rivière, i.e. the Toucques

P. 3-e] NOTES 159

6. salle, a provincial use of the word. Cf. Balzac, Eugénie Grandet, p. 19 (Calmann Lévy): "Au rez-de-chaussée de la maison la pièce la plus considérable était une salle. . . . Peu de personnes connaissent l'importance d'une salle dans les petites villes. ... La salle est à la fois l'antichambre, le salon, le cabinet, le boudoir, la salle à manger ; elle est le théâtre de la vie domestique, le foyer "ommun."

Page 4. — 1. muscadin, muscadin; name given to the muskscented royalists who in 1793 affected an excessive refinement of dress in contrast with the slovenliness of the sans-culottes.

Page 5. — 1. sols. Flaubert affects the archaic forms: colz=z cou, fol •=. fou, licol— licou, sol ' = sou, castel r = château, mantel=z manteau.

2. assemblée, fair, held in the provincial towns of Normandy and Poitou, usually to celebrate the holiday of the local patron saint

Pagre 6#— 1. que, what.

2. en, hère used instead of d'elle, probably to avoid the harsh allitération of d'elle des.

3. lui avaient acheté un homme, had hired a substitute for him. Conscription was definitely organized under the Directory, in 1798. Ail unmarried citizens between the âges of 20 and 25 were forced to serve in the army. Napoléon, in 1804, relaxed this System somewhat by drafting only a portion of those citizens who were eligible for military service, and, furthermore, by allowing anybody who was drafted to be exempt from service by hiring a substitute. Toward the end of the Empire, however, at which period the opening scènes of this story are laid, the demand for troops became so great that ail eligible citizens were drawn into service, including often even those who had repeatedly hired substitutes to évade it. Conscription was abolished by Louis XVIII, in the Charter of 181 4, only to be timidly reëstablished, however, four years later. The practice of acheter un homme and the traffic of the socalled marchands d'hommes, who enriched themselves by buying and selling substitutes, were suppressed during the Second Empire by the law of 1855, known as la loi de dotation de Varmée, in accordance with which exemption from service could be obtained only by pay-

l6o NOTES [P. 6-14

ing a certain sum of money directly to the government. Finally, the law of 1872, by establishing compulsory military service for ail citizens, abolished even this method of evading a public duty.

Page 7. — 1. Ce fut, etc., there was a moment of uncontrolled grief; c'est is frequently used by the Naturalistic writers instead of the overworn il y a, when a particularly vivid impression is to be produced.

2. Soit, very well ; according to most authorities the final t is sounded, when the word has this sensé. Rousselot, however, maintains that it is more usual not to pronounce the /.

Page 8. — 1. boston, a modification of whist, said to hâve been invented in Boston during the siège of 1775.

Page 11. — 1. éventrait, i.e. aurait éventré; observe this occasional use of the imperf ect for the conditional perfect in the conclusion of a condition expressed or implied.

2. une manière de, a sort of a kind of ; in this sensé, manière was commonly used by seventeenth century writers, but it has been gradually replaced in gênerai usage by espèce and sorte, Flaubert has a peculiar fondness for this use of the word which has today a somewhat archaic flavor.

Page 12. — 1. En voilà, etc. The en is not to be translated. It merely gives a familiar and vivid tone to the expression. In popular speech the conjunctive pronouns, as also ce or ça, are frequently used anticipating substantives which the speaker either does not hâve definitely in mind when he begins his sentence, or neglects to mention as being obvious to his listener. E.g. : "Laissela donc, cette enfant 1" You justlet her atone, that childl (Zola) "Tu y arriveras assez tôt à ton école." You wiil get there soon enough to your schooL (Daudet) " En voilà des cafards ! " Look at J em, the hypocrites! (Zola) "En voilà un chic!" There' s a sweîl for you! (Zola) "Comment c'est, un mort?" What does U look like,a dead person? (Maupassant)

Page 14. — 1. godefiches, scallops. This word is not found in any French dictionary. Rolland, in his Faune populaire de la France, (Vol. III, p. 216) gives under pecten maximus the popular forms gofiche, as in use at Cherbourg, and coquefiche or cottefiche, as in use at Hon fleur.

P. 17-31] NOTES l6l

Pagre 17. — I. Agnus Dei, Âgnus Dei, Lamb of God % plain song chanted by tûe choir at that moment in the mass when the priest recites the prayer beginning with the words " Agnus Dei."