little wall, from which small columns rose at equal distances united
by a railing, more, however, for ornament than protection, for the bars
of the railing were of painted wood.

The old man, named Pingret, noted for his avarice, lived with a single
woman-servant, a country-girl who did all the work of the house. He
himself took care of his espaliers, trimmed his trees, gathered his
fruit, and sent it to Limoges for sale, together with early
vegetables, in the raising of which he excelled.

The niece of this old man, and his sole heiress, married to a
gentleman of small means living in Limoges, a Madame des Vanneaulx,
had again and again urged her uncle to hire a man to protect the
house, pointing out to him that he would thus obtain the profits of
certain uncultivated ground where he now grew nothing but clover. But
the old man steadily refused. More than once a discussion on the
subject had cut into the whist-playing of Limoges. A few shrewd heads
declared that the old miser buried his gold in that clover-field.

"If I were Madame des Vanneaulx," said a wit, "I shouldn't torment my
uncle about it; if somebody murders him, why, let him be murdered! I
should inherit the money."

Madame des Vanneaulx, however, wanted to keep her uncle, after the
manner of the managers of the Italian Opera, who entreat their popular
tenor to wrap up his throat, and give him their cloak if he happens to
have forgotten his own. She had sent old Pingret a fine English
mastiff, which Jeanne Malassis, the servant-woman brought back the
next day saying:--