Dear and Illustrious Friend⁠— Permit me to inscribe your name at the head of this book, and above its dedication; for it is to you, before all, that I owe its publication. Reading over your magnificen...

We were in class when the headmaster came in, followed by a “new fellow,” not wearing the school uniform, and a school servant carrying a large desk. Those who had been asleep woke up, and everyone ro...

We were in class when the headmaster came in, followed by a “new fellow,” not wearing the school uniform, and a school servant carrying a large desk. Those who had been asleep woke up, and everyone ro...

One night towards eleven o’clock they were awakened by the noise of a horse pulling up outside their door. The servant opened the garret-window and parleyed for some time with a man in the street belo...

One morning old Rouault brought Charles the money for setting his leg⁠—seventy-five francs in forty-sou pieces, and a turkey. He had heard of his loss, and consoled him as well as he could. “I know wh...

The guests arrived early in carriages, in one-horse chaises, two-wheeled cars, old open gigs, wagonettes with leather hoods, and the young people from the nearer villages in carts, in which they stood...

The brick front was just in a line with the street, or rather the road. Behind the door hung a cloak with a small collar, a bridle, and a black leather cap, and on the floor, in a corner, were a pair ...

She had read Paul and Virginia, and she had dreamed of the little bamboo-house, the nigger Domingo, the dog Fidèle, but above all of the sweet friendship of some dear little brother, who seeks red fru...

She thought, sometimes, that, after all, this was the happiest time of her life⁠—the honeymoon, as people called it. To taste the full sweetness of it, it would have been necessary doubtless to fly to...

The château, a modern building in Italian style, with two projecting wings and three flights of steps, lay at the foot of an immense greensward, on which some cows were grazing among groups of large t...

Often when Charles was out she took from the cupboard, between the folds of the linen where she had left it, the green silk cigar case. She looked at it, opened it, and even smelt the odour of the lin...

Yonville-l’Abbaye (so called from an old Capuchin Abbey of which not even the ruins remain) is a market-town twenty-four miles from Rouen, between the Abbeville and Beauvais roads, at the foot of a va...

Yonville-l’Abbaye (so called from an old Capuchin Abbey of which not even the ruins remain) is a market-town twenty-four miles from Rouen, between the Abbeville and Beauvais roads, at the foot of a va...

Emma got out first, then Félicité, Monsieur Lheureux, and a nurse, and they had to wake up Charles in his corner, where he had slept soundly since night set in. Homais introduced himself; he offered h...

The next day, as she was getting up, she saw the clerk on the Place. She had on a dressing-gown. He looked up and bowed. She nodded quickly and reclosed the window. Léon waited all day for six o’clock...

When the first cold days set in Emma left her bedroom for the sitting-room, a long apartment with a low ceiling, in which there was on the mantelpiece a large bunch of coral spread out against the loo...

It was a Sunday in February, an afternoon when the snow was falling. They had all, Monsieur and Madame Bovary, Homais, and Monsieur Léon, gone to see a yarn-mill that was being built in the valley a m...

One evening when the window was open, and she, sitting by it, had been watching Lestiboudois, the beadle, trimming the box, she suddenly heard the Angelus ringing. It was the beginning of April, when ...

The next day was a dreary one for Emma. Everything seemed to her enveloped in a black atmosphere floating confusedly over the exterior of things, and sorrow was engulfed within her soul with soft shri...

At last it came, the famous agricultural show. On the morning of the solemnity all the inhabitants at their doors were chatting over the preparations. The pediment of the town hall had been hung with ...

Six weeks passed. Rodolphe did not come again. At last one evening he appeared. The day after the show he had said to himself⁠—“We mustn’t go back too soon; that would be a mistake.” And at the end of...

Gradually Rodolphe’s fears took possession of her. At first, love had intoxicated her; and she had thought of nothing beyond. But now that he was indispensable to her life, she feared to lose anything...

He had recently read a eulogy on a new method for curing clubfoot, and as he was a partisan of progress, he conceived the patriotic idea that Yonville, in order to keep to the fore, ought to have some...

They began to love one another again. Often, even in the middle of the day, Emma suddenly wrote to him, then from the window made a sign to Justin, who, taking his apron off, quickly ran to La Huchett...

No sooner was Rodolphe at home than he sat down quickly at his bureau under the stag’s head that hung as a trophy on the wall. But when he had the pen between his fingers, he could think of nothing, s...

To begin with, he did not know how he could pay Monsieur Homais for all the physic supplied by him, and though, as a medical man, he was not obliged to pay for it, he nevertheless blushed a little at ...

The crowd was waiting against the wall, symmetrically enclosed between the balustrades. At the corner of the neighbouring streets huge bills repeated in quaint letters “Lucie de Lammermoor⁠—Lagardy⁠—O...

Monsieur Léon, while studying law, had gone pretty often to the dancing-rooms, where he was even a great success amongst the grisettes, who thought he had a distinguished air. He was the best-mannered...

Monsieur Léon, while studying law, had gone pretty often to the dancing-rooms, where he was even a great success amongst the grisettes, who thought he had a distinguished air. He was the best-mannered...

On reaching the inn, Madame Bovary was surprised not to see the diligence. Hivert, who had waited for her fifty-three minutes, had at last started. Yet nothing forced her to go; but she had given her ...

They were three full, exquisite days⁠—a true honeymoon. They were at the Hôtel-de-Boulogne, on the harbour; and they lived there, with drawn blinds and closed doors, with flowers on the floor, and ice...

Léon soon put on an air of superiority before his comrades, avoided their company, and completely neglected his work. He waited for her letters; he reread them; he wrote to her. He called her to mind ...

She went on Thursdays. She got up and dressed silently, in order not to awaken Charles, who would have made remarks about her getting ready too early. Next she walked up and down, went to the windows,...

During the journeys he made to see her, Léon had often dined at the chemist’s, and he felt obliged from politeness to invite him in turn. “With pleasure!” Monsieur Homais replied; “besides, I must inv...

She was stoical the next day when Maître Hareng, the bailiff, with two assistants, presented himself at her house to draw up the inventory for the distraint. They began with Bovary’s consulting-room, ...

She asked herself as she walked along, “What am I going to say? How shall I begin?” And as she went on she recognised the thickets, the trees, the sea-rushes on the hill, the château yonder. All the s...

There is always after the death of anyone a kind of stupefaction; so difficult is it to grasp this advent of nothingness and to resign ourselves to believe in it. But still, when he saw that she did n...

He had only received the chemist’s letter thirty-six hours after the event; and, from consideration for his feelings, Homais had so worded it that it was impossible to make out what it was all about. ...

The next day Charles had the child brought back. She asked for her mamma. They told her she was away; that she would bring her back some playthings. Berthe spoke of her again several times, then at la...

A quotation from the Aeneid signifying a threat. ↩ Latin: “I am ridiculous.” ↩ A devotion said at morning, noon, and evening, at the sound of a bell. Here, the evening prayer. ↩ In place of a parent. ...