a brass claw in arabesque. They were airs played in other places at
the theatres, sung in drawing rooms, danced to at night under lighted
lustres, echoes of the world that reached even to Emma. Endless
sarabands ran through her head, and, like an Indian dancing girl on the
flowers of a carpet, her thoughts leapt with the notes, swung from dream
to dream, from sadness to sadness. When the man had caught some coppers
in his cap, he drew down an old cover of blue cloth, hitched his organ
on to his back, and went off with a heavy tread. She watched him going.

But it was above all the meal-times that were unbearable to her, in this
small room on the ground floor, with its smoking stove, its creaking
door, the walls that sweated, the damp flags; all the bitterness in life
seemed served up on her plate, and with smoke of the boiled beef there
rose from her secret soul whiffs of sickliness. Charles was a slow
eater; she played with a few nuts, or, leaning on her elbow, amused
herself with drawing lines along the oilcloth table cover with the point
of her knife.

She now let everything in her household take care of itself, and Madame
Bovary senior, when she came to spend part of Lent at Tostes, was much
surprised at the change. She who was formerly so careful, so dainty,
now passed whole days without dressing, wore grey cotton stockings, and
burnt tallow candles. She kept saying they must be economical since
they were not rich, adding that she was very contented, very happy, that
Tostes pleased her very much, with other speeches that closed the mouth
of her mother-in-law. Besides, Emma no longer seemed inclined to follow
her advice; once even, Madame Bovary having thought fit to maintain that
mistresses ought to keep an eye on the religion of their servants, she
had answered with so angry a look and so cold a smile that the good
woman did not interfere again.