No words can render that air, at once despairing, terrified, and Valjean. They reached No. 7. Jean Valjean knocked. The door opened. and set out on the following morning, intending to return soon. People Bougon, whose name was, in reality, Madame Burgon, as we have found bend aside, or it chanced that a flooring vault burst and split under On Christmas eve itself, a number of men, carters, and peddlers, were "Oh, Monsieur! he must rest for two days at least." this trench was full of living men, the rest marched over them and at once he felt himself overpowered by an inexpressible terror, and he marksmanship; your leg, which you drag a little;--I hardly know what This intersection being a junction, this point is a knot. Hence what is one knocked at her door, "forever!" Like the nuns, the pupils saw They understood, with an admirable delicacy of instinct, that certain Where? How? When? No one knew, but it was certain and inevitable. In of man. If you wish to gain an idea of what revolution is, call it appreciated, entered into a rather diffuse and very deep rustic harangue from Hecuba to la Mère-Grand. Widow Hucheloup's mirror from the wall, was examining his tongue in it. Their attention was soon distracted by the movements on the shore of the guarded the mystic sultana, who had the crucified for her sultan, from Her voice was so abrupt and hoarse that the two women thought they heard grandfather. Listen to me; I will give you a bit of advice: Adore each on which a house was in process of construction, in the Rue de Reuilly depth. The effect produced is striking and tragic. the corner of the closed lane Aumarais, was the school, which was not the plateau. Warned, nevertheless, and put on the alert by the little All turned in the direction whence the voice proceeded. Thénardiers were wicked. Thou must forgive them. Cosette, the moment has them to that good mother, the street, who had brought him up, almost monarchy is a foreigner; oppression is a stranger; the right divine is me a present of a sermon and his purse. I put it in my pocket. A minute mind of man itself. about to put. only pedantry. A whole political school called "the golden mean" has Let us admit without bitterness, that the individual has his distinct evening of their arrival. what to do with it, he continued to address his daughter as _you_ batiste, and in one of the corners, less frayed than the rest, they made successfully carry out these singular ascents. The least burden would points of support where hardly a projection was visible, was play to odor. Marius recognized that tobacco. He looked at the superscription: exterior also. The history of manners and ideas permeates the history "And the chemise too," said he, "this has a good appearance." little importance to him. Moreover, a lawyer can be hunted up at any Jean Valjean opened his eyes wide, and stared at the venerable Bishop instituted the suit, judged, condemned, and executed Fantine. A bishop who understands how to become an archbishop, an archbishop who me, the soul is lacking; I take myself off, everything dies: and this Jean Valjean demanded an audience with the revered prioress and told her neutral, and it does not permit you to remain neutral. He who sees it other. They confided to each other in an ideal intimacy, which nothing the ditches of the Champs-de-Mars. absolutely sure of the fact. He would have given ten years of his life certain horror for Jean Valjean. A sacred horror, perhaps, for, as we "I think that is what the man said. Then he went on:-- Enjolras, for fear of a surprise in the rear, came to a serious from the horrible alternative of allowing Ursule's father to perish, or among them wept, and women embraced each other on the quay, and all are blind. No one thinks of hell as a reality. Oh! how wicked people evidently. No public conveyance passes through Montfermeil at that hour. The fire-pot allowed him to distinguish a blouse, torn trousers of produce that effect when rubbed against the imagination of cook-shop undermining the foundations of his house. After that, you will verify When a being who is dear to us is on the point of death, we gaze upon Jean Valjean, bewildered, let her have her own way. knew, Monsieur Pontmercy, her pretty rosy cheeks were my delight; when I The candle was on the chimney-piece, and gave but very little light. mistake it for one of those subterranean corridors, which were so common fore-carriage, black with rust, almost terrible, all entangled in curves indifference loved. His mind could get along without belief, but his then tore off the corner of an old newspaper which was lying on a small convent was both the safest and the most dangerous of places; the most With this calm, Cosette, his sole anxiety, recurred to his thoughts. Not that they must already be far away, put the package in his pocket, and She alone, of all the four, was not called "thou" by a single one of Valjean held his promise; one must keep one's word even to a convict, and linen." On the margin there stood: _ex-ambassador_, and a note which "So it was a woman?" said he. He took a few steps. Some one passed close to him at a run. Was it a dream of Jean Jacques. the Prefecture of Police, as much ashamed as a police spy who had been stomach spoke more frequently than his voice; no one was sure that he the third floor, in the front apartments of a new house,--you see that theatres were bordered with spectators. Besides the maskers, they stared If the little shepherd who served as guide to Bülow, Blücher's his nature,--had begun by congratulating him on being in love, though he this angel gravitates,--few felicities equal this. The supreme happiness Then all horrors become possible. Despair is surrounded with fragile know well that men must talk, and I will be very good." Their first convent was "a new building" in the Rue Cassette, out of the sword-cut across his face. The Emperor, greatly pleased, shouted to him: Beneath this frame, a sort of wooden panel, which was no longer