The Life of the Fly 



have caught in the neck, what a wrathful 

 look! 



"The idea of wasting one's time with that 

 nonsense!" he would have thundered. 



For the patriarch was not given to joking. 

 I can still see his serious face, his undipped 

 head of hair, often brought back behind his 

 ears with a flick of the thumb and spreading 

 its ancient Gallic mane over his shoulders. 

 I see his little three-cornered hat, his small- 

 clothes buckled at the knees, his wooden shoes, 

 stuffed with straw, that echoed as he walked. 

 Ah, no ! Once childhood's games were past, 

 it would never have done to rear the Grass- 

 hopper and unearth the Dung-beetle from his 

 natural surroundings. 



Grandmother, pious soul, used to wear the 

 eccentric head-dress- of the Rouergue high- 

 landers: a large disk of black felt, stiff as a 

 plank, adorned in the middle with a crown a 

 finger's-breadth high and hardly wider across 

 than a six-franc piece. A black ribbon fastened 

 under the chin maintained the equilibrium of 

 this elegant, but unsteady circle. Pickles, 

 hemp, chickens, curds and whey, butter; wash- 

 ing the clothes, minding the children, seeing to 

 the meals of the household : say that and you 

 have summed up the strenuous woman's round 



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