GABET (MERE), an old woman who assisted the Huberts with their washing. She became ill, and being in great poverty, was assisted by Angelique, and later by Felicien. Le Reve.

GAGA, an elderly demi-mondaine who had flourished in the reign of Louis Philippe, and was still notorious in the Second Empire. She had a daughter named Lili, who became the mistress of the Marquis Chouard. Nana.

GAGEBOIS, glass-works at Montsou. The strike of miners led to the fires being extinguished. Germinal.

GAGNIERE, an artist, one of the band of Claude Lantier. He belonged to Melun, where his well-to-do parents, who were both dead, had left him two houses; and he had learned painting, unassisted, in the forest of Fontainebleau. His landscapes were conscientious and excellent in intent, but his real passion was music. Becoming more and more engrossed in this, he took lessons in playing the piano from a middle-aged lady whom he married soon afterwards. He established himself at Melun in one of his two houses, going to Paris two or three times a month to attend a concert, and he continued to exhibit each year at the Salon one of his little studies of the banks of the Seine. L’Oeuvre.

GALISSARD, a haberdasher of Plassans, whose daughter married Professor Lalubie. She was a pretty girl to whom Claude Lantier and Sandoz used to sing serenades.

GARCONNET, a Legitimist who was Mayor of Plassans at the time of the Coup d’Etat. He was taken prisoner by the insurgents. La Fortune des Rougon.

GARTLAUBEN (VON), captain in the Prussian Army. During the occupation of Sedan he was billeted on Delaherche. He was a person of some importance, as his uncle had been made Governor-General at Rheims, and exercised sovereign power over the district. Fascinated by Gilberte Delaherche, his chief wish was to be taken for a man of refinement, and not for a barbarous soldier. He was able to render some services to the Delaherches, and to make the Prussian occupation easier for them. La Debacle.

GASC, proprietor of a racing-stable. One of his horses, named Boum, ran in the Grand Prix de Paris. Nana.

GASPARINE, a tall, handsome girl of Plassans, with whom Achille Campardon fell in love. She had no money, however, and he married her cousin Rose Domergue, who had a dowry of thirty thousand francs. Tears and recriminations followed, and Gasparine went to Paris, where for some time she had a situation in the shop of Madame Hedouin. Madame Campardon having fallen into ill-health, her husband returned to his first love, and a liaison existed between him and Gasparine for a considerable time. Ultimately she went to live with the Campardons, and managed their household affairs. Pot-Bouille.

GASTON was the son of a general, and was the same age as the Prince Imperial, though much stronger than he. The Emperor frequently made inquiries regarding the child. Son Excellence Eugene Rougon.

GAUDE, bugler in the 106th regiment of the line. “He was a big, skinny, sorrowful, taciturn man, without a hair on his chin, and blew his instrument with the lungs of a whirlwind.” On the 1st September, during the defence of the Hermitage, he became seized with the madness of heroism, and continued to blow after his comrades had been slain and until he himself was shot down. La Debacle.

GAUDIBERT (ISIDORE), Mayor of Barbeville since 1850, wrote some poetry on political subjects, and was decorated by the Minister of State, Eugene Rougon. Son Excellence Eugene Rougon.

GAUDRON, husband of Madame Gaudron. He was described as having the sluggishness of a beast. L’Assommoir.

GAUDRON (MADAME), a wool-carder who lived with her husband and their large family in the same tenement-house as the Coupeaus and the Lorilleux. She was one of the guests at the Coupeaus’ wedding. L’Assommoir.

GAUDRON FILS, the eldest child of the Gaudrons, was a journeyman carpenter. L’Assommoir.

GAUJEAN (M.), a silk manufacturer of Lyons who was dissatisfied with the monopoly created by the large establishments, such as that of Octave Mouret, and thought it could be broken by the creation of special shops in the neighbourhood, where the public could find a large and varied choice of articles. With this object he assisted Robineau to purchase Vincard’s business by giving him credit to a large amount; the scheme was not successful, and he lost heavily. Au Bonheur des Dames.