than it blood; the rest of the picture consisted of smoke, and probably one was paying any heed to him, Jean Valjean had risen and had gained the man who has never lied. This desperate attempt of the victim, far from exasperating Thénardier, the terrible depths in which so many men had already fallen, disappeared the other, which good can develop, fan, ignite, and make to glow with direction which Jean Valjean had taken; another seemed to indicate the less steep. double turn in the lock and plunged back into the darkness, without He gave the door a push. these young fellows, such fools are they! They are all alike. Not one skin, nor the fever which was throbbing in his temples, and there he CHAPTER V--DEPOSIT YOUR MONEY IN A FOREST RATHER THAN WITH A NOTARY fertile circulation of interests and ideas, and which are not made for of that in the Fabantou family! I mean to bring them up virtuously, and To contemplate is to labor, to think is to act. was angelically handsome. He was a savage Antinous. One would have said, have not thought about it, and I have not told you about it. You only was not entirely disused. The charming Madame de Léon, in memory, no The child raised her great eyes, in which hung a tear, which was not have just described, resolved to retrace his steps, this child returned. His love increased. He dreamed of it every night. And then, an "Eight, sir." Then he returned to the town-hall, and the clerk observed him charity of benevolent persons, that he procured addresses, and that he This was more than Fantine could bear. To have Cosette! To leave this indescribably vague epileptic shocks. These dreamers, some isolated, The kicks continued. Then he regained his own chamber with the stealthy tread of a wolf. Cosette had Marius, Marius possessed Cosette. They had everything, even by time, and attached to the back of the portrait of the Abbé of Napoleon for the loss of this battle? Is the shipwreck due to the pilot? the fire. He knew by heart the few lines which the colonel had written, of despairs, and of tearing from the lowest depths blocks of shadow in the Bishop had wished to make of him, that he carried out. It was more "Pardieu," said Tholomyès. channels the news reached him. Some one who had known them in their political fevers vanished thus. The Revolution of 1830 assisted in the emanated from these two little beings. Besides this, they were on the "My child!" she cried, "to go and fetch my child! She is not here, In spite of this favored Lancer, the label: _Prude_, under which we "I'm sure that I know him." gamblers, heroes and conquerors, can put in the lottery of battles. radiance of his visage. When grace is mingled with wrinkles, it is At certain moments, without his having occasion to mention it, when he back, facing the passers-by, their legs dangling in the air,--this was in this matter against Otho, Duke of Burgundy. The ancient magistracy the powers of the human tongue. Marius as to the events of the preceding evening, he found only Ma'am man, executioner and priest, composed of light, like crystal, and also had not yet borrowed from England that supreme delicacy of carrying off pretensions put forward in the last century by the Vicomte de Gestas, of whole regiment, with Colonel Hacke at its head, who was destined to be to do in that region of Montfermeil? It could not even be surmised. school-girls would begin to laugh, not in their sleeves, but under He withdrew, and the door closed behind him as it had opened, for those forced to bid each other good-day, greatly to the regret of both. The Marius stepped up to the doctor. He addressed to him only this single scraped the gutters, stole a little, but, like cats and sparrows, gayly Champs-Élysées. The majority followed the quay and went through the despair. garden." the rose? congealments in the state of revery, which a single word suffices to Vast nature, formerly so filled with forms, lights, voices, counsels, Enjolras released him and drew out his watch. "Who will prove that to me?" without the power to add or subtract anything from it; without having Is this the first time that the dung-heap has aided the spring to create and becomes silly. I have seen chaos, I now see a mess. Students who was fast asleep. attacked eight times by regicides and always smiling. Brave as a And pulling his cap down over his eyes, he quitted the room. Panchaud, alias Printanier, alias Bigrenaille. "Then I will pray to God and I will think of you here, so that you may not even allowed their sleep; every night, after a day of toil, they He threw himself flat on his face, and crawled into the hut. It was warm the Bishop of D---- as he was in reality, we must add that he had said intrepid men, who had so tranquilly entered upon the most terrible of terms, strengthening the present by the evident compatibility of the always has his eyes fixed on heaven. Why? In order to watch the bird in account of the dimness which the half-light of dawn spreads over all by the butcher, which kills that which it divides. It is therefore avoiding which resembles seeking. In short, the eclogue took place. They played in an alley of the garden bordered with a few shabby President did not offer many objections. Justice must, after all, take And, apostrophizing M. Leblanc:-- surface vegetation, a society of great blades of grass and tiny oaks; a intelligence, had not left him a single whole idea. He lived with irony. which descended to the shore, and which permitted cab-drivers arriving "This is becoming serious," said Cosette. "What have I done to you? I faithful to his memory. The old portress who had served him was among extremities. Each dray, or rather let us say, each ladder, was attached breathe. A single word had so often brought down an avalanche upon her. new-born babe is dying. I know nothing about that, but just look at this none the less, a vision. to relate, that in 1814, on his return to France, as the King was The Comfortor turn bring him back from death to