But he was energetic, and did not object to difficulties--especially when they took such charming shape as in the present instance.
His meditations on this theme occupied him agreeably the rest of that week, during which time he overlooked his workmen and conferred with his architect.

Besides, his horses, his books, his domestics, and his journals arrived successively to dispel ennui.

Therefore he looked remarkably well when he jumped out of his dog-cart the ensuing Monday in front of M.des Rameures's door under the eyes of Madame de Tecle.
As the latter gently stroked with her white hand the black and smoking shoulder of the thoroughbred Fitz-Aymon, Camors was for the first time presented to the Comte de Tecle, a quiet, sad, and taciturn old gentleman.

The cure, the subprefect of the district and his wife, the tax-collector, the family physician, and the tutor completed, as the journals say, the list of the guests.
During dinner Camors, secretly excited by the immediate vicinity of Madame de Tecle, essayed to triumph over that hostility that the presence of a stranger invariably excites in the midst of intimacies which it disturbs.

His calm superiority asserted itself so mildly it was pardoned for its grace.