ed:

"One, two! one, two!"--counting his steps regularly, like the chasseurs
of Vincennes.

The road which they took was a continuously uphill one; the sloping
ground hid the horizon from their view. They reached a height close to
La Butte, and at a single glance the disaster was revealed to them.

All the stacks, here and there, were flaming like volcanoes in the midst
of the plain, stripped bare in the evening stillness. Around the biggest
of them there were about three hundred persons, perhaps; and under the
command of M. Foureau, the mayor, in a tricoloured scarf, youngsters,
with poles and crooks, were dragging down the straw from the top in
order to save the rest of it.

Bouvard, in his eagerness, was near knocking down Madame Bordin, who
happened to be there. Then, seeing one of his servant-boys, he loaded
him with insults for not having given him warning. The servant-boy, on
the contrary, through excess of zeal, had at first rushed to the house,
then to the church, next to where Monsieur himself was staying, and had
returned by the other road.

Bouvard lost his head. His entire household gathered round him, all
talking together, and he forbade them to knock down the stacks, begged
of them to give him some help, called for water, and asked where were
the firemen.

"We've got to get them first!" exclaimed the mayor.

"That's your fault!" replied Bouvard.

He flew into a passion, and made use of improper language, and everyone
wondered at the patience of M. Foureau, who, all the same, was a surly
individual, as might be seen from his big lips and bulldog jaw.

The heat of the stacks became so great that nobody could come close to
them any longer. Under the devouring flames the straw writhed with a
crackling sound, and the grains of corn lashed one's face as if they
were buckshot. Then the stack fell in a huge burning pile to the ground,
and a shower of sparks flew out of it, while fiery waves floated above
the red mass, which presented in its alternations of colour parts rosy
as vermilion and others like clotted blood. The night had come, the wind
was swelling; from time to time, a flake of fire passed across the black
sky.

Bouvard viewed the conflagration with tears in his eyes, which were
veiled by his moist lids, and his whole face was swollen with grief.
Madame Bordin, while playing with the fringes of her green shawl, called
him "Poor Monsieur!" and tried to console him. Since nothing could be
do