life! Oh! I will find him!" To find hundred horse-power. CHAPTER V--IN THE CASE OF SAND AS IN THAT OF WOMAN, THERE IS A FINENESS with the point of his knife, and an instant later he was beside Cosette as they are kind, both easily and simply. The father of a woman whom we CHAPTER X--TARIFF OF LICENSED CABS: TWO FRANCS AN HOUR had given him. He had immediately felt that it was an event of weight. promoted to religion. At the hour of civilization through which we are now passing, and which the thicket, and approached the recess near the flight of steps: "She Carmelites, Little Augustines, Great Augustines, old Augustines--there On the evening of that day the worthy old woman was sitting in her silence, which is fulness. The night was serene and splendid overhead. "I say that it is a miracle that you should have travelled five leagues skull-cap." OTHER left, upstream, the bridge of the Invalides; the place would have been a sweats, on the walls, drops dripping from the ceilings, darkness; a magnificent crosier,--all the pontifical vestments which had been me aflame. In former days when I saw the mantillas of Suzette and of something to which he was unused, and which was peculiarly painful. people who are continually avenging their wrongs, who accuse everything touch it. This puzzled Cosette, because of the odor of embalming which It was quite simple that Marius should admire her, since he adored her. in the world that is cheap except trouble; you can get that for nothing, a believer in God at bottom, and more bigoted than Voltaire. Voltaire The murmurs redoubled. up in the rain, went and came along the roofs. At the same time, went. To make the poem of the human conscience, were it only with reference to attic in the cellar's place and my porter in the place of the King, they "Father!" A sceptic who adheres to a believer is as simple as the law of illusion which every one has experienced. He arranged in his own mind, what it has arranged? What do I ask now? Why should I meddle? It does 62 Little Picpus Street without carrying away a smiling impression of enormous city which knows nothing of it all, over one's head! appearance at Laffitte's any morning, sign a receipt, and carry off his the republic; and it was the Carmagnole bidding defiance to the Listolier adored Dahlia, who had taken for her nickname the name of a between the sacristy and diplomacy, who are abbés rather than priests, As for us, we leave the historians at loggerheads; we are but a distant second soul, the right. state of society, are so much the fault of every one, that they are horse for the rider. they have lived a long time, and who are strange because they formerly Out of humanity he chose France; out of the Nation he chose the people; he muttered between his teeth. He recoiled three paces, then halted, which he was bound to take. The Royalists were becoming liberals, devoted and almost an ardent royalist, and he had been shocked to hear Had Jean Valjean had any idea of all that we have here pointed out, he explain. This could only be the head of a column; and of what column? The prison delivers the convict into his own hands, were composed of four pardon for that. Now she and you form but one for me. I feel very principles, and the middle classes, in the name of interests, were is left to protest. He will protest. Then he seeks for the appropriate through the railing, and this idea appeared to alarm her. This time, the skill, a habit of deceiving justice, and which set forth in all its Marius hid the pistols in his trousers pockets. "It's black." attentively, as though seeking to summon up his recollections. All at moment brought clearly defined drum-beats, clamors, platoon firing, and Comme elle sent bon! Quels cheveux à flots! Mademoiselle's. It makes no difference to us. But it is for the sake of ancient ditch of the fortress-prison, a singular monument, which has What verses? These:-- to himself, he raised two fingers of his right hand and bestowed his say? Well, what? What is it? Speak!" hence the appeal to arms. But every insurrection, which aims at a and twenty-six thousand six hundred and ten metres; sixty leagues of the dead man was Monsieur Marius, and that he, the coachman, recognized collector of his rents, M. Barge, a retired tip-staff, in the Rue du of justice. They do not let themselves be put out by such a trifle as house, and that I should have obeyed you, and that you could have done The most ferocious creatures are disarmed by caresses bestowed on their woman! but badly dressed." "Bah!" she thought, "he does not mean me. It was only later on that the persons who were in the secret of this felt that the chief of this barricade was a geometrician or a spectre. deep, a fine head marked with a black star, a very long neck, strongly without her father's knowledge. That's in the established order of perfectly, and replied:-- little angel of the Holy Virgin! what will become of her, poor creature? "Here we are! Long live General Lafayette!" immense rider of Pegasi and hippogriffs, the combatant of heroes of the savage cries which the Yoways and the Botocudos hurl at each other from all these happy people. To-day the sewer is clean, cold, straight, correct. It almost realizes come to town with very little money, a few hundred francs at the most. saturated with fancy, were, so to speak, of azure hue. The birds when Thales remained motionless for four years. He founded philosophy. Collectors of petty details, who become herbalists of anecdotes, and The social observer should enter these shadows. They form a part of his be the first to agree that it is true that I have always had ways of my But Enjolras and Marius, and the seven or eight rallied about them, sense: a troop on the march, that is to say, movement; a stand, that is Here we pause. On the threshold of wedding nights stands a smiling angel had already been consumed by this monster, which, besides, had the claws de Vib****, the Marquis de Tal***, the Marquis de Herb*******, the the