The Life of the Fly 



In the second degree of ancestry, my facts be- 

 come suddenly obscured. I will linger over 

 them a moment for two reasons : first, to en- 

 quire into the influence of heredity; and, sec- 

 ondly, to leave my children yet one more page 

 concerning them. 



I did not know my maternal grandfather. 

 This venerable ancestor was, I have been 

 told, a process-server in one of the poorest 

 parishes of the Rouergue.^ He used to en- 

 gross on stamped paper in a primitive spell- 

 ing. With his well-filled pen-case and ink- 

 horn, he went drawing out deeds up hill and 

 down dale, from one insolvent wretch to 

 another more insolvent still. Amid his at- 

 mosphere of pettifoggery, this rudimentary 

 scholar, waging battle on life's acerbities, cert- 

 ainly paid no attention to the insect; at most, 

 if he met it, he would crush it under foot. 

 The unknown animal, suspected of evil-doing, 

 deserved no further enquiry. Grandmother, on 

 her side, apart from her housekeeping and her 

 beads, knew still less about anything. She 

 looked on the alphabet as a set of hierogly- 

 phics only fit to spoil your sight for nothing, 



'A district of the province of Guienne, having Rodez 

 for its capital. The author's maternal grandfather, Sal- 

 gues by name, was the huissier, or, as we should say, 

 sheriff's officer, of Saint Leons. — Translator's Note. 

 Ii8 