GAUTIER, a wine-grower at Saint-Eutrope, with whom Francois Mouret had dealings at one time. La Conquete de Plassans.

GAVARD, originally kept a rotisserie or poultry-roasting establishment in the Rue Saint-Jacques, at which time he became acquainted with Florent and Quenu. In 1856 he retired from this business, and to amuse himself took a stall in the poultry-market. “Thenceforth he lived amidst ceaseless tittle-tattle, acquainted with every little scandal in the neighbourhood.” Gavard was a leading spirit in the revolutionary circle which met in Lebigre’s wine-shop, and was the means of bringing Florent to attend the meetings there. He was arrested at the same time as Florent and was transported. Le Ventre de Paris.

GAVAUDAN (JOSEPHINE), a market-woman of Plassans who married Antoine Macquart in 1826. She was much addicted to drink, but worked in order to keep her husband in idleness. She died in 1850. La Fortune des Rougon.

GEDEON, an ass which belonged to Mouche. It was very mischievous, and on one occasion got access to a vat of new wine, with the result that it became extremely drunk. La Terre.

GEORGES, a young man whose acquaintance Renee Saccard made by chance while walking one day on the Quai Saint-Paul. Her fancy for him passed without her ever having asked his family name. La Curee.

GERALDINE, a character in La Petite Duchesse, played by Clarisse Besnus at the Theatre des Varietes. It was originally intended that the part should be played by Nana. Nana.

GILQUIN (THEODORE), a lodger at Madame Correur’s hotel at the same time as Eugene Rougon and Du Poizat. A man of shady character, he was frequently employed by Rougon, and by a fortunate accident was able to give him warning of the Orsini plot against the life of the Emperor. He was rewarded with the appointment of Commissary of Police at Niort. On the order of Rougon, he arrested Martineau, Madame Correur’s brother. He was removed from his position on account of having compromised himself by taking a bribe to procure a conscript exemption from service. Son Excellence Eugene Rougon.

GIRAUD (TATA) kept at Plassans a boarding-school for children, where the sculptor Mahoudeau had known Pierre Sandoz and other comrades who met later in Paris. L’Oeuvre.

GODARD (ABBE), cure of Bazoches-le-Doyen. The authorities of Rognes, which was in his parish, refused to provide for a priest of their own, and Abbe Godard, in order to perform Mass, had to walk each Sunday the three kilometres which separated the two communes. He was a short, stout man of hasty temper, who was disgusted with the indifference and irreligion of his parishioners, and his services were the shortest and baldest possible. In spite of his temper, he had, however, a passion for the miserable, and to these he gave everything—his money, his linen, almost the clothes off his back. La Terre.

GODEBOEUF, a seller of herbs who occupied the shop in Rue Pirouette which formerly belonged to Gradelle, the pork-butcher. Le Ventre de Paris.

GODEMARD, a pupil of Dequersonniere, the architect. See Gorju. L’Oeuvre.

GOMARD, the keeper of a working-man’s cafe in Rue de la Femme-sans-Tete, under the sign Au Chien de Montargis. Claude Lantier occasionally took his meals there. L’Oeuvre.

GONIN, a family of fisher-folks who lived at Bonneville. It consisted of Gonin, his wife, and one little girl. A cousin of the wife, named Cuche, came to live with them after his house had been washed away by the sea. Gonin soon after fell into bad health, and his wife and Cuche treated him so badly that the police talked of an inquiry. Pauline Quenu tried to reform the little girl, who had been allowed to grow up wild. La Joie de Vivre.

GORJU, a pupil of Dequersonniere, and himself a future architect. On one of the walls of the studio one could read this brief statement: “The 7th June, Gorju has said that he cared nothing for Rome. Signed, Godemard.” L’Oeuvre.

