In those days Beaucaire with its famous fair was the great point of attraction on the Rhône. People of all nations, even Turks and negroes, journeyed there both by land and water. Everything made by the hand of man, whether to feed, to clothe, to house, to amuse or to ensnare, from the grindstones of the mill, bales of cloth or canvas, rings and ornaments made of coloured glass, all were to be found in profusion at Beaucaire, piled up in the great vaulted storehouses, the market-halls, the merchant vessels in the harbour or the booths in the meadows. It was a universal exhibition held yearly in the month of July of all the industries of the south.
Needless to say, my grandsire took good care never to miss this occasion of going to Beaucaire for four or five days’ dissipation. Under the pretext of purchasing articles for the household—such as pepper, cloves, ginger—he went off to the fair, a handkerchief in every pocket and others new and uncut wound like a belt round his waist, for he consumed much snuff. There he strolled about from morn till eve among the jugglers, the mountebanks, the clowns, and, above all, the gypsies, watching these last with interest as they disputed and squabbled over the purchase of some skinny donkey.
Punch and Judy possessed perennial joys for him. Open-mouthed he stood among the crowd, laughing like a boy at the old jokes, and experiencing an unholy joy as the blows were showered on the puppets representing law and order.
This was always the chance for the watchful pickpocket to quietly abstract one by one his handkerchiefs, a thing foreseen by my grandsire, who, on discovering the loss, invariably, without more ado, unwound his belt and used the new ones, with the result that on returning home he presented himself to his family with a nose dyed blue from the unwashed cotton.
“So I see,” cries my grandmother, “they have stolen your handkerchiefs again.”
“Who told you that?” asks her good man in surprise.
“Your blue nose,” answers she.
“Well, that Punch and Judy show was worth it,” maintains the incorrigible grandsire.
When his daughters, of whom, as I have said, my mother was one, were of an age to marry, being neither awkward nor disagreeable, in spite of their lack of dowry, suitors appeared on the scene. But when the fathers of these youths inquired of my grandsire how much he was prepared to give to his daughter, Master Étienne fired up in wrath:
“How much do I give my daughter? Idiot! I give your lad a fine young filly, well trained and handled, and you ask me to add lands and money! Who wants my daughters must take them as they are or leave them. God be thanked, in the breadpan of Master Étienne there is always a loaf.”