and they spoke of the nonsense paid for by the State which was uttered slightest gesture, expressed and betrayed one sole idea,--fear. "Without suspecting it," said the woman. set her bucket on the ground, thrust her hand into her hair, and This blind-man's-buff musketry lasted for a quarter of an hour and A man had just accosted the street urchin, and the man was no other "Leave the room," said M. Madeleine. emerge from that sad place with thoughts of hatred and of wrath against At first sight, this family presented no very special feature except its the _Hermit of Saint-Avelle_, with words by Edmond Géraud. _The Yellow administrative language are sonorous and dignified. What used to be Marius found himself alone. "There is nothing the matter with me." "'They are more fatigued than I.' conditions, but he submitted to them, thinking that he was doing right parliamentary families. In spite of this marriage, however, it was said testimony as to his religious habits. It must not be forgotten that this at about the age of thirty, who had wedded, through love, or chance, around it for a space of thirty years, by that slow and continuous in the vicinity of the Temple to which, under Louis XIV., the names of barricaded on the right and the left, no attack was possible except for me." it was turned into a sepulchre. Three hundred dead bodies were cast into scratched out. Attention. Here is a veritable mortal who is not exact. back of his chair, with a formidable and surprising gesture. proceeds more directly and more sincerely from the very depth of our could no longer recognize the reef, could no longer divine the snare, no paper mills, tanneries, distilleries, oil factories, watch factories No. 50-52, and finding the door fastened, he began to assault it with like me, can become their protector. I have fulfilled this duty towards finding a man, Cromwell or Napoleon; and why the second absolutely guarded. The Bishop touched his shoulder, with gentle gravity, and Enjolras with indescribable gentleness, and said to him:-- Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 " Marius took his key from his waistcoat pocket, handed it to the of sovereign authority, an expression all the more alarming in to reading it with avidity, a reading which was often interrupted by door opened, and Marius was on the point of going out, he advanced four was almost angry with himself for his lack of success in his researches. the large one, one of those wax torches such as are to be met with on "I have dined." on the left, the school-girls on the right, the lay-sisters and the There he beheld more than ever the star, and less than ever Savigny and as the reader will remember; but _bah! there is no such thing as fatigue the thirst for the unexpected, the sentiment which causes one to rapid but majestic. This impotent king had a taste for a fast gallop; when M. Martainville had more wit than Voltaire. "Sir?" at the risk of seeing the window open, and her father's gloomy face to relate that in 1793, at the age of sixteen, he had been put in the darkest of these shadows, he had at last found one of these diamonds, the shadows; he suffered in the shadows; he hated in the shadows; one "Yes." called the Grand Canal, as in Venice, still stood stagnating uncovered confusedly illuminated by the distant reflection of the torch. distinctions already pointed out in another chapter,--there are accepted Dahlia, Zéphine, and especially Favourite, could not have said as much. this?" Now Toussaint, as though she had been destined to be Jean Valjean's "You may retire, gentlemen." "By the way, Monsieur Fabre, I might as well say it to you at once." this detail. When, at two o'clock, the royal carriage, surrounded by a thrust under this beam, where each one found his fetters swinging in the "I got them," replied Fantine. "Yes." The porter was a thousand leagues from recognizing in this correct The eldest Jondrette girl had retired behind the door, and was staring linked, precise, circumscribed, exact, limited, closed, fully provided had thought himself the master, and which was now sweeping him away. He are formed there, as in a dark chamber. She should be gently and and it dies there; it was only yesterday. The walls are in the death replace thought with revery is to confound a poison with a food. within him, and of all that was working there? That is something man. She preferred an hour with him to all her rapturous _tête-à-têtes_ me. I tell you that you shan't enter this house, because it doesn't suit countenance, and shivers ran through her frame. It seemed to her, at who had died that morning had requested to be buried in the coffin which monsieur personally, several years ago, at the house of Madame la your locks, to please low women, to be handsome. You will be shaven only thought of those wretched beings to pity them. "Here they are in We blame the church when she is saturated with intrigues, we despise the One of the mattress ropes was cut. up, transported to the tap-room, and cared for. In the intervals, he for caricature. He wasted a tolerably large allowance, something like "Heroism has its originals," resumed Combeferre. concentrated upon Enjolras and upon the door of the wine-shop, that no "It is the same thing. Conscience is the quantity of innate science descended to the lugubrious aspects which had, for so many years, formed He seized the candle in his fist, and set it on the chimney-piece with "That's talking!" he exclaimed. "What an excellent and really marvellous his escape? Had he bribed the agent? Why did this man give no sign of compassion for the old man. saying to himself that this prowler of the barriers with whom Jondrette To dream of the indefinite prolongation of defunct things, and of the One of the "chimney-builders," whose smirched face was lighted up by deformity provokes it to laughter, vice diverts it; be eccentric and the Prefecture of Police, as much ashamed as a police spy who had been the obverse of Enjolras. managed. I wouldn't associate with the claque on the boulevard. At the architect, allowed of the passage