GOUJET, a blacksmith from the Departement du Nord, who came to Paris and got employment in a manufactory of bolts. “Behind the silent quietude of his life lay buried a great sorrow: his father in a moment of drunken madness had killed a fellow-workman with a crowbar, and after arrest had hanged himself in his cell with a pocket-handkerchief.” Goujet and his mother, who lived with him, always seemed to feel this horror weighing upon them, and did their best to redeem it by strict uprightness. “He was a giant of twenty-three, with rosy cheeks and blue eyes, and the strength of a Hercules. In the workshop he was known as Gueule d’Or, on account of his yellow beard. With his square head, his heavy frame, torpid after the hard work at the anvil, he was like a great animal, dull of intellect and good of heart.” For a time the Coupeaus were his neighbours, and he came to love Gervaise with a perfectly innocent affection, which survived all disillusionments, and subsisted up to the time of her death. It was he who lent her money to start a laundry, and afterwards repeatedly assisted her when in difficulties. L’Assommoir.

GOUJET (MADAME), mother of the preceding, was a lace-mender, and lived with her son in part of the house first occupied by the Coupeaus. She showed much kindness to them, though she was distressed by her son’s infatuation for Gervaise, and did not altogether approve of his lending her money to start a laundry. Notwithstanding this, she continued to assist Gervaise until neglect of work entrusted made it impossible to do so longer. She died in October, 1868, of acute rheumatism. L’Assommoir.

GOURAUD (BARON), was made a Baron by Napoleon I, and was a Senator under Napoleon III. “With his vast bulk, his bovine face, his elephantine movements, he boasted a delightful rascality; he sold himself majestically, and committed the greatest infamies in the name of duty and conscience.” La Curee.

GOURD (M.), at one time valet to the Duc de Vaugelade, and afterwards doorkeeper in the tenement-house in Rue de Choiseul which belonged to M. Vabre, and was occupied by the Campardons, the Josserands, and others. He spent much of his time spying on the tenants, and posed as guardian of the morals of the establishment. Pot-Bouille.

GOURD (MADAME), wife of the preceding. She was the widow of a bailiff at Mort-la-Ville, and she and her present husband owned a house there. She was exceedingly stout, and suffered from an affection of the legs which prevented her from walking. Pot-Bouille.

GRADELLE, brother of Madame Quenu, senr., and uncle of Florent and Quenu. He was a prosperous pork-butcher in Paris, and after Florent’s arrest he took young Quenu into his business. He died suddenly, without leaving a will, and Quenu succeeded to the business, and to a considerable sum of money which was found hidden at the bottom of a salting-tub. Le Ventre de Paris.

GRAND-DRAGON (LE), one of the band of brigands led by Beau-Francois. La Terre.

GRANDE (LA), elder daughter of Joseph Casimir Fouan, and sister of Pere Fouan, Michel Mouche, and Laure Badeuil. Married to a neighbour, Antoine Pechard, she brought to him seven acres of land against eighteen which he had of his own. Early left a widow, she turned out her only daughter, who, against her mother’s will, wished to marry a poor lad named Vincent Bouteroue. The girl and her husband died of want, leaving two children, Palmyre and Hilarion, whom their grandmother refused to assist. At eighty years of age, respected and feared by the Fouan family, not for her age but for her fortune, she exacted the obedience of all, and still directed the management of her land. She bitterly reproached her brother Louis for dividing his property between his children, and warned him that he need not come to her when they had turned him into the street, a threat which she carried into effect. She took delight in the squabbles of the Fouan family, exciting their cupidity by promising them a share of her property at her death. Meantime she made a will which was so complicated that she hoped it would lead to endless lawsuits amongst her heirs. La Terre.

GRANDGUILLOT, a notary at Plassans. He embezzled large sums belonging to his clients, among whom was Dr. Pascal Rougon, and thereafter fled to Switzerland. Le Docteur Pascal.

GRANDJEAN (M.), son of a sugar-refiner of Marseilles. He fell in love with Helene Mouret, a young girl of great beauty, but without fortune; his friends bitterly opposed the match, and a secret marriage followed, the young couple finding it difficult to make ends meet, till the death of an uncle brought them ten thousand francs a year. By this time Grandjean had taken an intense dislike for Marseilles, and decided to remove to Paris. The day after his arrival there he was seized with illness, and eight days later he died, leaving his wife with one daughter, a young girl of ten. Une Page d’Amour.

