Page 125 - les-miserables

gloire had the air of a peasant, and Mademoiselle Baptistine
that of a lady. Madame Magloire wore a white quilted cap,
a gold Jeannette cross on a velvet ribbon upon her neck, the
only bit of feminine jewelry that there was in the house, a
very white fichu puffing out from a gown of coarse black
woollen stuff, with large, short sleeves, an apron of cotton
cloth in red and green checks, knotted round the waist with
a green ribbon, with a stomacher of the same attached by
two pins at the upper corners, coarse shoes on her feet, and
yellow stockings, like the women of Marseilles. Mademoi-
selle Baptistine’s gown was cut on the patterns of 1806, with
a short waist, a narrow, sheath-like skirt, puffed sleeves,
with flaps and buttons. She concealed her gray hair under a
frizzed wig known as the baby wig. Madame Magloire had
an intelligent, vivacious, and kindly air; the two corners of
her mouth unequally raised, and her upper lip, which was
larger than the lower, imparted to her a rather crabbed and
imperious look. So long as Monseigneur held his peace, she
talked to him resolutely with a mixture of respect and free-
dom; but as soon as Monseigneur began to speak, as we have
seen, she obeyed passively like her mistress. Mademoiselle
Baptistine did not even speak. She confined herself to obey-
ing and pleasing him. She had never been pretty, even when
she was young; she had large, blue, prominent eyes, and a
long arched nose; but her whole visage, her whole person,
breathed forth an ineffable goodness, as we stated in the be-
ginning. She had always been predestined to gentleness; but
faith, charity, hope, those three virtues which mildly warm
the soul, had gradually elevated that gentleness to sancti-

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