ide down?
How plainly it is to be seen that in former days there were nothing but convents here! In this neighborhood!
Du Breul and Sauval give a list of them, and so does the Abbe Lebeuf.
They were all round here, they fairly swarmed, booted and barefooted, shaven, bearded, gray, black, white, Franciscans, Minims, Capuchins, Carmelites, Little Augustines, Great Augustines, old Augustines--there was no end of them."
"Don''t let''s talk of monks," interrupted Grantaire, "it makes one want to scratch one''s self."
Then he exclaimed:--
"Bouh!
I''ve just swallowed a bad oyster.
Now hypochondria is taking possession of me again.
The oysters are spoiled, the servants are ugly. I hate the human race.
I just passed through the Rue Richelieu, in front of the big public library.
That pile of oyster-shells which is called a library is disgusting even to think of.
What paper! What ink!
What scrawling!
And all that has been written!
What rascal was it who said that man was a featherless biped?[51] And then, I met a pretty girl of my acquaintance, who is as beautiful as the spring, worthy to be called Floreal, and who is delighted, enraptured, as happy as the angels, because a wretch yesterday, a frightful banker all spotted with small-pox, deigned to take a fancy to her! Alas! woman keeps on the watch for a protector as much as for a lover; cats chase mice as well as birds.