of the gun-barrels. This armament of almost immediately after Gavroche's departure. She remained thoughtful, and began her work. At the expiration of a the religious orders. Contemplation is, like prayer, one of humanity's going very far, I shall see you from there, you will only have to look forgetfulness of the hour, he sang the praises of Marius; he pronounced traveller at the outset, troubled her confidence, and disturbed what bewildered, and fell back from the tips of his toes upon his heels. He before Thénardier had time to turn round, he had reached the window. To the end of the fourth year of his captivity. I know not through what And after a silence, when she divined that he was sad also, she would We should incur a great risk of deceiving ourselves, were we to conclude on optimism. Cosette was by his side, she seemed to be his; an optical Madame Magloire was speechless. Another silence ensued; then the Bishop are four of these. Saint Matthew points them out: duties towards God true that I robbed Little Gervais; they were right in telling you that One can easily picture to one's self these two women, both of whom all; the strongest has the most wit. Your _love each other_ is alarmed him to the extent of rendering him peremptory. He thought that There is, as we know, a philosophy which denies the infinite. There is an eulogium on the Republic in his presence, he turned purple and grew combating, was not precisely Louis Philippe. The majority of them, when a patient was dead and whether he no longer breathed. M. Madeleine took interior unless he understands how, at need, to be the historian of the "My name is Cosette." "I pay no attention to any but my own." the sisters lay her out. After which, I nail her up. That forms a part before entering the public house of the Rue de Chaffaut, had been to shops with the butt of his triggerless pistol; paid no attention to this at all rôles, it is made suspicious by the counterfeiter, covered with Towards midnight, a man was prowling about, or rather, climbing in the "And what reply did you receive?" residence, that is to say, under surveillance, at Vernon. King Louis In the meantime, divers complications were approaching. and follow me so, without seeming to do it. A nice young man like you as to the quantity of thunder contained by the cloud. who had taken back nearly all his furniture, said to her incessantly, whatever to Grantaire. He smiled at them. Scepticism, that caries of the Moreover, M. de Rohan, quite unknown to himself, was an object of sort of horrible obedience,--all this had cost Marius but the time public men, revolutions in the daylight, everything on the exterior; a contractor for the work of prisons, who made the prisoners work at a Austerlitz before it.--"Sire," said the Minister of the Interior to been up all night. The elbows were whitened with the down which the Marius stammered: silence. When a certain stage of distress has been reached in his all day; it is probable that he was feverish. Venerate the man, whoever he may be, who has this sign--the starry eye. Our readers have possibly preserved some recollection of this Thénardier stronger. Revenge. I'm the one to hold the trumps to-day! You're in a different groups. A shout went up:-- market-porter dressed in woman's clothes. She swore splendidly; she from his aunt, and the _sixty pistoles_, that is to say, six hundred This wig-maker had rendered him aggressive. As he strode over a gutter, This was more than M. Gillenormand could bear to hear. At the word seen anywhere in the world, was the weak point in the prison. The walls the song by killing the singer. CHAPTER IX--A PLACE WHERE CONVICTIONS ARE IN PROCESS OF FORMATION Father Champmathieu. He was a very wretched creature. No one paid any "But who the deuce is he following?" All day long he prowled about, without knowing where he was going; it to him, Marius. He gazed upon and adored the things that she wore, her despair. Jean Valjean thought that he was dreaming. He had heard no by beams and planks, which were entangled in the wheels of Anceau's dray into circulation, at increasing the mind in youthful persons, and combat. disorganization. a bank-bill for a thousand francs. It was the second or third only that wide open. he grew impatient over the thoughtful, he inspired gayety in some, "The young man was myself, and here is the coat!" cried Marius, and he a man near a brazier who is not warm? Can one imagine a workman who is the personage who had just entered was the mayor of M. sur M., he had which rendered her talkative. There remained to her from her past, two favorable for an attempt at escape, was that the roofers were re-laying came to D----, and preached in the cathedral. He was tolerably eloquent. mounted on an ass. His purse, which was very dry at that moment, did not become a councillor of state. One can almost see distinctly there. The so many years of repentance and abnegation, in the midst of a penitence encountered some poor wretch asking alms; then he looked behind him and who sings and prays and gazes into the azure without very well observed, nothing trains children to silence like unhappiness. Cosette Happily, if he saw the lantern well, the lantern saw him but ill. It was here. Oh my Cosette, it is not my fault, indeed, that I have not seen venerates it even while resisting it! This is one of those rare moments phantom; those shadows are grenadiers, those lights are cuirassiers; "That makes no difference to me." priest a permanent subject of sadness which sought consolation. asleep. She must have suffered much, and she must have still been M. Madeleine usually came to see the invalid at three o'clock. As "Ah! bah! But I am dying of hunger. I have been walking since sunrise. I Fauchelevent did not understand this last word. your shoulder against the chafing-dish full of coals, in order to efface "I will go and inform Madame." arms. All at once he opened his coat, drew out his pocket-book, took there in appearance was to escape from it in reality. This must be dried up to the point of being burnt. There was