III

Some three leagues from Roche-Mauprat, on your way to Fromental, you must have noticed an old tower standing by itself in the middle of the woods.  It is famous for the tragic death of a prisoner about a century ago.  The executioner, on his rounds, thought good to hang him without any further formality, merely to gratify an old Mauprat, his overlord.

At the time of which I am speaking Gazeau Tower was already deserted and falling into ruins.  It was state property, and, more from negligence than kindness, the authorities had allowed a poor old fellow to take up his abode there.  He was quite a character, used to live completely alone, and was known in the district as Gaffer Patience.

“Yes,” I interrupted; “I have heard my nurse’s grandmother speak of him; she believed he was a sorcerer.”

Exactly so; and while we are at this point let me tell you what sort of a man this Patience really was, for I shall have to speak of him more than once in the course of my story.  I had opportunities of studying him thoroughly.

Patience, then, was a rustic philosopher.  Heaven had endowed him with a keen intellect, but he had had little education.  By a sort of strange fatality, his brain had doggedly resisted the little instruction he might have received.  For instance, he had been to the Carmelite’s school at ——­, and instead of showing any aptitude for work, he had played truant with a keener delight than any of his school-fellows.  His was an eminently contemplative nature, kindly and indolent, but proud and almost savage in its love of independence; religious, yet opposed to all authority; somewhat captious, very suspicious, and inexorable with hypocrites.  The observances of the cloister inspired him with but little awe; and as a result of once or twice speaking his mind too freely to the monks he was expelled from the school.  From that time forth he was the sworn foe of what he called monkism, and declared openly for the cure of the Briantes, who was accused of being a Jansenist.  In the instruction of Patience, however, the cure succeeded no better than the monks.  The young peasant, endowed though he was with herculean strength and a great desire for knowledge, displayed an unconquerable aversion for every kind of work, whether physical or mental.  He professed a sort of artless philosophy which the cure found it very difficult to argue against.  There was, he said, no need for a man to work as long as he did not want money; and he was in no need of money as long as his wants were moderate.  Patience practised what he preached:  during the years when passions are so powerful he lived a life of austerity, drank nothing but water, never entered a tavern, and never joined in a dance.  He was always very awkward and shy with women, who, it must be owned, found little to please in his eccentric character, stern face, and somewhat sarcastic wit.  As if to avenge himself