Apparently very economical, the better to deceive his mother and Madame Descoings, he wore a hat that was greasy, with the nap rubbed off at the edges, patched boots, a shabby overcoat, on which the red ribbon scarcely showed so discolored and dirty was it by long service at the buttonhole and by the spatterings of coffee and liquors.
His buckskin gloves, of a greenish tinge, lasted him a long while; and he only gave up his satin neckcloth when it was ragged enough to look like wadding.

Mariette was the sole object of the fellow's love, and her treachery had greatly hardened his heart.

When he happened to win more than usual, or if he supped with his old comrade, Giroudeau, he followed some Venus of the slums, with brutal contempt for the whole sex.
Otherwise regular in his habits, he breakfasted and dined at home and came in every night about one o'clock.

Three months of this horrible life restored Agathe to some degree of confidence.
As for Joseph, who was working at the splendid picture to which he afterwards owed his reputation, he lived in his atelier.

On the prediction of her grandson Bixiou, Madame Descoings believed in Joseph's future glory, and she showed him every sort of motherly kindness; she took his breakfast to him, she did his errands, she blacked his boots.
The painter was never seen till dinner-time, and his evenings were spent at the Cenacle among his friends.