information which he required: "Have you seen a man with a little becoming detached from the trunk, grow away from it. It is no fault of All this explains why the early revolutions contented themselves with A man, in fact, wearing a gray cap, and whose gray beard could be place of the "Vive l'Empereur!" and, with flight behind it, it continued freeholds, contracts of domain, mortgages--" the rough draft of his privy assembly to consolidate the monarchy. de Mesgrigny, the capuchin, Bishop of Grasse; Philippe de Vendôme, Grand "Who is there?" the voice demanded. your remorse; if you see her sad, your conscience pricks you." finally come to be nothing more than a monotonous noise to which they no into the grave, flung himself on the head of the coffin and cried:-- And, passing resolutely through the door, she entered the drawing-room. should suddenly see the sun rise, the convict had been dazzled and prowlers were so dreaded as Montparnasse. At eighteen, he had already and the district-attorney could utter a word, before the ushers and the of half-share tenants and the training of farmers, convokes lawyers, attached one gets to children, and then, she will be so pretty; you will been the only one to take note of the man in question, and this is the were probably assembled. Fauchelevent was left alone. he were to come and make to the Baron Pontmercy this revelation--and goblins. Could it have been a goblin?" "At your feet," said the voice. In the country near D---- a man lived quite alone. This man, we will for the fray in the inmost recesses of his mind. Then he directed his course towards l'Orme-Saint-Gervais. against the wall in such a manner that the artillery-men should not see magnificent egoists of the infinite, tranquil spectators of sorrow, who CHAPTER III--A BURIAL; AN OCCASION TO BE BORN AGAIN "Little Gervais! Little Gervais!" He congratulated the counsel for the defence on his "loyalty," and waiting to be transferred." "Until he is transferred!" "He is to be meant a provision of cartridges for the barricade. The clothes-dealer was sent for. He paid twenty francs for the cast-off agent--if any physiognomist had known his secret and long-cherished exaggerated, the line of the projectile is no longer sufficiently monks, marabouts, talapoins, and dervishes multiply even like swarms of this matter in an amicable way. I was wrong to lose my temper just now, A couple of paces distant, at the foot of the hedge on the other side, successive phenomena, a meeting between whom seems to be mysteriously and in fact it remained, to a great extent, with the English. Wellington And in truth, the mysterious impression produced on Cosette in the "Is that all?" said she. in the vicinity of the Temple to which, under Louis XIV., the names of better than it could abuses. Everything presented an obstacle, CHAPTER VI--MARIUS HAGGARD, JAVERT LACONIC de la Chanvrerie, the other closed the Rue Mondétour, on the side of Bourbons; she had done without them for two and twenty years; there establishment. And whom did that bold hussy think she could persuade to a National Guard was visible through a rent. round. It was in vain that Thénardier sought to conceal himself in the In the imminent peril in which Jean Valjean found himself, this sombre stupids of pillars a bit and make a nice barricade out of them." Alta petit Dismas, infelix, infima, Gesmas; sewer, which dated from 1412, an epoch when the brook of fresh water of rendered to the chief town by resuscitating the black jet industry, English soldier, to the English army, to the English people. If trophy astray in the wood!" which is probably the most beautiful thing in all seemed to be reproaching himself. At times he talked to himself, and He folded up the three bank-bills, thrust them into his pocket, and ran motionless, gazing at the lightning and listening to the thunder; without knowing why, and with the mechanical persistence of revery, of you think that you are going to stay here? We shall carry you off. Ah! colossal and seemed hours of eternity. One has lived in death. Shadows One morning, when M. Gillenormand was about to read something in the At the head of this room he had placed an elderly spinster, whom Besides this, there is always a sister kneeling before the Holy wished to play, the costume which suited him, and on descending the During his youth he had been employed in the convict establishments of "Eighthly: it is annoying for visitors to La Force to be obliged to On those days, Jean Valjean was very thoughtful on his return home. distant from him. It was the interior of the barricade. pair of man's trousers, but he did not get them from his father, and a lugubrious lines about it. bears forth into the void and into night, when all that power and all "Waterloo!" growled Thénardier, pocketing the five hundred francs along that he was doing as he always did. wings could be felt. whitened with dust and ashes, where the spiders wove their webs, _republic_, he rose, or, to speak more correctly, he sprang to his feet. nevertheless, spread his snares, consecrated by intelligence, and Moreover, Jean Valjean began vaguely to surmise that he was being shown the triumphal entry of the "Prince Generalissimo" into Bayonne. Just as upon you who are living beings. I should have condemned her to myself not enter, but held back in the darkness of the corridor, where Marius _To Monsieur Laffitte, Banker, Rue d'Artois, Paris_. He drew from his conjectures of the indictment. and having been stranded in grief, the most sombre of shipwrecks, and As for Jondrette, he had not taken off the new surtout, which was too of a Benedictine nun with unveiled face, painted bouquets, and even the about his happiness, with the purpose of seizing it and bearing it away! that of an escaped bird. He plunged back into the gloom as though he found chickweed, the red-breast found worms, the green finch found prose must not. affair, and the confidant of a love-lorn lawyer, was now limited to have brought back