ill-advised as to call him Monsieur Cruchot would soon be made to feel
his folly in court. The magistrate protected those who called him
Monsieur le president, but he favored with gracious smiles those who
addressed him as Monsieur de Bonfons. Monsieur le president was
thirty-three years old, and possessed the estate of Bonfons (Boni
Fontis), worth seven thousand francs a year; he expected to inherit the
property of his uncle the notary and that of another uncle, the Abbe
Cruchot, a dignitary of the chapter of Saint-Martin de Tours, both of
whom were thought to be very rich. These three Cruchots, backed by a
goodly number of cousins, and allied to twenty families in the town,
formed a party, like the Medici in Florence; like the Medici, the
Cruchots had their Pazzi.

Madame des Grassins, mother of a son twenty-three years of age, came
assiduously to play cards with Madame Grandet, hoping to marry her
dear Adolphe to Mademoiselle Eugenie. Monsieur des Grassins, the
banker, vigorously promoted the schemes of his wife by means of secret
services constantly rendered to the old miser, and always arrived in
time upon the field of battle. The three des Grassins likewise had
their adherents, their cousins, their faithful allies. On the Cruchot
side the abbe, the Talleyrand of the family, well backed-up by his
brother the notary, sharply contested every inch of ground with his
female adversary, and tried to obtain the rich heiress for his nephew
the president.

This secret warfare between the Cruchots and des Grassins, the prize
thereof being the hand in marriage of Eugenie Grandet, kept the
various social circles of Saumur in violent agitation. Would
Mademoiselle Grandet marry Monsieur le president or Monsieur Adolphe
des Grassins? To this problem some replied that Monsieur Grandet would