GRANDJEAN (MADAME HELENE), wife of the preceding. See Helene Mouret.

GRANDJEAN (JEANNE), born 1842, was the daughter of M. Grandjean and Helene Mouret, his wife. She inherited much of the neurosis of her mother’s family along with a consumptive tendency derived from her father, and from an early age had been subject to fits and other nervous attacks. One of these illnesses, more sudden and severe than usual, caused her mother to summon Doctor Deberle, and thus led to an intimacy which had disastrous results. Jeanne’s jealous affection for her mother amounted almost to a mania, and when she came to suspect that Dr. Deberle had become in a sense her rival, she worked herself into such a nervous state that she exposed herself to a chill, and having become seriously ill, died in a few days, at the age of thirteen. Une Page d’Amour.

GRANDMORIN (LE PRESIDENT), one of the directors of the Western Railway Company. “Born in 1804, substitute at Digne on the morrow of the events in 1830, then at Fontainebleau, then at Paris, he had afterwards filled the posts of procurator at Troyes, advocate-general at Rennes, and finally first president at Rouen. A multi-millionaire, he had been member of the County Council since 1855, and on the day he retired he had been made Commander of the Legion of Honour.” He owned a mansion at Paris in Rue du Rocher, and often resided with his sister, Madame Bonnehon, at Doinville. His private life was not unattended by scandal, and his relations with Louisette, the younger daughter of Madame Misard, led to her death. A somewhat similar connection with Severine Aubry, a ward of his own, had less immediately serious consequences, as he arranged for her marriage to Roubaud, an employee of the railway company, whom he took under his protection. Three years later Roubaud learned the truth by chance, and murdered Grandmorin in the Havre express between Malaunay and Barentin. The President left a fortune of over three and a half million francs, among other legacies being one to Severine Roubaud of the mansion-house of Croix-de-Maufras. La Bete Humaine.

GRANDMORIN (BERTHE), daughter of the preceding, was the wife of a magistrate, M. de Lachesnaye. She was a narrow-minded and avaricious woman, who affected ignorance of her father’s real character, and the influence of her husband tended to increase her meanness. After the murder of President Grandmorin, when vague suspicions fell on Roubaud, Berthe took up a position antagonistic to her old play-fellow Severine Roubaud, in the hope that a legacy left by Grandmorin to her would be cut down. La Bete Humaine.

GRANDSIRE (M.), the justice of peace who assisted the Huberts in making the necessary arrangements for their adoption of Angelique. Le Reve.

GRANOUX (ISIDORE), one of the group of conservatives who met in Pierre Rougon’s yellow room to declaim against the Republic. La Fortune des Rougon.

GRAS (MADAME), an old lady living in the Rue des Orties, who boarded and lodged young children for a small sum. When Denise Baudu got a situation in “The Ladies’ Paradise,” she put her young brother Pepe under the charge of Madame Gras for a time. Au Bonheur des Dames.

GREGOIRE (CECILE), daughter of Leon Gregoire. Her parents were devoted to her, and brought her up in happy ignorance, allowing her to do much as she liked. They taught her to be charitable, and made her dispense their little gifts to the poor; these were always in kind, as they held that money was likely to be misused. When the great strike broke out at Montsou, Cecile could comprehend nothing of the revolt of the poor, or the fury with which they regarded those better off than themselves, and when she fell into the hands of a fierce crowd was almost paralysed under the attack of La Brule and of Pere Bonnemort, from which she escaped with difficulty. A little later she chanced to call on a charitable errand at Maheu’s house, and unfortunately was left alone for a few moments with Bonnemort, who was now supposed to be helpless. The sight of her seemed, however, to waken memories in the old man, for in an accession of madness he found strength to throw himself upon the poor girl and strangle her. Germinal.

