The Mother Superior's Twenty-Five Francs

He really was comic, old Pavilly, with his great spider legs, his little body, his long arms, and his pointed beard, surmounted by a flame of red hair on the top of his skull.

He was a clown, a peasant clown, a born clown, born to play tricks, to raise laughter, to play parts, simple parts, since he was the son of a peasant, and a peasant himself, hardly able to read. Oh, yes, the good God had created him to amuse other people, the poor devils belonging to the countryside, who had no theatres and no feasts; and he amused them with all his might and main. In the café, they stood him drinks to keep him there, and he went on drinking without turning a hair, laughing and joking, playing tricks on everyone without annoying a single soul, while the onlookers rolled with laughter.