Fortunately for Virginie other women did the same, not for the same reason, but out of a sympathy which was part of the scene.
It had been the intention of some friends of Jean Jacques to give him a cheer when he left, and even his sullen local creditors, now that the worst had come, were disposed to give him a good send-off; but the incident of the canary in its cage gave a turn to the feeling of the crowd which could not be resisted.

They were not a people who could cut and dry their sentiments; they were all impulse and simplicity, with an obvious cocksure shrewdness too, like that of Jean Jacques--of the old Jean Jacques.

He had been the epitome of all their faults and all their virtues.
No one cheered.

Only one person called, "Au 'voir, M'sieu' Jean Jacques!" and no one followed him--a curious, assertive, feebly-brisk, shock-headed figure in the brown velveteen jacket, which he had bought in Paris on his Grand Tour.
"What a ridiculous little man!" said a woman from Chalfonte over the water, who had been buying freely all day for her new "Manor," her husband being a member of the provincial legislature.
The words were no sooner out of her mouth than two women faced her threateningly.
"For two pins I'd slap your face," said old Mere Langlois, her great breast heaving.

"Popinjay--you, that ought to be in a cage like his canary." But Virginie Poucette also was there in front of the offender, and she also had come from Chalfonte--was born in that parish; and she knew what she was facing.
"Better carry a bird-cage and a book than carry swill to swine," she said; and madame from Chalfonte turned white, for it had been said that her father was once a swine-herd, and that she had tried her best to forget it when, with her coarse beauty, she married the well-to-do farmer who was now in the legislature.
"Hold your tongues, all of you, and look at that," said M.Manotel, who had joined the agitated group.