Why, she was growing jolly stupid nowadays! How could she take up with such an ape?
For, indeed, Fontan was a regular ape with that great swingeing nose of his.

Oh, he had an ugly mug! Besides, the man knocked her about too! "It's possible I like him as he is," she one day made answer in the quiet voice peculiar to a woman who confesses to an abominable taste.
Bosc contented himself by dining with them as often as possible.

He shrugged his shoulders behind Prulliere's back--a pretty fellow, to be sure, but a frivolous! Bosc had on more than one occasion assisted at domestic scenes, and at dessert, when Fontan slapped Nana, he went on chewing solemnly, for the thing struck him as being quite in the course of nature.

In order to give some return for his dinner he used always to go into ecstasies over their happiness.

He declared himself a philosopher who had given up everything, glory included.