Nevertheless, the famous "Manual" continued to make very slow progress, for Rodolphe had no genius whatever for this kind of literature.

The uncle avenged himself for this lazy indifference on the great subject of chimneys by making his nephew undergo a host of annoyances.

Sometimes he cut short his commons, and frequently stopped the supply of tobacco.
One Sunday, after having sweated blood and ink upon the great chapter of ventilators, Rodolphe broke the pen, which was burning his fingers, and went out to walk--in his "park." As if on purpose to plague him, and excite his envy the more, he could not cast a single look about him without perceiving the figure of a smoker on every window.
On the gilt balcony of a new house opposite, an exquisite in his dressing gown was biting off the end of an aristocratic "Pantellas" cigar.

A story above, an artist was sending before him an odorous cloud of Turkish tobacco from his amber-mouthed pipe.

At the window of a _brasserie_, a fat German was crowning a foaming tankard, and emitting, with the regularity of a machine, the dense puffs that escaped from his meershaum.