The Fortune of the Rougons | Page 4

throughout the whole of contemporary society, and ascend to all
sorts of positions by the force of that impulsion of essentially modern
origin, which sets the lower classes marching through the social system.
And thus the dramas of their individual lives recount the story of the
Second Empire, from the ambuscade of the Coup d'Etat to the treachery
of Sedan.
For three years I had been collecting the necessary documents for this

long work, and the present volume was even written, when the fall of
the Bonapartes, which I needed artistically, and with, as if by fate, I
ever found at the end of the drama, without daring to hope that it would
prove so near at hand, suddenly occurred and furnished me with the
terrible but necessary denouement for my work. My scheme is, at this
date, completed; the circle in which my characters will revolve is
perfected; and my work becomes a picture of a departed reign, of a
strange period of human madness and shame.
This work, which will comprise several episodes, is therefore, in my
mind, the natural and social history of a family under the Second
Empire. And the first episode, here called "The Fortune of the
Rougons," should scientifically be entitled "The Origin."
EMILE ZOLA PARIS, July 1, 1871.

THE FORTUNE OF THE ROUGONS


CHAPTER I
On quitting Plassans by the Rome Gate, on the southern side of the
town, you will find, on the right side of the road to Nice, and a little
way past the first suburban houses, a plot of land locally known as the
Aire Saint-Mittre.
This Aire Saint-Mittre is of oblong shape and on a level with the
footpath of the adjacent road, from which it is separated by a strip of
trodden grass. A narrow blind alley fringed with a row of hovels
borders it on the right; while on the left, and at the further end, it is
closed in by bits of wall overgrown with moss, above which can be
seen the top branches of the mulberry-trees of the Jas-Meiffren--an
extensive property with an entrance lower down the road. Enclosed
upon three sides, the Aire Saint-Mittre leads nowhere, and is only
crossed by people out for a stroll.
In former times it was a cemetery under the patronage of Saint-Mittre, a
greatly honoured Provencal saint; and in 1851 the old people of

Plassans could still remember having seen the wall of the cemetery
standing, although the place itself had been closed for years. The soil
had been so glutted with corpses that it had been found necessary to
open a new burial-ground at the other end of town. Then the old
abandoned cemetery had been gradually purified by the dark thick-set
vegetation which had sprouted over it every spring. The rich soil, in
which the gravediggers could no longer delve without turning up some
human remains, was possessed of wondrous fertility. The tall weeds
overtopped the walls after the May rains and the June sunshine so as to
be visible from the high road; while inside, the place presented the
appearance of a deep, dark green sea studded with large blossoms of
singular brilliancy. Beneath one's feet amidst the close-set stalks one
could feel that the damp soil reeked and bubbled with sap.
Among the curiosities of the place at that time were some large pear-
trees, with twisted and knotty boughs; but none of the housewives of
Plassans cared to pluck the large fruit which grew upon them. Indeed,
the townspeople spoke of this fruit with grimaces of disgust. No such
delicacy, however, restrained the suburban urchins, who assembled in
bands at twilight and climbed the walls to steal the pears, even before
they were ripe.
The trees and the weeds with their vigorous growth had rapidly
assimilated all the decomposing matter in the old cemetery of Saint-
Mittre; the malaria rising from the human remains interred there had
been greedily absorbed by the flowers and the fruit; so that eventually
the only odour one could detect in passing by was the strong perfume
of wild gillyflowers. This had merely been a question of a few
summers.
At last the townspeople determined to utilise this common property,
which had long served no purpose. The walls bordering the roadway
and the blind alley were pulled down; the weeds and the pear-trees
uprooted; the sepulchral remains were removed; the ground was dug
deep, and such bones as the earth was willing to surrender were heaped
up in a corner. For nearly a month the youngsters, who lamented the
loss of the pear-trees, played at bowls with the skulls; and one night

some practical jokers even suspended femurs and tibias to all the
bell-handles of the town. This scandal, which is still remembered at
Plassans, did not