“I will sell him to you, Cesaire, for three pistoles” (thirty francs).
“I will take him, Antoine, and I invite you to eat some black pudding.”
“What I want is his feet.”
“Feel his belly; you will see that it is all fat.”
And they all winked at each other, but dared not laugh too loud, for fear the Prussian might finally suspect they were laughing at him. Anthony, alone growing bolder every day, pinched his thighs, exclaiming, “Nothing but fat”; tapped him on the back, shouting, “That is all bacon”; lifted him up in his arms as an old Colossus that could have lifted an anvil, declaring, “He weighs six hundred and no waste.”
He had got into the habit of making people offer his “pig” something to eat wherever they went together. This was the chief pleasure, the great diversion every day. “Give him whatever you please, he will swallow everything.” And they offered the man bread and butter, potatoes, cold meat, chitterlings, which caused the remark, “Some of your own, and choice ones.”
The soldier, stupid and gentle, ate from politeness, charmed at these attentions, making himself ill rather than refuse, and he was actually growing fat and his uniform becoming tight for him. This delighted Saint Anthony, who said: “You know, my pig, that we shall have to have another cage made for you.”
They had, however, become the best friends in the world, and when the old fellow went to attend to his business in the neighborhood the Prussian accompanied him for the simple pleasure of being with him.
The weather was severe; it was freezing hard. The terrible winter of 1870 seemed to bring all the scourges on France at one time.
Father Antoine, who made provision beforehand, and took advantage of every opportunity, foreseeing that manure would be scarce for the spring farming, bought from a neighbor who happened to be in need of money all that he had, and it was agreed that he should go every evening with his cart to get a load.