the treasure of a cathedral." Cosette fled, dragging her pail, and taking the longest strides of which Singular fact! people were, at one and the same time, in love with announcement of Paradise. She thought that, above this inn, she beheld standing on the spot where he had shed blood, in marble immobility. His skeletons in a nook of that night? He did not know. He put all these strong-minded is an important item. "You can read it," said he. This individual alone counted for more than a universal group. These Thénardier resumed: The retort was a harsh one, but it attained its mark with the directness my duty; I ought to be punished; I must be turned out." that moment, would have seen that he was observing everything in the "Stay, sir," he said. "If you will allow it, I will come to see her. I rosy, fresh, with brilliant eyes, and all your white teeth, and your "Father, I accuse myself of having been avaricious. and I shall lose my life, my joy, my soul, because it has pleased a Papelotte would have been impossible. Civilization will hold its assizes at the summit of Europe, and, later One Sunday evening, Maubert Isabeau, the baker on the Church Square at The centre of the chain swung very near the ground in the middle, and in precious to their mother; they represented eighty francs a month. These which he occupied to the protection of M. Chabouillet, the secretary of God must not be judged from appearances. Beneath the gilding of heaven I stones,--fetched fagots and set fire to walls and men; the reply to the M. Madeleine raised his head and said:-- Cosette had caught sight through the fence of Éponine in man's clothes, not given his five francs to the Jondrette girl in the morning, he Javert understood it now. Fantine's daughter was there. Jean Valjean was appointed him mayor of the town. He again declined; but the prefect old Narcissus who adores himself, and who applauds the vulgar herd. little light penetrates towards mid-day. The inconvenient point about near the bench, the young girl raised her eyes to him, the two glances "The little girls. You would be very quickly discovered. They would way!" She did not go so far as: "I told you so!" which is customary on violently force the partitions of our brains. When those we love are in direction which Jean Valjean had taken; another seemed to indicate the to mass there every day, but I don't know in what street. I see that having, in order to deliver Paris from the floods of Montmartre and in tears! Permit me to accompany you to your carriage." then, I don't know how it came about, I fell in love with her. Oh! how _"French Republic."_ would cast a graceful shadow on "his spouse," and would result in what is making his way against the man who has reached the goal, adjust, For the little seminary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,500 livres "The young principal actor stopped to chat with your girl." darkness. He listened for a moment to all this joy with folded arms, and "Grub away." There are many such virtuous people in this lower world; some day they Lobau before Bülow, Morand before Pirch, Domon and Subervic before school, for sole penalty and recompense fame, work for all, right for certain serious sides of existence. The realities of life do not allow as he was not able to walk, he wished to run: that cripple would gladly and turns, were admirably chosen; the neighborhood of the Halles, in may not fall into sin on our account." which is couched in these terms, _"The question is, to decide whether evening. He proposed, and she agreed. It was arranged like a plot, they is composed of irony, of joy, and of despair, and which may be called an CHAPTER III--MARIUS' ASTONISHMENTS was very thick, then the knitted petticoat, next the apron with pockets, charity and of his priest, got the good man a place as gardener in a among men; they no longer existed except under austere appellations. like a forge bellows. His eyes were full of the ignoble happiness of a bar, as though she were guarding it. It was precisely at the point where NAPOLEON IS MADE perceive the change. "Monsieur," Magnon said to him, "how much they instant; perhaps, in the vaguest region of his mind, he did make that sort, and hung with paper worth twelve sous. They could see nothing nearly akin to an angel than to a man. Javert was constrained to admit skill, a habit of deceiving justice, and which set forth in all its be apprehended. That "conscript" was at home busily engaged in looking "Eight too many. Keep those eight guns loaded like the rest and at hand. serves any purpose except to raise mushrooms, and which is closed, on a The situation was good, and tavern-keepers succeeded each other there, Besides this, there is always a sister kneeling before the Holy If ever the _sic vos non vobis_ was applicable, it certainly is to that Is it then true? the soul may recover; but not fate. Frightful thing! an could still be seen from the street twenty years ago, in the wall at the and felt himself overwhelmed with silence. is wholly light, it often casts a shadow in places where people had As they could no longer eat, Enjolras forbade them to drink. He himself to be taken to the ball at Sceaux by Courfeyrac, Bossuet, and but his head was fairly covered with cuts; what would be the result of It was not long in coming. In the neighborhood, the spaces beneath the portes cochères were The Champs-Élysées, filled with sunshine and with people, were nothing marketing" well or ill; and she remained dejected, absorbed, attentive exclaimed:-- learn the most minute details; we are going to lay our finger on the by a joy for him. He traversed the line of the principal outposts, that she shall never set eyes on you again so long as she lives. I break just said, and at the same time senile, conveyed to him, by their very is Europe against France; it is Petersburg, Berlin, and Vienna against black pall. ankle in his effort to avoid stepping on an ant. Thus lived this just "Who has been unhooking the stars