderie, on the banks of the Aigre. From daybreak till night the reg...

Two years had passed in this active monotonous country life; and, with the fated return of the season, Rognes had lived its eternal round of the same toils, the same slumbers.

Having got rid of La Rousse, who was too fat and no longer calved, Lise and Françoise had resolved to go that Saturday to Cloyes market to buy another cow, Jean offering to driv...

Once more had the hay-making time come round, with a blue scorching sky, cooled by occasional breezes. The marriage had been fixed for Midsummer-Day, which fell that year on a S...

So at last Buteau had got his share, that land he had so ardently coveted, and yet refused during more than two years and a half, in a fury compounded of longing, rancour, and o...

One day that summer old Rose, who had suffered from swooning fits, and whose legs were failing her, sent for her grand-niece, Palmyre, to clean the house. Fouan had gone out to...

For a whole year Fouan lived in this fashion, silent and alone, in the empty house. He was ever to be found there on his legs, roaming hither and thither with trembling hands an...

The bright August sun had been climbing the horizon since five o'clock, and La Beauce displayed its ripe grain under the glowing sky. Since the last summer showers, the green, e...

Lost in thought she stood in the cow-house, gazing at the cow, whose belly was distended beyond measure. Never had any animal swollen to such an extent. She looked round as a ba...

Jean had been engaged for a couple of days in some fields which Hourdequin owned near Rognes, and where he had set up a steam threshing-machine, hired from a Châteaudun engine-b...

After the shearing and the sale of the lambs in May, Soulas, the shepherd, had removed the sheep from La Borderie. Nearly four hundred head there were, which he led away without...

The next morning Fouan took up his abode with the Buteaus. The removal of his belongings did not give him any trouble, as they merely consisted of a couple of bundles of clothes...

Hyacinthe was a very windy individual, and he was constantly going off in explosions, which kept the house in a lively state, for he never allowed one of these reports to pass w...

It was now early in October. The vintage was about to commence; a week of merry joviality, during which such families as had fallen out were in the habit of getting reconciled o...

The months glided along; winter passed away, and then the spring. At Rognes matters went on in the same old way; whole years were necessary for the accomplishment of any really...

The week passed away, and Françoise still persisted in her refusal to return to her sister's house. There was a terrible scene one day on the road. Buteau, who was dragging the...

Prior to the ploughing, La Beauce, stretched beneath the grey, damp, November sky, was hidden from sight by a covering of manure. Carts were lumbering along the country roads, p...

Fouan made his way down the hill. His anger speedily evaporated, and when he reached the bottom and gained the high-road he stopped short, feeling dazed and confused at finding...

The winter ploughing had commenced, and Jean, that cold grey February afternoon, had just arrived with his plough at his big patch of ground on the plain, where he still had a g...

It happened that on the following day, Sunday, the young men of Rognes were to go to Cloyes for the conscription-ballot; and as La Grande and La Frimat, who had hurried up to th...

As a matter of fact, the Abbé Madeline's health had gradually been getting worse during the two years and a-half that he had been stationed at Rognes. A feeling of home-sickness...

Early the next day, as Françoise's body was being placed in the coffin, which was resting upon two chairs in the middle of the bedroom, Jean was overcome with surprise and indig...

Two days afterwards, on the very morning on which old Fouan was to be buried, Jean, tired from having remained in bed for hours without being able to sleep, woke up very late in...