midday
They gave her a little dish of red Marseilles-ware full of boiled chestnuts -- frugal breakfast of bygone times , which nothing would have induced her to change . At once she was off , hurrying with great strides , her large silver keyring at her belt , whence jingled all her keys , her plate in her hand , balanced by the distaff which she held , in working order , under her arm , for she spun all day long , and did not stop even to eat her chestnuts . On the way , a glance at the stables , still dark , where the animals were moving duly , at the stifling pens with their rows of impatient and outstretched muzzles ; and the first glimmers of light creeping over the layers of stones that supported the embankment of the park , lit up the figure of the old woman , running in the dew , with the lightness of a girl , despite her seventy years -- verifying exactly each morning all the wealth of the domain , anxious to make sure that the night had not taken away the statues and the vases , uprooted the hundred-year-old quincunx , dried up the springs which filtered into their resounding basins . Then the full sunlight of midday , humming and vibrating , showed still , on the sand of an alley , against the white wall of a terrace , the long figure of the old woman , elegant and straight as her spindle , picking up bits of dead wood , breaking off some uneven branch of a shrub , careless of the shock it caused her and the sweat which broke out over her skin . Towards this hour another figure was to be seen in the park also -- less active , less noisy , dragging rather than walking , leaning against the walls and railings -- a poor round-shouldered being , shaky and stiff , a figure from which life seemed to have gone out , never speaking , when he was tired giving a little plaintive cry towards the servant , who was always near , who helped him to sit down , to crouch upon some step , where he would stay for hours , motionless , mute , his mouth hanging , his eyes blinking , hushed by the strident monotony of the grasshopper 's cry -- a blotch of humanity in the splendid horizon . This , this was the first-born , Bernard 's brother , the darling child of his father and mother , the glorious hope of the nail-maker 's family . Slaves , like so many others in the Midi , to the superstition of the rights of primogeniture , they had made every possible sacrifice to send to Paris their fine , ambitious lad , who set out assured of success , the admiration of all the young women of the town ; and Paris , after having for six years , beaten , twisted , and squeezed in its great vat the brilliant southern stripling , after having burnt him with all its vitriol , rolled him in all its mud , finished by sending him back in this state of wreckage , stupefied and paralyzed -- killing his father with sorrow , and forcing his mother to sell her all , and live as a sort of char-woman in the better-class houses of her own country-side .