He was the first to import into the Rougon-Macquart stock a fat face with regular features, which showed all the coldness of a grave yet not over-intelligent nature.

This boy grew up with the determination of some day making an independent position for himself.

He attended school diligently, and tortured his dull brain to force a little arithmetic and spelling into it.

After that he became an apprentice, repeating much the same efforts with a perseverance that was the more meritorious as it took him a whole day to learn what others acquired in an hour.
[*] Figures prominently in _La Terre_ (_The Earth_) and _La Debacle_ (_The Downfall_).
As long as these poor little things remained a burden to the house, Antoine grumbled.

They were useless mouths that lessened his own share.
He vowed, like his brother, that he would have no more children, those greedy creatures who bring their parents to penury.