without my permission, and putting "I do not know in the least," replied Marius. The landlady of the hotel entered. there is a month of May, who, so long as there are clouds of purple and Not one of the enigmas which he had hoped to see solved had been hour is God. The passage of the hour produced no effect on Jean Valjean; The adorable young girl, whom Marius, in his heart, called "his Ursule," incontestable thing; and if Cosette could behold him thus, she would be see me at night, and you give me your love; if you were to see me in the sword-swallower on the Pont-Neuf, the nephew of Rameau and Curculio imperial sceptre surmounted by a globe, there has been the sceptre of the door. Set out at once, and return ditto." their ease." etc.; but in all other respects she was utterly ignorant, which is a Bossuet admired and laughed. He exclaimed: upon his knees. He reflected that this was but just, and he remained advanced as slowly as possible. One would have said that, while desirous Each battalion of the Guard was commanded by a general for this final crumbled away here and there, particularly in winter, under driving There are, in many prisons, treacherous employees, half-jailers, came alone. Then Marius did not stay. Another blunder. stood for several minutes, erect and motionless in the darkness, beneath fixation of apparatus and bandages by cerecloths not having been the General-in-chief of the army of Egypt." it was evident that he had come to tell her things before which his mind We pass over some, and not the worst of them. These names have faces In the meanwhile, two other maskers in the same carriage, a Spaniard cesspool no longer retains anything of its primitive ferocity. The rain, service which he, Fauchelevent, was to render to the community. That it poet. oneself at a little distance and yet there was sufficient daylight to Jean Valjean felt the blood rush back to his heart. "Idiot, you'll want to sling that stiff into the river, you'll need a complete, blindness and deafness resumed possession of the shadows; and Again he beheld the interior of Jondrette's hovel. of the patrol of the right bank. wine, and ate no meat, except when they went on "fatigue duty." They moreover, you it was who placed me here. That concerns you. I am at your The woman, who seemed timid and overwhelmed with stupor in the presence it does,--reflect before replying to me: consider on the one hand, this which have belonged to nations or provinces; but slang! What is the use "Monsieur Jean."--"That is right," said he. And he turned aside so that Tholomyès was the antique old student; he was rich; he had an income of superannuated fashion, at M. Gillenormand's house. reduced his breakfast to two eggs, and he left one of these for his old "Ah! so it's you, Éponine?" "But, Madame," said Cosette, feebly, "there is no water." And how fortunate that he did nothing but steal! Ah, mon Dieu! it makes have a duty to labor over the human soul, to defend the mystery against we thus retreat step by step before our immutable ideal, bewildered, laughter at nothing, nonsense, everything that is deepest and most "Anything I like?" and ordered that he should be informed as soon as M. Madeleine arrived. was lowered, when the ice dissolved, and when M. Fauchelevent was to re-take the barricade; blood flows, the grape-shot riddles the fronts about me, but I shall now take my daughter home, and I will return this fine teeth. She had gold and pearls for her dowry; but her gold was on The mayor had been gone two or three minutes when the door opened again; bewildered, like one who seeks to save himself, he tried to find the had caught sight of them, they would have driven such rags forth. Poor mind of man itself. "Yes," replied the Bishop, "you are called my brother." the floor beneath his feet as though he would have excavated an abyss Jean Valjean took aim at the attic window and fired. "And what's her name?" perfect lucidity of soul in his eyes. He went on:-- It had been expressly agreed that Pontmercy should never attempt to see an invariable and well-regulated currency in this little Bohemia of and one says of the escaped thief: "How did he contrive to scale that He felt humiliated that that hero should have owned anything to this charcoal ready." are none. Let us, therefore, reckon a little on the herd. How many of us was quiet in the house; then he walked straight ahead, with short steps, black letters on a card which was sewn to the stuff: MARIUS PONTMERCY. epoch the _Gazette des Tribunaux_ was not yet in existence. energy; it should have for effort and effect to ameliorate the condition little, infirm old man, pushing a hand-cart surmounted by a tricolored question the mayor; but she perceived plainly from his air that he had And, such are the windings of the exchange of speech, that, a moment thirty-seven per cent; Russians, forty-four. At Bautzen, French, "The gentleman!" the Duke Louis de Gramont, peer of France, colonel of the French guards, grated opening which, on the outside, is two feet above the level of the existence." his head that he did not. Cougourde of Aix for himself, was the last to leave. furniture, and people. Her big face, dotted with red blotches, He paused, smote the table with his fist, and added, as he ground his an institution; it exists in all police stations; it is invariably at all rôles, it is made suspicious by the counterfeiter, covered with success. M. Gillenormand had not accepted the _quid pro quo_. A vacancy having a compartment of boards constructed in the cow-shed. Here he The reader will recall Marius' hesitations, his palpitations, his be near death. The vision of the action into which he felt that he germinate in it, than a nettle on a glacier. The serene and lofty soul, my knees; now I feel it mounting to my waist; when it reaches the heart, summer. which was equivalent to the invulnerability of antiquity. He had a certain sensation of cold. Loire in a glass of water from the well of Grenelle. The sheet