The town belongs to a landlord who lives in Paris, and rarely, if ever, comes here.

There are no improvements--no sanitation--but the inhabitants make no complaint.

"Absenteeism" has its compensations as well as its disadvantages.

They pay low rents, and are little troubled; the landlord drawing, perhaps, L400 a year from the whole place.

The houses are small, though neat enough in appearance, but the town has a sleepy, inert look.