Page:Novels of Honoré de Balzac Volume 23.djvu/74

 which was for each like an unexpected, autumn fraternity, the delights were only the better enjoyed. In Ursule, this family of chosen spirits had a child adopted by each according to his tastes; the curé thought about the soul, the justice of the peace constituted himself the guardian, the soldier promised himself to become the tutor; and, as for Minoret, he was at once father, mother and physician.

After having become acclimatized, the old man resumed his habits and regulated his life as it is regulated in the depths of all the provinces. On account of Ursule, he never received anyone in the morning, and he never invited anyone to dine; his friends could arrive about six in the evening and stay until midnight. The first comers used to find the papers on the salon table and would read them whilst waiting for the others, or they would sometimes go to meet the doctor if he were out walking. These quiet habits were not only necessary to old age, but with the old gentleman were wisely and deeply calculated to prevent his happiness from being disturbed by the anxious curiosity of his heirs or by the tittle-tattle of the small towns. He would make no concessions to that fickle goddess, public opinion, whose tyranny, one of France’s misfortunes, was setting itself up and making a very province of our country. And so, from the time the child was weaned and could walk, he sent away the cook that his niece, Madame Minoret-Levrault, had given him, through discovering that she told the postmistress of all that went on in his house.