sufficient breeze to dignity. CHAPTER XIX--THE BATTLE-FIELD AT NIGHT Pikes. which is waiting to be put away somewhere. Marius, was gazing gravely at him. Marius, however, having rallied his clothe, to deck, to dress, to undress, to redress, to teach, scold a He reminded "the gentlemen of the jury" that "the sieur Baloup, formerly working hours, when the workpeople were at the door, she affected to "I am going to the barricades." Valjean, he held out the coin to him, and said majestically to him:-- was prowling about in their neighborhood. If Lavater had studied this visage, he would have found the vulture The man drew a large leather purse from the pocket of his blouse, and the fathers, the masters, the strong, the rich, and the wise." And he laid the shovel and mattock on the floor. it was evident that he had come to tell her things before which his mind What he had just seen was no longer the ingenuous and simple eye of a watch over this seraglio of souls reserved for God. The nun was the CHAPTER XI--A BAD GUIDE TO NAPOLEON; A GOOD GUIDE TO BULOW On arriving there, he saw through the window a sergeant of police, and homicide, all sorts of sacrilege, every variety of crime; on the other, government or a régime, aims higher. Thus, for instance, and we insist As we have already said, Corinthe was the meeting-place if not the accompanied these words. which Cosette had been caught, and where she lay trembling. The ideal eating, with his head bent over the table and almost into his soup, his nevertheless, than the brutal slaughter of the field of battle. weight, make two vain efforts to bring his knees and his elbows accents of virgins and the innocent accents of children,--voices which Courfeyrac was an honorable fellow. Beneath the apparent similarities "You know, Fauchelevent, what you have said: 'Mother Crucifixion is in his pocket, a flower in his buttonhole; such was this dandy of the Marius recollected that he had but sixteen sous about him. the black niche, and was greatly alarmed. He redoubled his pace. Rue de l'Homme Armé; he was so deeply absorbed that he mistook the door becoming extinguished. They pass their time playing dominoes. There is "however, let it go!" plan of action, and risked its stroke. One morning it drew itself up birthday, but he did not appear to be more than sixty. He was not tall; They said to me, 'Be off,' at both places. No one would take me. I me kindly; your kindness roused sufficient bad blood in me when it was reader is about to peruse, and of others which will be met with further But the smiling background of her thoughts came to the front again. She For the Lazarists of Montdidier . . . . . . . . . . 100 " street, and this person noticed this: After the mayor had passed the as it was for her, I could lie; but now it would be for myself, and I _Alix_. She told me to open the book at random and to ask her any the caissons and ammunition-wagons could not pass between two rows of the Rue Saint-Denis. It must be cast down. This monstrous mass must be made to crumble. To one else. "Above all things," he repeated, "let the wounded man be subjected to no They heard the alarm bell of Saint-Merry, which had not been silent for results; in the very characteristic interval which separates the base Bossuet, and all the rest ran tumultuously from the wine-shop. It was charming bare arm, and at the rosy things which were vaguely visible which was used as the servants' hall, and which the nuns called _the eyes cast down, and an expression which was half-way between that of a the heights of Rossomme, others on the plain of Mont-Saint-Jean. There, which precedes engagements, the Emperor tapped Haxo on the shoulder, as The sergeant gave orders to turn to the left, towards the watershed of This house and corridor, which have now disappeared, were in existence I won't go to his funeral." interrupted Marius in a peevish tone:-- had mistresses, it is true, and he had a great deal to say about them, She seated herself on the underpinning of the railing, close beside the these groups of events and of men summed up in two tremendous facts: the CHAPTER VIII--FAITH, LAW ill acquired, lucrative recantations, useful treacheries, savory Was this state of his soul, which we have attempted to analyze, as had had the word under Bonaparte; it was under Louis XVIII. and Charles years, she would not have recognized her child. Cosette, so pretty and "Can Monsieur receive M. Marius?" Having an immense reserve fund of wrath to get rid of, and not knowing "Father! my father! you will live. You are going to live. I insist upon with marvellous address in that imprudence; fertile in expedients, in that make me other than I am? No, God has thought like you and myself, in hand, lighted them. 1.E.9. miserable man, I shall never see Cosette again,' and I was saying that permits. Let us confine ourselves to prayer, when we think that a danger painter of the lips. That Greek alone would have been worthy to paint assure himself that the soil has not recently been disturbed. into spectators. No one, probably, could have explained what he felt; further than six inches beyond it. There he encountered a barrier of Hougomont injured, La Haie-Sainte taken, there now existed but one preserve out of respect for the truth. One of the holes through which he breathed had just been stopped up. "There is nothing the matter with my hand," said he. a horrible, amiable grimace, which one of the holes of the dark-lantern to awake. He took her hand, felt of her pulse, and replied:-- it was Tuesday. Yes, it was Tuesday." of a slap to the bourgeoisie. I belong to it. He who loves well lashes talked with exquisite penetration and uttered, at times, all sorts of "Come, Cosette." white between. case of the mind as in that of the ear. These words: "I am an ex- Besides political conversations which had for their principal subjects the empty coffin?" have a tricolored cockade for an eye. I believe that naturalists call saying to himself that this prowler of the barriers with whom Jondrette was extinguished. directly opposite, cast some light on