" If the mayor of Saumur
had carried his ambition higher still, if fortunate circumstances,
drawing him towards the higher social spheres, had sent him into
congresses where the affairs of nations were discussed, and had he
there employed the genius with which his personal interests had
endowed him, he would undoubtedly have proved nobly useful to his
native land. Yet it is perhaps equally certain that outside of Saumur
the goodman would have cut a very sorry figure. Possibly there are
minds like certain animals which cease to breed when transplanted from
the climates in which they are born.
"M-m-mon-sieur le p-p-president, you said t-t-that b-b-bankruptcy--"
The stutter which for years the old miser had assumed when it suited
him, and which, together with the deafness of which he sometimes
complained in rainy weather, was thought in Saumur to be a natural
defect, became at this crisis so wearisome to the two Cruchots that
while they listened they unconsciously made faces and moved their
lips, as if pronouncing the words over which he was hesitating and
stuttering at will. Here it may be well to give the history of this
impediment of the speech and hearing of Monsieur Grandet. No one in
Anjou heard better, or could pronounce more crisply the French
language (with an Angevin accent) than the wily old cooper. Some years
earlier, in spite of his shrewdness, he had been taken in by an
Israelite, who in the course of the discussion held his hand behind
his ear to catch sounds, and mangled his meaning so thoroughly in
trying to utter his words that Grandet fell a victim to his humanity
and was compelled to prompt the wily Jew with the words and ideas he
seemed to seek, to complete himself the arguments of the said Jew, to
say what that cursed Jew ought to have said for himself; in short, to
be the Jew instead of being Grandet.
Pages:
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131