M
MACQUART, a poacher and smuggler who lived at Plassans in a hovel adjoining the Fouque property. His reputation was of the worst, and “although no crimes had actually been brought home to him, the first suspicions always fell upon him whenever a theft or murder had been perpetrated in the country.” He frequently disappeared for long periods, but during his short sojourns in the town he drank to great excess. He became the lover of Adelaide Fouque in 1789, less than a year after the death of her husband, and had two children by her, Antoine and Ursule Macquart. A man of violent and unrestrained passions, and of incorrigibly lazy habits, he retained complete influence over Adelaide, and they lived in the same relationship for over twenty years. About 1810, Macquart was killed on the frontier by a custom-house officer while he was endeavouring to smuggle a cargo of Geneva watches into France. Adelaide was sole legatee, the estate consisting of the hovel at Plassans and the carbine of the deceased, which a smuggler loyally brought back to her. La Fortune des Rougon.
MACQUART (ANTOINE), born 1789, son of Macquart the smuggler and Adelaide Fouque; was drawn in the conscription in 1809. On his return to Plassans, he found that his half-brother Pierre had sold the family property and had appropriated the proceeds. Being a confirmed drunkard, he was averse from work of any kind, but in order to support himself he learned the trade of basket-making. In 1826 he married Josephine Gavaudan, a market-woman, whom he afterwards allowed to support him. They had three children, Lisa, Gervaise, and Jean. His wife died in 1850, and soon after his daughter Gervaise and his son Jean, who had assisted to keep him in idleness, ran off. He had a bitter ill-will towards his brother Pierre Rougon, and, chiefly with a view to his annoyance, expressed strong Republican principles. For the same reason he took every opportunity of teaching these principles to his young nephew Silvere Mouret. After the Coup d’Etat he took an active share in the agitation which resulted in a Republican rising. When the Insurgents left Plassans, he remained with a few men to overawe the inhabitants. He and his whole band were, however, taken prisoners by the citizens under the leadership of Pierre Rougon. He was assisted to escape by Madame Felicite Rougon, who promised him a sum of money on condition that he would bring about an attack on the Town Hall by the Republicans. He did so the same night, and an ambush having been prepared by the Rougons, a number of lives were sacrificed. He thereafter left the country. La Fortune des Rougon.
Some time afterwards he returned to France, and bought a small house at Les Tulettes, about three leagues from Plassans. He fitted up his establishment by degrees, and even became possessed of a horse and trap. Where the money came from no one knew, but it was believed that his brother Pierre Rougon was keeping him. Notwithstanding this, he had great ill-will towards the Rougons, and lost no opportunity of annoying them. Partly with this object, and partly at the instigation of Abbe Fenil, who wished to be revenged on Abbe Faujas, he contrived the escape of Francois Mouret from the asylum at Les Tulettes; as result, Mouret returned to Plassans, and setting fire to his house, caused the death of Abbe Faujas, himself perishing in the flames. La Conquete de Plassans.
Macquart lived to an old age at Les Tulettes, though he increasingly gave way to drunkenness. His relations with the Rougons were friendly, but he was hated by Felicite on account of his knowledge of the origin of the family fortune. At eighty-four years of age he was still healthy, but his flesh was so saturated with alcohol that it seemed to be preserved by it. One day, as he was sitting helpless with drink and smoking his pipe, he set fire to his clothes, and his body, soaked as it was with ardent spirits, was burned to the last bone. Felicite Rougon chanced to enter the house just as the conflagration began, but she did nothing to stop it, and went silently away. The combustion was so complete that there was nothing left to bury, and the family had to content itself with having masses said for the repose of the dead. When Macquart’s will was opened, it was found that he had left all his money for the erection of a magnificent tomb for himself, with weeping angels at the head and foot. Le Docteur Pascal.
MACQUART (MADAME ANTOINE), wife of the preceding. See Josephine Gavaudan.
MACQUART (GERVAISE), born 1828, was a daughter of Antoine Macquart, and was slightly lame from birth. She was apprenticed to a laundress, but at an early age had two children to a journeyman tanner named Lantier.[*]
Soon after the death of her mother, in 1850, she ran off to Paris with Lantier and her children, Claude, a boy of eight, and Etienne, aged four. La Fortune des Rougon.
The party had only been in the city a few weeks when Lantier ran off with a girl named Adele, leaving Gervaise and the children unprovided for. She got work in the laundry of Madame Fauconnier, and not long after received an offer of marriage from Coupeau, a respectable zinc-worker, which after some hesitation she accepted. The marriage took place, and for a considerable time things prospered, one child, a daughter named Nana being born. An accident to Coupeau, who fell from a roof and was seriously injured, led to a gradual change; formerly temperate and industrious, he became unwilling to work, and began to spend his time in public-houses. Gervaise had meantime taken a shop with money borrowed from the Goujets, and had started a laundry in it. She was at first successful, but in time grew lazy and fond of good living, while Coupeau continued idle and became increasingly intemperate. Business began to go, and Gervaise became more careless, even taking more drink occasionally than she had been wont to do. About this time Lantier, her former lover, appeared again, and made friends with Coupeau, who agreed to take him into the house as a lodger. After that, the descent of Gervaise was rapid. Lantier never paid anything for his support, Coupeau drank more heavily than ever, and Gervaise, who was gradually drifting into intemperance, resumed her old connection with her lover. All the time work was being neglected, and debts were accumulating with alarming rapidity. Eventually Madame Virginie Poisson took over the shop, and with it Lantier, who transferred his affections along with the lease, and the Coupeaus removed into a small house high up in the same building. Coupeau suffered from repeated attacks of delirium tremens, and eventually died in an asylum. Gervaise continued to sink still lower, until no work was too menial or too repulsive for her to undertake for the price of drink, and one day in the winter of 1869 she was found dead in a garret of that great tenement house where she had passed so much of her life. L’Assommoir.
Her sister, Lisa Quenu, the pork-butcher, did not come to her assistance. Lisa did not like people who were unfortunate, and she was ashamed that Gervaise should have married a workman. Le Ventre de Paris.