time when the cows calved or went dry, brought in about one hundred
and sixty francs a year besides supplying the wants of the family.
Tonsard himself managed to earn another hundred and sixty by doing odd
jobs of one kind or another.

The sale of food and wine in the tavern, after all costs were paid,
returned a profit of about three hundred francs, for the great
drinking-bouts happened only at certain times and in certain seasons;
and as the topers who indulged in them gave Tonsard and his wife due
notice, the latter bought in the neighboring town the exact quantity
of provisions needed and no more. The wine produced by Tonsard's
vineyard was sold in ordinary years for twenty francs a cask to a
wine-dealer at Soulanges with whom Tonsard was intimate. In very
prolific years he got as much as twelve casks from his vines; but
eight was the average; and Tonsard kept half for his own traffic. In
all wine-growing districts the gleaning of the large vineyards gives a
good perquisite, and out of it the Tonsard family usually managed to
obtain three casks more. But being, as we have seen, sheltered and
protected by the keepers, they showed no conscience in their
proceedings,--entering vineyards before the harvesters were out of
them, just as they swarmed into the wheat-fields before the sheaves
were made. So, the seven or eight casks of wine, as much gleaned as
harvested, were sold for a good price. However, out of these various
proceeds the Grand-I-Vert was mulcted in a good sum for the personal
consumption of Tonsard and his wife, who wanted the best of everything
to eat, and better wine than they sold,--which they obtained from
their friend at Soulanges in payment for their own. In short, the
money scraped together by this family amounted to about nine hundred
francs, for they fattened two pigs a year, one for themselves and the
other to sell.