Madame Bovary - Penn State University

FlaubertTowards the end of February old Rouault, in memory of Charles prescribed valerian and camphor baths. Everythinghis cure, himself brought his son-in-law a superb turkey, and that was tried only seemed to irritate her the more.stayed three days at Tostes. Charles being with his patients, On certain days she chatted with feverish rapidity, and thisEmma kept him company. He smoked in the room, spat on over-excitement was suddenly followed by a state of torpor,the firedogs, talked farming, calves, cows, poultry, and municipalcouncil, so that when he left she closed the door on What then revived her was pouring a bottle of eau-de-co-in which she remained without speaking, without moving.him with a feeling of satisfaction that surprised even herself. logne over her arms.Moreover she no longer concealed her contempt for anything As she was constantly complaining about Tostes, Charlesor anybody, and at times she set herself to express singular fancied that her illness was no doubt due to some local cause,opinions, finding fault with that which others approved, and and fixing on this idea, began to think seriously of setting upapproving things perverse and immoral, all of which made elsewhere.her husband open his eyes widely.From that moment she drank vinegar, contracted a sharpWould this misery last for ever? Would she never issue from little cough, and completely lost her appetite.it? Yet she was as good as all the women who were living It cost Charles much to give up Tostes after living therehappily. She had seen duchesses at Vaubyessard with clumsier four years and “when he was beginning to get on there.” Yet ifwaists and commoner ways, and she execrated the injustice of it must be! He took her to Rouen to see his old master. It wasGod. She leant her head against the walls to weep; she envied a nervous complaint: change of air was needed.lives of stir; longed for masked balls, for violent pleasures, After looking about him on this side and on that, Charleswith all the wildness that she did not know, but that these learnt that in the Neufchatel arrondissement there was a considerablemarket town called Yonville-l’Abbaye, whose doc-must surely yield.She grew pale and suffered from palpitations of the heart. tor, a Polish refugee, had decamped a week before. Then he59