What a stir there'll be! oh! won't there! Go along, you fellows, and see if the stoves are drawing properly.
Heavens and earth! our world is coming down about our ears." "That poor young one," said Laurent, "had a sort of sunstroke when he heard that Jesuit of a Dutocq had got here before him." "I have told him a dozen times,--for after all one ought to tell the truth to an honest clerk, and what I call an honest clerk is one like that little fellow who gives us 'recta' his ten francs on New-Year's day,--I have said to him again and again: The more you work the more they'll make you work, and they won't promote you.

He doesn't listen to me; he tires himself out staying here till five o'clock, an hour after all the others have gone.

Folly! he'll never get on that way! The proof is that not a word has been said about giving him an appointment, though he has been here two years.

It's a shame! it makes my blood boil." "Monsieur Rabourdin is very fond of Monsieur Sebastien," said Laurent.
"But Monsieur Rabourdin isn't a minister," retorted Antoine; "it will be a hot day when that happens, and the hens will have teeth; he is too--but mum! When I think that I carry salaries to those humbugs who stay away and do as they please, while that poor little La Roche works himself to death, I ask myself if God ever thinks of the civil service.
And what do they give you, these pets of Monsieur le marechal and Monsieur le duc?
'Thank you, my dear Antoine, thank you,' with a gracious nod! Pack of sluggards! go to work, or you'll bring another revolution about your ears.

Didn't see such goings-on under Monsieur Robert Lindet.