very meal the very food he swallowed was made a
subject of reproach against him; he was called a drone, a clown, and
although his brother-in-law had taken possession of his portion of the
inheritance, he was helped grudgingly to soup, getting just enough to
save him from starving.

His face was very pale and his two big white eyes looked like wafers. He
remained unmoved at all the insults hurled at him, so reserved that one
could not tell whether he felt them.

Moreover, he had never known any tenderness, his mother having always
treated him unkindly and caring very little for him; for in country
places useless persons are considered a nuisance, and the peasants would
be glad to kill the infirm of their species, as poultry do.

As soon as he finished his soup he went and sat outside the door in
summer and in winter beside the fireside, and did not stir again all the
evening. He made no gesture, no movement; only his eyelids, quivering
from some nervous affection, fell down sometimes over his white,
sightless orbs. Had he any intellect, any thinking faculty, any
consciousness of his own existence? Nobody cared to inquire.

For some years things went on in this fashion. But his incapacity for
work as well as his impassiveness eventually exasperated his relatives,
and he became a laughingstock, a sort of butt for merriment, a prey to
the inborn ferocity, to the savage gaiety of the brutes who surrounded
him.

It is easy to imagine all the cruel practical jokes inspired by his
blindness. And, in order to have some fun in return for feeding him, they
now converted his meals into hours of pleasure for the neighbors and of
punishment for the helpless creature himself.

The peasants from the nearest houses came to this entertainment; it was
talked about from door to door, and every day the kitchen of the
farmhouse was full of people. Sometimes they placed before his plate,
when he was beginning to eat his soup, some cat or dog. The animal
instinctively perceived the man's infirmity, and, softly approaching,
commenced eating noiselessly, lapping up the soup daintily; and, when
they lapped the food rather noisily, rousing the poor fellow's attention,
they would prudently scamper away to avoid the blow of the spoon directed
at random by the blind man!

Then the spectators ranged along the wall would burst out laughing, nudge
each other and stamp their feet on the floor. And he, without ever
uttering a word, would continue