Indifferent scholars--in spite of their disarming industry--and fundamentally refractory to any sort of culture, the Blafafoires would always have been at the bottom of their form if it had not been for the assistance of Eudoxe Lévichon, who, in return for a small consideration, corrected and even wrote their exercises for them. This Lévichon was the son of one of the chief jewellers of the town. (Albert Lévy, shortly after his marriage twenty years earlier with the only daughter of the jeweller Cohen, had found his business so prosperous that he had quitted the lower quarters of the town in order to establish himself not far from the Casino, and at the same time he had judged it a favourable opportunity to unite and agglutinate the two names as he had united the two businesses.) Blafaphas had a wiry constitution, but Fleurissoire was delicate. At the approach of puberty Gaston’s superficies had turned dusky--one would have thought that the sap was going to burst forth into hair over the whole of his body; while Amédée’s more sensitive epidermis resisted, grew fiery--grew pimply, as if the hair were bashful at making its appearance. Old Monsieur Blafaphas advised the use of detergents and every Monday Gaston used to bring over in his bag a bottle of anti-scorbutic mixture, which he surreptitiously handed to his friend. They used ointments as well. About this time Amédée caught his first cold--a cold which, notwithstanding the salubrious climate of Pau, lasted all the winter and left behind an unfortunate bronchial delicacy. This gave Gaston the opportunity for renewed attentions; he overwhelmed his friend with liquorice, with jujubes, with cough mixtures and with eucalyptus pectoral lozenges, specially prepared by Monsieur Blafaphas _père_ from a receipt which had been given him by an old _curé_. Amédée became subject to constant catarrh and had to resign himself to never going out without a comforter. The highest flight of Amédée’s ambition was to succeed to his father’s business. Gaston, however, notwithstanding his indolent appearance, was not without initiative; even at school he amused himself with devising small inventions, chiefly, it must be confessed, of a somewhat trifling nature--a fly-trap, a weighing-machine for marbles, a safety lock for his desk--which, for that matter, had no more secrets in it than his heart. Innocent as these first applications of his industry were, they nevertheless led him on to the more serious labours which afterwards engaged him, and the first result of which was the invention of a “hygienic, fumivorous [or smoke-consuming] pipe for weak-chested and other smokers,” which for a long time occupied a prominent place in the chemist’s shop window. * * * * *