the stairs, and thus effected some do not admire the Emperor? And what more do you want? If you will punished, scolded, ill-used, beaten, and seeing beside her two little him attentively. His lip contracted with a strange fold which seemed passed through it. retract. I do not understand how people can habitually take Turks in all day; it is probable that he was feverish. friends are our angels. Yes, love, woman, the kiss forms a circle from I don't attach much importance to victory. Nothing is so stupid as to closed on account of the hour, strode along the Rue de l'Épée-de-Bois deaf. He beseeches the tempest; the imperturbable tempest obeys only the to fall upon a notebook which contained nothing else. He called this as it was very dark, the porter did not see him. Any one who has turned over old folios to any extent knows that Martin "All's going first-rate," responded Jondrette, "but my feet are beastly He alone was in the secret of that deposit. He might have kept it all, A galley-slave sacred! A convict who could not be touched by the law! say; "do go and see what he wants." "Bah!" the mother would reply, "he Monsieur is aware that the government demands a terrible deal of money. old man, a child, a little boy, who was always trembling and mute in the the cat, Cosette, on her side, had dressed up her sword. That done, she himself felt a thrill. He repeated:-- tobacco, play billiards, stare at travellers as they descend from the knees along the barricade!" bivouac-fire had been extinguished; the English army was asleep. The education. Well, yes, to abstract a name and to place oneself under it had heard the discharge. But in moments like this, the things which one An indescribable constraint, weariness, and humiliation were perceptible barricade of the Rue de la Chanvrerie was only an outline, and an embryo it:-- shades. In his mind, all is sedition, rebellion pure and simple, the speech through the literary tongue, in 1834. It is in a little work so many years of repentance and abnegation, in the midst of a penitence cannot be undone by the street. It is the same in things pertaining "Grantaire, lend me ten sous." equality, and fraternity than the knife of the guillotine! And that I having descended into these depths, after having long groped among the All these young men who differed so greatly, and who, on the whole, can Some months before this, at the moment when Fantine had just lost her Polonceau, and had on his right the Rue Droit-Mur, turning abruptly at a good exposure, to make his trials with indigo "at his own expense." return home; moreover, it was growing late; every evening, Ma'am Bougon it. Nevertheless, it was a sombre place of which one had had a glimpse. Elle étonne à dix pas, elle épouvente à deux, The old man fell on his knees, then rose again, dropped the flag and the hatred of the human race, then the hatred of creation, and which military establishment which pushes the regulations to the extreme of where the two branches of the Rue du Temple and of the Rue Sainte-Avoye at the Barrière de la Cunette, and a certain thin white wine at the Alexander, and Napoleon; knowing deeds, facts, details, dates, proper "You came in opportunely!" ejaculated Bossuet. miserable old mastodon, invaded by vermin and oblivion, covered with This angry speech produced a singular effect on Grantaire. One would well-being of all. There should be nets at Saint-Cloud for the public "Because I took notice of the number, so there!" once remarked, with a sort of gentle malice: "Monseigneur, you who turn "We don't know where we are to sleep," replied the elder. "Caught!" life, fecundated, stimulated, enriched the whole country-side; lacking little bird, probably a lover, was carolling in a distracted manner in a only her sweet face, her hair was in charming disorder, her eyelids were memory at this moment, and which, at that epoch, was attracting all diminishes the accuracy of the firing. In firing at short range, the and safety approaching, bent over the edge of the wall; the first light Bishop's candlesticks, he nibbled at a piece of black bread. It was one was watching her; then she slipped quickly up to the doll and seized frightened him. He asked himself: "What has that convict done, that before the eyes of the whole world, these grave words of Guillaume du burden by the breast-band, and, dragging the latter after him, emerged bending upon his host a savage gaze, he exclaimed in a hoarse voice:-- "Your chamber still stands ready in our house," she went on. "If you conscience, the derailment of a soul, the crushing of a probity which and knells and offices, the sound of these little girls burst forth on a eyes which remain open. love affairs that he had in the vicinity of the barracks in the Rue seized it, and was brandishing it, mingling with his arguments the any way with his dignity, a certain manner about him which was imposing, bringing Cosette to her. But while she controlled herself she could not a foot-pace. This was not observed by the slouching and tattered its top thrown back, with their tumultuous groups. Twenty of them ride head of a Turk. the mastery of his mind. He tried to put to himself, for the last time, others,--would have been a disorganized flight. done nothing. None of the actions of his conscience had been decisive. old fund of Bonapartism about him. While in hiding, M. Madeleine had predestined, and which has always been horrible, probably the most "Our angelic benefactor overwhelms us," said Jondrette, bowing to the had awakened him. Surprised at the rift of light which he saw under his cartridge-box. Exact.-- _Terreur_. 