This boy grew up with the determination of
some day making an independent position for himself. He attended school
diligently, and tortured his dull brain to force a little arithmetic and
spelling into it. After that he became an apprentice, repeating much
the same efforts with a perseverance that was the more meritorious as it
took him a whole day to learn what others acquired in an hour.
[*] Figures prominently in _La Terre_ (_The Earth_) and _La
Debacle_ (_The Downfall_).
As long as these poor little things remained a burden to the house,
Antoine grumbled. They were useless mouths that lessened his own share.
He vowed, like his brother, that he would have no more children, those
greedy creatures who bring their parents to penury. It was something to
hear him bemoan his lot when they sat five at table, and the mother gave
the best morsels to Jean, Lisa, and Gervaise.
"That's right," he would growl; "stuff them, make them burst!"
Whenever Fine bought a garment or a pair of boots for them, he would
sulk for days together. Ah! if he had only known, he would never had had
that pack of brats, who compelled him to limit his smoking to four sous'
worth of tobacco a day, and too frequently obliged him to eat stewed
potatoes for dinner, a dish which he heartily detested.
Later on, however, as soon as Jean and Gervaise earned their first
francs, he found some good in children after all. Lisa was no longer
there.
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