Frugal in all respects, he barely touches the dishes before him; avoiding all meats, and saving himself wholly for the fruits; for is not man naturally frugivorous, by his teeth, his stomach, and his bowels? Certain dishes repel him, for reasons of sentiment rather than through any real disgust; such as paté de foie gras, which reminds him too forcibly of the so cruelly tortured goose; such cruelty is too high a price to pay for a mere greasy mouthful. (15/5.) On the other hand, he drinks wine with pleasure, the harsh, rough "wine of the country" of the plains of Sérignan. He is also well able to appreciate good things and appetizing cookery; no one ever had a finer palate; but he is happiest in seeing others appreciate the pleasures of the table. Witness that breakfast worthy of Gargantua, which he himself organized in honour of his guests, whom he had invited to an excursion over the Ventoux Alp; where he seems expressly to have commanded "that all should come in shoals." What a tinkling of bottles, what piles of bread! There are green olives "flowing with brine," black olives "seasoned with oil," sausages of Arles "with rosy flesh, marbled with cubes of fat and whole peppercorns," legs of mutton stuffed with garlic "to dull the keen edge of hunger"; chickens "to amuse the molars"; melons of Cavaillon too, with white pulp, not forgetting those with orange pulp, and to crown the feast those little cheeses, so delightfully flavoured, peculiar to Mont Ventoux, "spiced with mountain herbs," which melt in the mouth. (15/6.) But his greatest pleasure is his pipe; a briar, which in absence of mind he is always allowing to go out, and always relighting. Respectful of all traditions, he has kept up the observance of old customs; no Christmas Eve has ever been passed under the roof of his Harmas without the consecrated meats upon the table; the heart of celery, the nougat of almonds, the dish of snails, and the savoury-smelling turkey. Then, stuck into the Christmas bread (15/7.), the sprigs of holly, the verbouisset, the sacred bush whose little starry flowers and coral berries, growing amid evergreen leaves, affirm the eternal rebirth of indestructible nature. At Sérignan Fabre is little known and little appreciated. To tell the truth, folk regard him as eccentric; they have often surprised him in the country lying on his stomach in the middle of a field, or kneeling on the ground, a magnifying glass in hand, observing a fly or some one of those insignificant creatures in which no sane person would deign to be interested. How should they know him, since he never goes into the village? When he did once venture thither to visit his friend Charrasse, the schoolmaster, his appearance was an event of which every one had something to say, so greatly did it astonish the inhabitants. (15/8.)