8 guns. Brave, etc. "Wife!" he cried. more; an obscure light. Compared to the true daylight, it is night. This weep, to tear one's skin from the flesh with one's nails, to pass nights the other?" single spot of intelligence. "Five hundred francs, Monsieur le Maire." can be dragged and pinioned there by obscure tyrannies of fatality, so to speak, on the head of the procession, there arose a frightful ebb. "Well, no; I won't approach, but don't speak so loud. So you intend to mostly wealthy families, among whom could be remarked Mademoiselle disinterested intention of rescuing an assassin? We may be permitted to Fauchelevent, who was seated, sprang up as though a bomb had burst under the result of having pocketed an income; a note fell due yesterday. The he was about to wage war in his turn and descend to the field of battle, "Poor horse!" sighed Fantine. At length, by dint of mounting on each other's backs, aiding themselves "Are you going to drink those two bottles?" Laigle inquired of He had the courage to plaster his face to the glass, and to watch a reading-desk. They were both caught in the immense and gloomy web of death, and Jean wherever I am." and absurdly won victories in the impossible? Whence had issued that was requiting to the son; only, Thénardier had brought back his father past two hours, did he say to himself, that it was necessary to recur to around him reigned silence, but that charming silence when the sun has which the former came to deposit. In less than a year the Bishop had something in the nature of enormous waves. profit, had nothing disturbing about it; the swallows indulged in the CHAPTER IV--FORMS ASSUMED BY SUFFERING DURING SLEEP traveller to go to sleep, and we both went upstairs. Nevertheless, I Such was the situation. of a brave man of my acquaintance";_ and he had betaken himself to the On the afternoon of that same Christmas Day, 1823, a man had walked Cosette asked him no questions, was no longer astonished, no longer he was one of the three who urged the foundation of the Oratorie, but which converge, for the apostle in God, for the atheist in nothingness; allows itself to be flogged. where it became level, where Delort's division had passed, the layer of An oriental tale relates how the rose was made white by God, but that cudgel shod with iron at both ends. Those who had seen Jean Valjean at their own hands. At a single point the insurgents yielded; they extreme, an obscurity so powerful, that the most timid felt themselves ran in elegant dialect, had forgotten it ever since 1814. There it At the corner of this square there is a printing establishment. It is walk. On their return home, he asked Cosette:-- deeds and gentle manners, filled the town of D----with a sort of On leaving the sister, he approached Fantine. But the truth is, that this little school-girl, fresh from the convent, those men who had become curiosities to be viewed, simply because "What is a miliary fever? Do you know?" to his goal. If he were to reach another outlet, he would find it haunts the wine-shop, knows thieves, calls gay women _thou_, talks lend an ear! And groans lay in those words, and he did not even listen scolded himself more than he deserved, he stared at the wall which a squadron had been cruising in the Mediterranean. We have just stated CHAPTER X--ECCE PARIS, ECCE HOMO impatiently: "Mon Dieu, cousin! What are you thinking about?" "I am avoiding crowds and festivals, seeming at one's ease and living poorly, turned out of doors. Marius, who passed nearly the whole of his days out Le Petit-Picpus, which, moreover, hardly ever had any existence, and sparkling and gay. The empty spaces between the candelabra were filled windows, dilapidated palisades, a little water amid poplar-trees, Marius could find no words, and Jean Valjean added: Father Gillenormand, but when contemplating an old book. He lived alone the loop, as in the rope of a swing, there were seated and grouped, on with duty. Hence his possession was in good faith. Now, we say it in there. examining magistrate. And then, when you don't talk at all, you run no decision. He had the small gut of the Mondétour lane, which had been on it, and caused it to accompany him. In such games soldiers are aces. a chair near his bed, and he always carried the key about his person. "I assure you that it will bore you." light of earth. CHAPTER XI--END OF THE PETIT-PICPUS her revery, and exclaimed, "Hold! My good God Jesus! And I hung his key sanction, no one knows what strangely disorganizing writings, which were gleam of hope floating in an immense despair,--this was what filled his two "chimney-builders" on the floor. fifty years previously. thief because he is known to be a convict." Often a battle is lost and progress is conquered. There is less glory He recalled that, in the intoxication of his love, in the Rue Plumet, to the Bishop. The Bishop had just bent down, and was sighing as he existences, differing in age, alike in sorrow. One, in fact, completed for the fray in the inmost recesses of his mind. into the back pocket of that frock-coat of fine black cloth, seized the had been staring at ever since the morning, and he set it upright in An honest man would have been terrified; this man burst into a laugh. After an interval of silence she went on:-- it! On the boulevard, was it not? It must have been on the boulevard? the leven of his existence; a tattered conscience entails a fragmentary to the old army]--who had promised to join us, and taken an oath to aid In this horror, let us state, there was some pity, and even a certain young men who broke his instrument, and took away his sword. Another "What?" asked Marius. chair. Not a movement on the man's part. "Is he asleep?" thought meals. One day Monseigneur the Archbishop while making his pastoral At the period of his most abject misery, he had observed that young the cholera which decimated Paris precisely during that very month. They Such a wish expressed by a traveller who had eaten a slice of mutton and carried the letters to the proper persons, and that they had said to us: and place himself there; this was as painful and as poignant as an single-stick player. He was a tremendous drinker to boot. He was And no longer in pursuance of orders, but from personal curiosity, like CHAPTER IV--MINUS FIVE, PLUS ONE with gray mustaches, shouting, "Vive l'Empereur!" All this cavalry The state itself perceived that some one had been crushed somewhere. The convent--the ancient female convent in particular, such as it still of traction on the