The Village Rector

“I was hiding there, madame. The ground is so resonant that when my ear was against it I could hear the horses of the gendarmerie, or even the footsteps of the soldiers, which a...

When the two afflicted women came the young abbe, very impatient to get back to Limoges, left the parsonage to see if the horses were harnessed. A few moments later he returned...

The head-forester of Montegnac was a former cavalry-sergeant in the Royal guard, born at Limoges, whom the Duc de Navarreins had sent to his estate at Montegnac to study its cap...

They were now riding up the ascent to the chateau as Colorat pointed to the plain below. Madame Sauviat, evidently uneasy, Aline and the other servants were waiting at the gate,...

“We want the wise State councillors who, under the Emperor, reflected on the laws, and a legislative body elected by the intelligence of the country as well as by the land-owner...

“She cannot live forty-eight hours longer,” replied Monsieur Roubaud. “During my absence the disease has fully developed; Monsieur Bianchon does not understand how it was possib...

The plantations along the roads, sufficiently moistened by the water allowed to run through the ditches, made rapid growth. So that in 1838, six years after Madame Graslin had b...

“The person to whom I refer is pretty; she is young, and wishes to live at Montegnac. If you will marry her you will help to soften my last hours. I will not dwell upon her virt...

The tiniest boat is not launched upon the sea without the protection of some living emblem or revered name, placed upon it by the mariners. In accordance with this time-honored...

Such a region was naturally out of reach of law. No one now travelled through it. Without circulation, neither commerce, industry, exchange of ideas, nor any of the means to wea...

The grand entrance-gate, to which the road just constructed led, is flanked by two pretty lodges in the style of the sixteenth century. The facade on the courtyard looking east...

“Good-morning, my poor children,” said the lawyer, bowing to Monsieur Bonnet; “how can I be of service to you? Perhaps you would like me to claim your brother’s body and send it...

The repentance and resignation of great criminals on their way to death is one of the triumphs which the Church reserves for itself,--a triumph which seldom misses its effect on...

The married daughters wept; their husbands, patient farmers, were grave and serious. The three brothers, profoundly sad, did not raise their eyes from the ground. In the midst o...

Often she was seen with fixed eyes, mentally absorbed, thinking no doubt of the days of her youthful ignorance spent in that chamber full of harmonies now forever passed away. S...

So, after being the most obscure young girl in all Limoges, considered ugly, dull, and vacant, Madame Graslin, at the beginning of the year 1828, was regarded as one of the lead...

You will tell me, perhaps, that nothing hinders me from employing the leisure that I certainly have in using my intellectual powers and seeking in the stillness of this commonpl...

Veronique was, as a matter of fact, absolutely ignorant of the value of things. She had never wanted for anything; she never saw a piece of gold till the day of her marriage; sh...

Old Clousier’s personal appearance was remarkable for a broad, high forehead and two bushes of white hair which stood out from his head on either side of it. His highly colored...

Gerard seems to me to have a cool head and an ardent heart; that’s the sort of man you want. Paris is just now a hotbed of new doctrines; I should be delighted to have the lad r...

The accused himself showed points of character that were rare amongst the peasantry. He baffled the cleverest police-spies employed against him, without knowing their real chara...

On the return of old Sauviat Graslin paid his first evening visit at half-past nine o’clock. Veronique was expecting him, dressed in her blue silk gown and muslin guimpe, over w...

“He lost his mind when he saw what he thought his happiness destroyed by unforeseen circumstances. The unhappy man, misled by his love, went headlong from a delinquent act to cr...