Page 221 - madame-bovary

Charles after dinner, seeing her gloomy, proposed, by
way of distraction, to take her to the chemist’s, and the first
person she caught sight of in the shop was the taxcollector
again. He was standing in front of the counter, lit up by the
gleams of the red bottle, and was saying—
‘Please give me half an ounce of vitriol.’
‘Justin,’ cried the druggist, ‘bring us the sulphuric acid.’
Then to Emma, who was going up to Madame Homais’
room, ‘No, stay here; it isn’t worth while going up; she is
just coming down. Warm yourself at the stove in the mean-
time. Excuse me. Good-day, doctor,’ (for the chemist much
enjoyed pronouncing the word ‘doctor,’ as if addressing an-
other by it reflected on himself some of the grandeur that he
found in it). ‘Now, take care not to upset the mortars! You’d
better fetch some chairs from the little room; you know
very well that the arm-chairs are not to be taken out of the
drawing-room.’
And to put his arm-chair back in its place he was darting
away from the counter, when Binet asked him for half an
ounce of sugar acid.
‘Sugar acid!’ said the chemist contemptuously, ‘don’t
know it; I’m ignorant of it! But perhaps you want oxalic acid.
It is oxalic acid, isn’t it?’
Binet explained that he wanted a corrosive to make him-
self some copperwater with which to remove rust from his
hunting things.
Emma shuddered. The chemist began saying—
‘Indeed the weather is not propitious on account of the
damp.’

0 Madame Bovary