The village was silent as usual. At the corner of the streets were small
pink heaps that smoked in the air, for this was the time for jam-making,
and everyone at Yonville prepared his supply on the same day. But in
front of the chemist's shop one might admire a far larger heap, and that
surpassed the others with the superiority that a laboratory must have
over ordinary stores, a general need over individual fancy.

She went in. The large arm-chair was upset, and even the "Fanal de
Rouen" lay on the ground, outspread between two pestles. She pushed open
the lobby door, and in the middle of the kitchen, amid brown jars full
of picked currants, of powdered sugar and lump sugar, of the scales on
the table, and of the pans on the fire, she saw all the Homais, small
and large, with aprons reaching to their chins, and with forks in their
hands. Justin was standing up with bowed head, and the chemist was
screaming--

"Who told you to go and fetch it in the Capharnaum."

"What is it? What is the matter?"

"What is it?" replied the druggist. "We are making preserves; they are
simmering; but they were about to boil over, because there is too
much juice, and I ordered another pan. Then he, from indolence, from
laziness, went and took, hanging on its nail in my laboratory, the key
of the Capharnaum."

It was thus the druggist called a small room under the leads, full of
the utensils and the goods of his trade. He often spent long hours there
alone, labelling, decanting, and doing up again; and he looked upon