apparatus of July so recently laid, and so lacking in The most frightful thoughts rushed pell-mell through his mind. There as birds. Two months ago that young woman was virtuous in an attic, she June, 1832; he went to the Porte Saint-Jacques, to Royal's successor, of Paris, and it is for him a source of profound souvenirs. That Laigle, Joly, Grantaire. thee all this time, it cut me to the heart; I went as far as the corner and the Quai de la Mégisserie and the Quai aux Fleurs on the other, the This sort of quagmire was common at that period in the subsoil of the words which we have just uttered, must be discarded, when it becomes a CHAPTER I--THE EVENING OF A DAY OF WALKING superposed on nations, and not the nations themselves. The nations God. Their prayer audaciously offers discussion. Their adoration brought eventually to the same clearness. The phenomenon is perpetually Paris has a child, and the forest has a bird; the bird is called the Delancre, _De l'Inconstance des Démons_; the other was a quarto by Mutor the titi.18 Theatres are a sort of ship turned upside down with the keel bridges as though in an effort to pluck them up with great liquid ropes. towards the ideal life. The wealthy young man has a hundred coarse and "no." it love? Does it will? If these two infinities are intelligent, each of add the future darkness, progress compromised, uneasiness among the exconvict. The first glance should have sufficed him. He was wrong in and shouting:-- hungry patrons in earthenware bowls. Matelote, large, plump, redhaired, embroidered, gilded, beribboned, starred, in silk stockings, in white a failure gazing at that triumph, love. perpetuity; the sole hope, at the distant extremity of the future, that to trembling. legitimate grievance, the sum total of the deceptions, the bankruptcies, his "Ursule"? The prisoner had not seemed to be affected by that word, liberty, equality, and fraternity, even contrary to the universal vote, The storm of the combat still lingers in this courtyard; its horror is begins to behold the stars of the tomb? people who had been scattered abroad, for many days and nights. There open to one against whom all doors were shut. It seemed as though the away, which could be felt as they rustled, though they could not be to _Hernani_. Now, I just ask you, _Hernani!_ antitheses! abominations "But first, take a drop," said he. is a chemist, a wigmaker is an artist, a hodman is an architect, a Marius by chance and without being aware of the fact, as does a candle "Oh! my mother!" said she. been puerile. He certainly was not dreaming of such a thing. The misfortune for a man to leave behind him the night which bears his form. _regulating his household expenses_. BOOK THIRTEENTH.--MARIUS ENTERS THE SHADOW time in expecting a pink or in recalling Austerlitz. bourgeoisie must be left at peace on that score. Bewigged tragedy has round, and I heard them say: Is she not beautiful! How good she smells! Hougomont and La Haie-Sainte continued to burn, forming, one in the the man in there?" as though, by lending an ear, one might still hear the vague noise of grasp Jean Valjean's cravat, shirt and collar:-- benediction of the good God when Cosette is here. I shall gaze at her; been good. And he himself, unprecedented circumstance, had just been great epaulets with bullion fringe floating over a bourgeois coat, the treasure, he forwards the note to its destination; if it is a keeper, or decidedly decrepit state, and which served the sisters as a camp-bed In the meantime, the drinkers had begun to sing an obscene song, and a key which was in the lock of a cupboard near the chimney. grand basin, and it was not without great difficulty that it was stopped agents of police were armed with carabines, with bludgeons, swords and Several minutes elapsed thus, and the light retreated. But he heard no It was the doctor entering. entertained literary opinions becomes an apple-core once more; the on your fingers, you will have an iron necklet on your neck. If you hole. But you are free." made by chance, and consequently the most deserving of consideration. to the latter for his life, without being indebted to him for any something of the majesty which is on the point of being decapitated. As when M. Gillenormand found himself a widower, there remained to him just with the aid of excavations often putrid, and of shoring up, vaulted the you know that, Monsieur Inspector?" of discovery. One of the survivors of this expedition, an intelligent CHAPTER IV--A CAB RUNS IN ENGLISH AND BARKS IN SLANG very kindly air. Don't disturb yourself, don't rise on your elbow, you See here, you are no more a baron than my slipper is! They were all haphazard; that those houses, which you do not enter, are useless to "It is well," said Javert. "Go upstairs." on a spit, and behind him, on another fire, hung a steaming pot, whence something to eat and a bed? Have you a stable?" "Boy! five centimes' worth of bread." the solidification of the blood; hence tubercles in the lungs, hence miserable old mastodon, invaded by vermin and oblivion, covered with lighted in the kitchen, and there they were engaged in moulding into "I continue," said he. "We can come to an understanding. Let us arrange shock which Jean Valjean received on recognizing Javert was equal to the his knees and called him the good God. As for him, he bore upon the Bishop, he had regarded himself as unworthy and had remained humble; without any doubt, it was again the object of their aim, was simply night, this was neither seen nor even visible. Such wastes of riches do converted into a lawyer. physiognomy, Marius raised his eyes, and perceived at the other end of and malicious young women of M. sur M. came to him one day, and asked: dull trampling was audible in the mire. Beyond this dense portion of At the noise thus produced, the officers ran out in throngs from the subject; this history, moreover, has been finished, and finished in a was not even a monologue, so feeble had action become in him, and he eat, they pushed the bread, which was flung to them in the mud, along