The little man, gifted with the patience of a chemist, could not enjoy
(that is the term employed in the provinces to express the abolition
of domestic rule) Madame Vermut,--a charming woman, a lively woman,
capital company (for she could lose forty sous at cards and say
nothing), a woman who railed at her husband, annoyed him with
epigrams, and declared him to be an imbecile unable to distil anything
but dulness. Madame Vermut was one of those women who in the society
of a small town are the life and soul of amusement and who set things
going. She supplied the salt of her little world, kitchen-salt, it is
true; her jokes were somewhat broad, but society forgave them; though
she was capable of saying to the cure Taupin, a man of seventy years
of age, with white hair, "Hold your tongue, my lad."

The miller of Soulanges, possessing an income of fifty thousand
francs, had an only daughter whom Lupin desired for his son Amaury,
since he had lost the hope of marrying him to Gaubertin's daughter.
This miller, a Sarcus-Taupin, was the Nucingen of the little town. He
was supposed to be thrice a millionaire; but he never transacted
business with others, and thought only of grinding his wheat and
keeping a monopoly of it; his most noticeable point was a total
absence of politeness and good manners.

The elder Guerbet, brother of the post-master at Conches, possessed an
income of ten thousand francs, besides his salary as collector. The
Gourdons were rich; the doctor had married the only daughter of old
Monsieur Gendrin-Vatebled, keeper of the forests and streams, whom the
family were now _expecting to die_, while the poet had married the niece
and sole heiress of the Abbe Taupin, the curate of Soulanges, a stout
priest who lived in his cure like a rat in his cheese.