ux; from Bayeux, they
walked to Port-en-Bessin.

They had not been deceived. There were curious stones alongside the
Hachettes; and, assisted by the directions of the innkeeper, they
succeeded in reaching the strand.

The tide was low. It exposed to view all its shingles, with a prairie of
sea-wrack as far as the edge of the waves. Grassy slopes cut the cliff,
which was composed of soft brown earth that had hardened and become in
its lower strata a rampart of greyish stone. Tiny streams of water kept
flowing down incessantly, while in the distance the sea rumbled. It
seemed sometimes to suspend its throbbing, and then the only sound
heard was the murmur of the little springs.

They staggered over the sticky soil, or rather they had to jump over
holes.

Bouvard sat down on a mound overlooking the sea and contemplated the
waves, thinking of nothing, fascinated, inert. Pecuchet brought him over
to the side of the cliff to show him a serpent-stone incrusted in the
rock, like a diamond in its gangue. It broke their nails; they would
require instruments; besides, night was coming on. The sky was empurpled
towards the west, and the entire sea-shore was wrapped in shadow. In the
midst of the blackish wrack the pools of water were growing wider. The
sea was coming towards them. It was time to go back.

Next day, at dawn, with a mattock and a pick, they made an attack on
their fossil, whose covering cracked. It was an ammonite nodosus,
corroded at the ends but weighing quite six pounds; and in his
enthusiasm Pecuchet exclaimed:

"We cannot do less than present it to Dumouchel!"

They next chanced upon sponges, lampshells, orks--but no alligator. In
default of it, they were hoping to get the backbone of a hippopotamus or
an ichthyosaurus, the bones of any animals whatever that were
contemporaneous with the Deluge, when they discovered against the cliff,
at a man's height, outlines which assumed the form of a gigantic fish.

They deliberated as to the means by which they could get possession of
it. Bouvard would extricate it at the top, while Pecuchet beneath would
demolish the rock in order to make it descend gently without spoiling
it.

Just as they were taking breath they saw above their heads a
custom-house officer in a cloak, who was gesticulating with a commanding
air.

"Well! What! Let us alone!" And they went on with their work, Bouvard on
the tips of his toes, trapping with his mattock, Pecuchet, with his back