GREGOIRE (EUGENE), grandfather of Leon Gregoire. He inherited the share in the Montsou mine bought by his father, but the dividends at that time were small, and as he had foolishly invested the remainder of the paternal fortune in a company that came to grief, he lived meanly enough. The share passed to his son Felicien. Germinal.

GREGOIRE (FELICIEN), son of the preceding and father of Leon Gregoire. The family fortune began with him, for the value of the share in the Montsou mine had greatly increased, and he was able to buy the dismembered estate of Piolaine, which he acquired as national property for a ludicrous sum. However, bad years followed; it was necessary to await the conclusion of the revolutionary catastrophes, and afterwards Napoleon’s bloody fall. The little fortune of Felicien Gregoire passed to his son Leon. Germinal.

GREGOIRE (HONORE), great-grandfather of Leon Gregoire. He was in 1760 steward on the estate of Piolaine, a property which belonged to Baron Desrumaux. When the Montsou treaty was made, Honore, who had laid up savings to the amount of some fifty thousand francs, yielded tremblingly to his master’s unshakable faith. He gave up ten thousand francs, and took a share in the Montsou Company, though with the fear of robbing his children of that sum. When he died his share passed to his son Eugene. Germinal.

GREGOIRE (LEON), great-grandson of Honore Gregoire. It was he who profited at a stupefying rate of progress by the timid investment of his ancestor. Those poor ten thousand francs grew and multiplied with the company’s prosperity. Since 1820 they had brought in cent for cent ten thousand francs. In 1844 they had produced twenty thousand; in 1850, forty. During two years the dividend had reached the prodigious figure of fifty thousand francs; the value of the share, quoted at the Lille Bourse at a million, had centrupled in a century. Six months later an industrial crisis broke out; the share fell to six hundred thousand francs. But Leon refused to be alarmed, for he maintained an obstinate faith in the mine. When the great strike broke out he would not be persuaded of its seriousness, and refused to admit any danger, until he saw his daughter struck by a stone and savagely assaulted by the crowd. Afterwards he desired to show the largeness of his views, and spoke of forgetting and forgiving everything. With his wife and daughter Cecile he went to carry assistance to the Maheus, a family who had suffered sadly in the strike. Cecile was unfortunately left alone with old Bonnemort, Maheu’s father, who in a sudden frenzy attacked the girl and strangled her. This terrible blow entirely shadowed the lives of Gregoire and his wife. Germinal.

GREGOIRE (MADAME LEON), wife of the preceding, was the daughter of a druggist at Marchiennes. She was a plain, penniless girl, whom he adored, and who repaid him with happiness. She shut herself up in her household, having no other will but her husband’s. No difference of tastes separated them, their desires were mingled in one idea of comfort; and they had thus lived for forty years, in affection and little mutual services. Germinal.

GRESHAM, a jockey who, it was said, had always bad luck. He rode Lusignan in the Grand Prix de Paris. Nana.

GROGNET, a perfumer in Rue de Grammont, whose business was ruined by the growth of Octave Mouret’s great establishment. Au Bonheur des Dames.

GROSBOIS, a Government surveyor who had also a small farm at Magnolles, a little village near Rognes. Liable to be summoned from Orgeres to Beaugency for purposes of survey, he left the management of his own land to his wife, and in the course of these constant excursions he acquired such a habit of drinking that he was never seen sober. That mattered little, however; the more drunk he was the better he seemed to see; he never made a wrong measurement or an error in calculation. People listened to him with respect, for he had the reputation of being a sly, acute man. La Terre.

GUENDE (MADAME DE), a friend of the Saccards. She was a woman well known in the society of the Second Empire. La Curee.

GUEULE-D’OR, the sobriquet of Goujet. L’Assommoir.

GUEULIN, nephew of Narcisse Bachelard, was a clerk in an insurance office. Directly after office hours he used to meet his uncle, and never left him, going the round of all the cafes in his wake. “Behind the huge, ungainly figure of the one you were sure to see the pale, wizened features of the other.” He said that he avoided all love affairs, as they invariably led to trouble and complications, but he was ultimately caught by his uncle in compromising circumstances with Mademoiselle Fifi, who was a protegee of the old man. Bachelard insisted on their marriage, and gave the girl a handsome dowry. Pot-Bouille.