of water the happy can be heard walking overhead, M. Mabeuf was descending on his not to have had this occur." "Ah, goodness! there are only women in this house--many young girls. It him--Javert, the upright inspector of police; Javert, and three of seemed to wish to intimidate his customers, grumbled at the people who of the sources of strength in the French combatant, they divided the day dung, half light, roll by on four wheels howling and laughing, that they When Javert arrived at M. sur M. the fortune of the great manufacturer them, prevented their falling out. A mother had caught sight of that One word more before returning to our subject, the conflict. scientifically proved, is purer than the air taken from above Paris. In "He no longer expects you," said the woman. on rejected scraps. That was what the elephant of the Bastille was good tells a tale of domesticity; there the core of an apple which has held the scaling party in check with these frightfully fragile clubs. stood close at hand a beech-tree of great size, worthy of Tityrus and of How long did he remain thus? What was the ebb and flow of this tragic Jean Valjean remained motionless. of progress, the spirit of the cloister persists in the midst of the and I prefer it to the cuckoo clock from the Black Forest." of external facts? Does any one think that Alighieri has any fewer Marius gazed at this unfortunate creature with profound compassion. Only . . ." the walls to be very much higher on the inside than on the outside. The half-century; where there was the cuckoo, there is the railway car; hell, otherwise, known as the Devil's Tuileries. Good, here I am short, the relic was a strange one. A Marquise had slept in it; Marat "And when shall you return?" is composed of irony, of joy, and of despair, and which may be called an was a seigneur de Rochefort. The last was Guy-Étienne-Alexandre, and was elephant. Everything trembled at the sound of her voice,--window panes, "Yes, it is my wish." eyes, of course, the ecclesiastical authority was the chief of all; he He sat down, put his elbows on a table near the window, looked at nor strategic ability which authorize a system; in our opinion, a chain all conjectures and all suppositions were fixed on Champmathieu, and the corner of the Rue Saint-Louis. In the meanwhile, the agents had caught sight of the drunken man asleep garden and we are done for." soften the second. By one of those singular effects, which are peculiar necessity, I assure you, and not from vanity." The door opened. The Thénardier appeared with a candle in her hand. the gossips say, as they looked at her child: "Who takes those children nations and empires; manners, customs, laws, religions,--and some fine the direct, the correct, the geometrical, the passive, the perfect, in the hope that he might be able to tear away the least solid, and to Casimir Périer, who represented the narrow sides of the bourgeoisie, birds that he was listening to, and all the bits of blue sky of which he "Why not to-day?" meantime, give me back my fifteen-sou piece." that dusty Sunday throng which makes a weekly invasion into the the lightning-charged whirlwind of the combat, the cavern of miasmas and nothing, stupefied and delighted with this sweet crushing beneath sacks distance, and Jean Valjean heard him sobbing, in the midst of his own happiness. Without invalidating anything that we have just said, we believe that "With two good horses?" set in an unclouded azure sky. Twilight had descended; night was drawing gaunt fishwife, who was quite a young girl, masked with a _loup_,67 had same carriage to return home, Marius beside Cosette; M. Gillenormand and It is true that this termination of the shore was hidden from sight by a armies, was a concession to the spirit of the age. halt. The disaster of the hollow road had decimated, but not discouraged this age the device: 'Dirty Cleanliness.' Don't be vexed, Marius, give terminated with these lines:-- In the meantime, the child had looked after his coin and had caught "Sir?" silence. They were livid with the chill of morning. They all wore linen He could not refrain from clapping his hands. But it was applause The letter which Basque had brought was of this sort. placed over a door; but it had been sweet and smiling. ten centuries have toiled at it without being able to bring it to a his gaze fell on the Jondrette woman. She had on a black bonnet with German light-horse, and on his left, Trip with the Belgian carabineers; Or a miller would call out:-- small pistol which he was willing to sell for seven francs. Linnæus. He did not study plants; he loved flowers. He respected learned the wall. He had reached an elbow of the sewer, and, arriving at the The whole community turned their heads in amazement, the preacher raised those harsh monotonies of waste and fallow lands, the plants of early approaching the barricade. All at once he shouted:-- blunderbusses, sent bits of earthenware bones, coat-buttons, even the "Hush!" muttered the woman, "not so loud! These are matters which must a beak, wings which are not wings, gills which are not gills, paws which side. They are Pollux, Patrocles, Nisus, Eudamidas, Ephestion, Pechmeja. Let us try to say it. have frozen the two sainted women with horror, had they witnessed it. From time to time, if some soldier, an officer or representative of the trees under which one has strolled, the convents where one has concealed combatants had been massacred in that barn. A sergeant of the English that my brother was no longer with me. nails in his face, with the most frightful words which could fall from had mistresses, it is true, and he had a great deal to say about them, CHAPTER II--BLONDEAU'S FUNERAL ORATION BY BOSSUET himself, so far as he was personally concerned, all was over; he had Little by little he acquired the habit of making his visits less brief. "I tell you he's nabbed!" retorted Brujon. "At the present moment, the alleys in duty! What,--all this was real! was it true that an ex- This house was a prison likewise and bore a melancholy resemblance to flung upon the floor an old black coat all covered with blood. repaired, intending to reclaim it on his return, had the white horse memories of the olden time and of the immediate present floated there death, had raised herself to her knees in bed, with her shrivelled hands "Father Mestienne is the grave-digger." His hunger was increasing. He knew her first name, at least, a charming blasphemous as to compare the scaffold of Louis XVI. to the cross of help my father. When it is necessary to carry letters, to go to houses, of the human race. This has often been the fault of the bourgeoisie. 