masters were greater in their minds than their own,--/were/ their own
in fact,--Mademoiselle Zephirine insisted on looking after everything.
Her attention being never distracted, she knew, without going up to
verify her knowledge, how large was the heap of nuts in the barn; and
how many oats remained in the bin without plunging her sinewy arm into
the depths of it. She carried at the end of a string fastened to the
belt of her /casaquin/, a boatswain's whistle, with which she was wont
to summon Mariotte by one, and Gasselin by two notes.

Gasselin's greatest happiness was to cultivate the garden and produce
fine fruits and vegetables. He had so little work to do that without
this occupation he would certainly have felt lost. After he had
groomed his horses in the morning, he polished the floors and cleaned
the rooms on the ground-floor, then he went to his garden, where weed
or damaging insect was never seen. Sometimes Gasselin was observed
motionless, bare-headed, under a burning sun, watching for a
field-mouse or the terrible grub of the cockchafer; then, as soon as it
was caught, he would rush with the joy of a child to show his masters
the noxious beast that had occupied his mind for a week. He took
pleasure in going to Croisic on fast-days, to purchase a fish to be had
for less money there than at Guerande.

Thus no household was ever more truly one, more united in interests,
more bound together than this noble family sacredly devoted to its
duty. Masters and servants seemed made for one another. For
twenty-five years there had been neither trouble nor discord. The only
griefs were the petty ailments of the little boy, the only terrors were
caused by the events of 1814 and those of 1830. If the same things
were invariably done at the same hours, if the food was subjected to
the regularity of times and seasons, this monotony, like that of