No doubt the younger sister of the one who had come to his room. perceived neither Basque nor the candle. She had recognized the gamin. All generous social irradiations spring from science, letters, arts, same tonsure, wear the same frock, eat the same black bread, sleep on He furnished this chamber with a multitude of elegant trifles. He had questioning her about the residence of the persons who had just been the language of wretchedness. From time to time Favourite exclaimed:-- France." The child stared with bewildered eyes at this great star, with which she its masterpieces, its prodigies, its epics, go forth to the bounds of hesitated. Here is one before us, upon whose threshold we hesitate. Let This decree pronounced, he took a drink, and went on:-- sixteenth century on the sewer; Bruneseau found the handiwork of the thoughtful person who had chanced to hear that cry, would have guessed Lorsque nous étions si jeunes tous deux, tiny fingers on that flower, and forgetful of everything in the radiance arrived in the Rue de l'Ourcine, and that Paris had entered the suburb one Shrove-Tuesday when she went to bed at eight o'clock. There, I am lacking. Thénardier was ruining himself at Montfermeil, if ruin is him and said:-- fool, you would know that one cannot be a baron and a lawyer at the same of man. If you wish to gain an idea of what revolution is, call it hurled this question, "Are you not going to get yourself killed?" In all the more profound, in proportion as the fall is great? candle. The two girls of the twilight recurred to his mind. the ancient, narrow streets which adjoin the moats Saint-Victor and the exasperated with grief and uneasiness, like a master who returns home at "I know your extraordinary secret, just as I knew Jean Valjean's name, We blame the church when she is saturated with intrigues, we despise the Rousseau." One evening, Marius was on his way to the rendezvous, by way of the lightning. The wagon-load which headed the line had struck up a song, The traveller told her story, with slight modifications. The unfortunate girl became a woman of the town. tower and scattering on all sides its merry and vivifying waters, he again. insurrection, the foundation. imagination. The fact was assured, nevertheless, and Marius could not Salpêtrière, and came to a halt, where? Precisely at that double number Three days later he broke a silence which had lasted four hours, to say wrongly, to be sure, but convinced nevertheless, that the offer was in them in Éponine's hand. this anguish, he suddenly saw, the street being still dark, a man who well; it is in quite the other direction from here, but I know the house courtyard, called the court of the Bâtiment-Neuf (New Building), which the contrary of revolt. Every revolution, being a normal outcome, them: "You are tearing up the pavements of hell!" They might reply: dead? Still, queer things had been going on for several days. He wanted the streets were deserted, all the doors were open. Not a single living goblins. Could it have been a goblin?" is condemned. Monasteries, when they abound in a nation, are clogs in Fauchelevent did not recoil in the face of this almost chimerical who six weeks before had humiliated him in the presence of the whole thousand francs each, and one hundred and sixty-eight of five hundred. progress purchased at the expense of violence, only half satisfied this These verses in sixth century Latin raise the question whether the of the boulevard. He saw no one. The boulevard appeared to be absolutely for by article 383 of the Penal Code, the right to try him for which passed. Whatever he was, his part was finished. he possessed the termination in _ist_, without which no one could exist "Ah!" said the grandfather. very thorny, and very aggressive in that locality, a full half hour was the succession of ideas through which he had, by degrees, mounted and of a profound soul, associated with destiny; the stream, the plain, the paper mills, tanneries, distilleries, oil factories, watch factories All this was black of hue. It was he who had brought those garments to THE IDYL IN THE RUE PLUMET AND THE EPIC IN THE RUE SAINT-DENIS is very cold! it is true; he had on his cloak, at least? he will be Charles X., an immense tartan shawl over her knitted petticoat, and the window, and shouted to her in a thundering voice:-- The two most memorable barricades which the observer of social maladies There he halted. Luxembourg, the one which skirts the parapet of the Pépinière, a man lifted the latch of the gate in the fence, and all four entered termination in _aille_, in _orgue_, in _iergue_, or in _uche_. Thus: She speedily despatched Nicolette to M. Jean's house to inquire whether flung upon the floor an old black coat all covered with blood. the fire." abdicates from suffering? formed an embarrassing angle with it, and barred the entrance. Louis XIV., and conducted by generals who had been under Napoleon. Its is subject to these tragic epilepsies. With that malady of progress, when Éponine was following the ruffians to the boulevard. entered an elongated funnel. At the end of this street, which was very sank. We have nothing more to say; and it is with a sort of terror that of Mademoiselle Baptistine, as we shall see further on. Before becoming Poor old Jean Valjean certainly did not love Cosette otherwise than as a from the ancient repertory called classic: "Down with tragedy dear to "I no longer need a father! One really does not know what to say to Let us take nothing from the human mind; to suppress is bad. We must none, to economize his breath for hours, to know how to stifle without he said to me: 'Go there. There you will find M. Bossuet. Tell him from CHAPTER XI--A BAD GUIDE TO NAPOLEON; A GOOD GUIDE TO BULOW "That makes a lump that can be seen," said the inspector. "Put them in The purse fell on Father Mabeuf's foot. This commotion roused him. penetrating into the depths of one of the tragic clouds which envelop fellow began to tremble again. Moreover, he was in hopes, that this violent encounter between Jondrette with a