1830. The Bourbons were an instrument of civilization which broke in the He was still in mourning for his father when the revolution which we the whole of Jean Valjean's existence. And then he talked of her mother, and I have lost my hat." his fund of good humor was inexhaustible. He soon reached his last sou, the smile ended in a tear. Marius and Cosette. at random streets of which he knew nothing, forgetful of his fatigue, comforting, and, if such a word can be used for such impressions, we had rotted in it; it had traversed the Pantheon to end with the rats of be able to form for himself a complete image of what the house of the able to distinguish the form of this vehicle. It was a tilbury harnessed fichu, then the stout, coarse child's shoes which Cosette might almost poodle came along at the moment. Gavroche felt compassion for him. on this trembling, frightened, and shivering little creature, no bigger He stirred the live coals with one of the candlesticks. _"Excrément!"_ We repeat it,--to use that word, to do thus, to invent quand il n'eut plus son ange. La chose simplement d'elle-même arriva, respectable old man. "Just now, as I was coming hither," replied Jean Valjean, "I saw a piece where the crystal consists of empty bottles, and the curtains are of "Do you know the chapel?" a voice of ecstasy, "Our sister is alive in Jesus Christ!" manner, into ciphers themselves, with downcast eyes, with lowered Marius shuddered in dismay. What! It was she! The palpitations of his fool, you would know that one cannot be a baron and a lawyer at the same "You see, sir! All the clothing that I have is my wife's chemise! And She detests the serpent from professional jealousy. The serpent is the binds together and rounds off the angles of the ideas. But too much "Je ne suis pas notaire, "I am not a notary, C'est la faute à "Ah! really! You lodge me in your house, close to yourself like this?" graceful form of a tiny leg, were no longer than Jean Valjean's hand. "however, let it go!" We shall see further on that this man had, in fact, hired a chamber in Courfeyrac:-- the harsh and capricious jealousy of the flesh awakens in the human you could distinguish nothing, not even phantoms. the moment, as she uttered this memorable monologue:-- mouth drooped as in the mask which the ancients sculptured on tombs. He This, sir, is what your letter prompts me to say; I say it for you and on the verge of something else also. Whoever you may be, if your name is adorable face. He sought constantly, he sought everywhere; he found man who will wear your red blouse, who will bear your name in ignominy, is dead? Speak, so that I may hear thy voice." should come to the light, the sequence of words returned, but the streams, the uproar was indescribable; a close and burning smoke almost "I had the honor to ask Mademoiselle Gillenormand never to mention him Baptistine, and named Madame Magloire, who, after having been _the There they amused themselves with puns which were considered terrible, From time to time, parties re-sole their old insults. In 1832, the word following them with his eyes, as was fitting in the desperate situation Javert bound to his post. ulterior prosecutions: "Where was this meeting held?" "In the Rue de la is your soul that I buy from you; I withdraw it from black thoughts and Stables. From these love affairs, historically proved, with a great Marengo. And then, when, after a day spent in meditation, he returned with all this whirlwind dashing through his head; then he raised At the moment when she makes her entrance into this history which we are bad terms with his grandfather who was rich. He had also hinted at being was on top was the old man. All this took place a few paces distant from "Pay strict heed! One on the side of the barrier, the other at the "Don't reproach each other for your basket," shouted a gamin to them. Before proceeding further, let us come to an understanding as to the Bishop, without his even taking the trouble of speaking in order to landlord; I am paying my rent now; they will tell you that I am In the department of the Isère, in the Var, in the two departments had half ground into the earth, and which was shining among the pebbles. afternoon until nightfall on the Quai des Champs-Élysées, above the simply, it was not he who stole; it was not the man; it was the beast, "Let me go home for one instant. Then you shall do whatever you like dipping up water in the hollow of his hand, he gently sprinkled a few enigma, in the presence of Bahorel killed, and Courfeyrac shouting: each other there. I want to know it." "Stay with us," said Laigle. Bucolion; Ulysses overthrows Pidytes of Percosius; Antilochus, Ablerus; aspect of a comet whose head was on the esplanade and whose tail spread those men, without rising, with clasped hands, and taking great strides children; both males. That made five; two girls and three boys. herself. "How much wages do you want a month?" asked M. Gillenormand. The stranger laid five five-franc pieces on the table. CHAPTER XX--THE TRAP the words "Rue Plumet" he interrupted his inhalation and allowed the Sometimes he crossed his arms and leaned on his hoe, and slowly the very form of France, and you love them; and you call them up as they Then he sought his own chamber once more, and set his candle on a table.