He stared at Maxime, seeming happy to find him already wrinkled at thirty-two, with his hair and beard sprinkled with snow. “Ah, well!” he added, “we are all growing old. But I, at least, have no great reason to complain. I am solid.” And he planted himself firmly on his legs with his air of ferocious mockery, while his fiery red face seemed to flame and burn. For a long time past ordinary brandy had seemed to him like pure water; only spirits of 36 degrees tickled his blunted palate; and he took such draughts of it that he was full of it—his flesh saturated with it—like a sponge. He perspired alcohol. At the slightest breath whenever he spoke, he exhaled from his mouth a vapor of alcohol. “Yes, truly; you are solid, uncle!” said Pascal, amazed. “And you have done nothing to make you so; you have good reason to ridicule us. Only there is one thing I am afraid of, look you, that some day in lighting your pipe, you may set yourself on fire—like a bowl of punch.” Macquart, flattered, gave a sneering laugh. “Have your jest, have your jest, my boy! A glass of cognac is worth more than all your filthy drugs. And you will all touch glasses with me, hey? So that it may be said truly that your uncle is a credit to you all. As for me, I laugh at evil tongues. I have corn and olive trees, I have almond trees and vines and land, like any _bourgeois_. In summer I smoke my pipe under the shade of my mulberry trees; in winter I go to smoke it against my wall, there in the sunshine. One has no need to blush for an uncle like that, hey? Clotilde, I have syrup, if you would like some. And you, Félicité, my dear, I know that you prefer anisette. There is everything here, I tell you, there is everything here!” He waved his arm as if to take possession of the comforts he enjoyed, now that from an old sinner he had become a hermit, while Félicité, whom he had disturbed a moment before by the enumeration of his riches, did not take her eyes from his face, waiting to interrupt him. “Thank you, Macquart, we will take nothing; we are in a hurry. Where is Charles?” “Charles? Very good, presently! I understand, papa has come to see his boy. But that is not going to prevent you taking a glass.” And as they positively refused he became offended, and said, with his malicious laugh: “Charles is not here; he is at the asylum with the old woman.” Then, taking Maxime to the end of the terrace, he pointed out to him the great white buildings, whose inner gardens resembled prison yards. “Look, nephew, you see those three trees in front of you? Well, beyond the one to the left, there is a fountain in a court. Follow the ground floor, and the fifth window to the right is Aunt Dide’s. And that is where the boy is. Yes, I took him there a little while ago.”