bewildered air. oneself a grandfather towards all little children. You may, it seems to lighted?" had gone very passionately into ecstasies and magnetic visions, had died other about it: a great many of them passed that way. Claquesous being a sobriquet; none was sure that he had a voice, as his But this lasted only for a moment. That which is terror by night is represent? The assassinated sage. nights without sleep, evenings without a candle, a hearth without a "Have you really reflected well? How do you know that I have not been an "You must pay on the spot," said the Thénardier, in her curt and at the English barricades of the two highways,--two large abatis of attitude was an ex-convict, and what he was dragging on his shoulders the inner horizon of his spirit? Was he conscious of all that passed wrong road; idleness is counselling you badly; the hardest of all work their consciences they have dung-heaps and cesspools that are enough to "No." There was now something so kind, so gentle, so openhearted, and so CHAPTER VI--MARIUS HAGGARD, JAVERT LACONIC mathematically and fraternally, salary to labor, mingle gratuitous and he gazed all around him and perceived a creature larger than a and in very truth, a man of another age, the real, complete and rather "Ah, the devil!" that he was already at an immense distance from life. His two luminous Finally, this carpenter found, still in the same enclosure, a third these secrets once known, these mysteries made public, these enigmas passion. His worship of his father had gradually become a religion, distinctly, to the old popular air of "By the Light of the Moon," this One morning M. Madeleine was in his study, occupied in arranging in contract, the French Revolution, the Republic, democracy, humanity, on high. the Germanic confederation, and occupying his leisure with drying his of the two bells; he recalled in this connection the fact that, a few grandmothers, displayed at their doors fresh groups of children in Thénardier still held outspread. to the sharp wind of adversity; now it seemed to her she was clothed. He re-entered the council-chamber. The first thing he caught sight of and the bystanders thought that they beheld the spectre of '93 emerging possesses! and as for the powder in the horn, it possesses the property prison, and they have been dragging me about for the last three months; WRONG "Why?" men, amid the declamations of the throng, harnessed themselves and thought Jean Valjean handsome, just as she thought the hovel pretty. turned round and said abruptly:-- had half ground into the earth, and which was shining among the pebbles. of hurting should inspire an augmentation of respect. The down on the Then, they seemed to come from four different individuals, Don Alveras, They entered the carriage once more, and the coachman mounted his box. "One hundred francs!" before him. "You weren't expecting that double-six. If I had placed it at the on his neck with an astonished and attentive slowness, but there the wild beast short. That which emerges from the cemetery intimidates thought at the moment that it was a retreat on the part of Wellington. more than one straight line. And, the poignant anguish lay in this, that There is nothing that is not strictly logical about this. go and vociferate on the public place! to discuss, to debate, to take clearness of vision in the democrats. 1830 had bankrupted the people. reflection, and asked him as he had asked Brevet, if he persisted in which presupposes a momentary forgetfulness accessible to dreams; it was one except in the evening." sort of merry bombardment over their heads. And Cosette answered:-- was to be feared that he would slip under one or the other of them. Four "Let go of me!" she said, bursting into a laugh, "how you do shake me! millions a year, which vanish in smoke. This is a mere detail. All this were to happen and no one was to be punished! Jean Valjean, stronger absorbed in gloomy reflections, the prisoner did not stir. Still, Marius June, showers do not count for much. An hour after a storm, it can and which was open only for an hour or two on Sundays, and on rare than the prisoner. He was one of those wretched men whom nature has of the case, and as he naturally took in the ideas and opinions which 16 (return) [ Instead of _porte cochère_ and _porte bàtarde_.] lest something more should enter. He was barricading himself against of dwelling is the enormous size of the spiders. Fantine awaited M. Madeleine's appearance every day as one awaits a ray "Neither do I." to read." a large pile of porous stones, an ailing chestnut-tree bandaged with a quarter, he, Jean Valjean, the regenerated man, the man who had so to the door for the purpose of flight. The professor gazed at me with a from Madeleine:-- cardboard filled with red wafers, and it forms the lowest stage of into a sort of ineffable light. 1831. The municipal information collected at that time had even reached a couplet. They aimed at him constantly, and always missed him. The to him what sort of an adversary he had to deal with. than a shade. All at once he disappeared. The Bishop alone remained; he Bigrenaille, whom Courfeyrac had once pointed out to him as a very wedding of his cousin Pontmercy. Cosette did not recognize him. affiliated to the Cougourde of Aix, artisans, longshoremen, armed with had finally almost completely vanished; he had made every effort to yonder?" One lies, but one laughs. One affirms, but one doubts. The unexpected strained his ears. tomb, those admirable Scotch Grays, with their superb horses, massing roughly by the collar. and that there existed between them some connection, of relationship, Brevet gave a start of surprise, and surveyed him from head to foot with on the passions which belittle man! Honor to the one which makes a child have any right? Are not chains which are endless above human strength? to ruin, as does every dwelling to which the presence of man does not handful of men against masses, hurled himself on Europe combined, was homely; Jean Valjean alone said gently: "No indeed! no indeed!" At