GUIBAL (MADAME), wife of a barrister well known at the Palais de Justice, who led, it was said, a somewhat free life. The husband and wife were never seen together, and Madame Guibal consoled herself with M. De Boves, from whom she derived such large sums of money that he found difficulty in carrying on his own establishment. She was a tall, thin woman, with red hair, and a somewhat cold, selfish expression. Au Bonheur des Dames.

GUICHON (MADEMOISELLE), the office-keeper at the railway station at Havre. She was a slim, fair woman about thirty years of age, who owed her post to M. Dabadie, the chief station-master, with whom it was generally believed she was on intimate terms. Nevertheless Madame Lebleu, who lived on the same corridor and kept perpetual watch, had never been able to discover anything. La Bete Humaine.

GUIGNARD, a peasant who belonged to the same village as Zephyrin Lacour. He desired to sell his house, and Zephyrin and Rosalie, his sweetheart, looked forward to buying it. Une Page d’Amour.

GUILLAUME, a peasant of Rognes. He owned a piece of land beside the hovel of Hyacinthe Fouan. La Terre.

GUILLAUME, a young swineherd at La Borderie. He afterwards became a soldier. La Terre.

GUIRAUD (M. DE), a magistrate of Paris, who was a friend of Doctor Deberle and visited at his house. Une Page d’Amour.

GUIRAUD (MADAME DE), wife of the preceding. She was on intimate terms with Madame Deberle, and took part in the amateur theatricals arranged by that lady. Une Page d’Amour.

GUIRAUDE (MADAME), mother of Sophie and Valentin, patients of Dr. Pascal. Her husband died of phthisis, and she herself suffered from a slow decomposition of the blood. She died soon after her son Valentin. Le Docteur Pascal.

GUNDERMANN, the great Jew banker, master of the Bourse and of the financial world. He was a man of over sixty years of age, who had long suffered from ill-health. Constantly engaged in business of the greatest magnitude, he never went to the Bourse himself; indeed, he even pretended that he sent no official representatives there. He was not on friendly terms with Saccard, and when the Universal Bank was started he placed himself in antagonism towards it. The wild speculation in the shares of the bank gave him his chance; his principle was that when a share rose above its true value a reaction was bound to follow. Accordingly, when the bank shares rose to two thousand francs he began to sell, and though Saccard by steady buying forced them to over three thousand francs, he continued to sell. His losses meantime were, of course, enormous, but having got information through Baroness Sandorff that Saccard’s resources were at an end, he made a final effort, with the result that a panic ensued, the price of the shares broke, and Saccard, along with the bank, was ruined. L’Argent.

GUNTHER (OTTO), captain in the Prussian Guard. He was a cousin of Weiss on the mother’s side. His feelings were strongly anti-French, and he refused to give any assistance to Henriette Weiss after the death of her husband, when she was searching for his body. La Debacle.

GUSTAVE, Maxime Saccard’s hairdresser. La Curee.

GUTMANN, a soldier in the Prussian Army, who took part in the attack on Bazeilles. It was he who tore Henriette Weiss from the arms of her husband, who, being a civilian, was about to be executed for firing upon the Prussian troops. Henriette found him later in the ambulance at Remilly. He was unable to speak, a ball having carried away half his tongue, and they could only guess from the sounds he made that his name was Gutmann. Henriette, moved by pity, remained with him to the end, and she alone followed him to the place of burial. La Debacle.

GUYOT (ABBE), a priest of Saint-Eutrope. He took duty temporarily at Artaud while Abbe Mouret was ill. La Faute de l’Abbe Mouret.

GUYOT-LAPLANCHE, a man of considerable importance in the Second Empire, whom Clorinde Balbi gained to the cause of Eugene Rougon. Son Excellence Eugene Rougon.