Then, turning to the young woman, the doctor added:
"My child, tell these gentlemen, please, how many gardeners you and your husband employ in your occupation."
"At least twenty men the whole time, my dear uncle."
"And their salary, my child."
"According to your advice, dear uncle, we give them the fixed price of fifty cents, and a part of our profit, in order to interest them as much as we are in the excellence of the work. We find this arrangement the best in the world, for our gardeners, interested as much as ourselves in the prosperity of our undertaking, labour with great zeal. So this year, their part in the income of the establishment has almost amounted to five francs a day."
"And about how much a year is the whole income, my child?"
"Thanks to our nurseries of fine fruit-trees, we make, dear uncle, from eighty to a hundred thousand francs a year."
"As much as that?" said the abbé.
"Yes, sir," replied the young woman; "and there are many houses in the neighbourhood of Paris and in the provinces whose incomes are larger than ours."
The canon, absorbed in the contemplation of fragrant golden fruits, truffles, and mushrooms, and the first vegetables of the season as luscious as they were rare, gave only a distracted attention to the economics of the conversation, and reluctantly accepted the doctor's invitation, who said to him: