Summary of the of the book the tale of two cities chapter 8
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The Marquis drives through a small, poor village to his chateau. In the countryside, he is considered the Monseigneur. The people of the village are desperately poor because of all of the taxes they pay, including taxes to the Marquis. They are reduced to eating grass, leaves, and sometimes dirt. There are no dogs and few children. The Marquis sees one of them staring at his carriage and stops to ask what he's looking at. He is a mender of roads, who says that someone was hanging under the carriage on its chain, covered in dust, but isn't there anymore. The Marquis asks his servant, Gabelle, to find the person who ran away and drives on.
As his carriage slows beside a graveyard, a woman stops him with a petition about her husband. He responds, "What of your husband, the forester? ... He cannot pay something?" She tells him her husband is dead. "Well! He is quiet. Can I restore him to you?" She explains that he is dead, that like so many others he has "die[d] of want." "Again, well?" replies the Marquis, "Can I feed them?" The woman begs him for a morsel of wood or stone to mark her husband's grave so she can tell where he is buried when she comes back to mourn him. The Marquis drives on.
Arriving at his chateau, the Marquis asks his servant, who opens the door, whether "Monsieur Charles" has "arrived from England" yet, but learns he has not.