The Descoings, father-in-law and mother-in-law of the doctor, were
commission merchants in the wool-trade, and did a double business by
selling for the producers and buying for the manufacturers of the
golden fleeces of Berry; thus pocketing a commission on both sides. In
this way they grew rich and miserly--the outcome of many such lives.
Descoings the son, younger brother of Madame Rouget, did not like
Issoudun. He went to seek his fortune in Paris, where he set up as a
grocer in the rue Saint-Honore. That step led to his ruin. But nothing
could have hindered it: a grocer is drawn to his business by an
attracting force quite equal to the repelling force which drives
artists away from it. We do not sufficiently study the social
potentialities which make up the various vocations of life. It would
be interesting to know what determines one man to be a stationer
rather than a baker; since, in our day, sons are not compelled to
follow the calling of their fathers, as they were among the Egyptians.
In this instance, love decided the vocation of Descoings. He said to
himself, "I, too, will be a grocer!" and in the same breath he said
(also to himself) some other things regarding his employer,--a
beautiful creature, with whom he had fallen desperately in love.
Without other help than patience and the trifling sum of money his
father and mother sent him, he married the widow of his predecessor,
Monsieur Bixiou.
In 1792 Descoings was thought to be doing an excellent business.
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