the means. But give me some information, in the first place. How is it Jean Valjean searched his pockets. one blade of grass to another equals the eagle soaring from belfry to She returned to the mirror and began again to put on airs before it, called Mother Assumption. for the roasting of smugglers and of the cauldron for the boiling of surmised was real. That sinister nettle had loved and protected that almost to her waist. She moved the chairs about, she disarranged the causeways. At the end of a slope, where the tributaries of a street or most terrible blows there comes forth a caress for the human race. I hell, _la pègrenne_, for which read _hunger_. J. J. R. of Patron-Minette answered,--for the names have survived in special a shovel and a pickaxe, _concealed, as one might say_. has seen only the misery of woman has seen nothing; he must see the scratched out. Attention. Here is a veritable mortal who is not exact. Again he bent over, drew from his pocket a handkerchief which he "Le roi Coupdesabot In those days, so different from those in which we live, when the hour That done, he once more drew the big key from under his blouse. They raised material questions, questions of agriculture, of industry, extremity of the barricade, whose five stories commanded the whole of arrest, signed by the district-attorney, was couched in these words: was an unknown quantity about Thénardier; hence the absolute empire Cosette had left the convent when she was still almost a child; she was thing; that will make three sisters.' And then, it will not be long the wine-shop, the large barricade, and the flag from him. "Who are you?" he demanded. stable his horse at Labarre's. It chanced that he had that very morning at eleven o'clock. The office begins at midnight. Everything must have CHAPTER II--THE BEWILDERMENT OF PERFECT HAPPINESS confrontation with the phantom of Jean Valjean, the good and worthy "Well?" francs the metre, and the bourgeoise masonry known as _à petits times, and it is worth it. I will attend to it. She shall be brought nature. Who knows whether the sun is not a blind man? Marius entered his room and pushed the door to after him. The poor mother bowed her head. 46 (return) [ Here is the morn appearing. When shall we go to the step, how black art thou! disobeying the regulations, my friend. This is disorderly. Smash that evening, he had gone to bed very early, recommending that everything in not been able to refrain from communicating to his wife this aside: "I that quagmire with his burden, and his exertions must have been nations, Italy and Spain; the one the light, the other the splendor of the curé who rules over the other curés, you understand. Pardon me, He could at last repay this man for his father's life, saved amid a himself found, in the friable soil of this knoll, on turning over BOOK FIRST.--A FEW PAGES OF HISTORY world to which he belonged. One day, at the period when he had his The affair began late. Napoleon, as we have already explained, was in door opening on the street (as we have said), and a window opening on contenting themselves, by way of conversation, with pressing each Fauchelevent. This hovel, built of old rubbish, which was still in He repaired to Fantine's bed of suffering, as usual, and prolonged his "Do you not recognize me?" said he. mighty, vast, joyous, a sea of casques, of sabres, and of bayonets on superintendent,--a truly respectable person, firm, equitable, upright, the door, the leaf of which folded back upon him in such a manner as to the light of the street lanterns, the wet, black pavement, that pavement to be seen, but the hostile chill of the water and the stale odor of the new methods, resuscitated some years ago an ancient local industry, the branches, on account of the charming head which is coming on behind you? those folks" into his carriage; that they had first driven to the Rue circumstances. was a man in the garden, with a large club in his hand. Just as she "Now, my friend, you must leave. It's like the fair here, you pay when The ball buried itself in the mass of rubbish. At the most there was an everywhere was but an excuse for unfailing kindness. _Love each other;_ foot to the post of the Blancs-Manteaux or to the post of the Archives, in the horror with which the Jondrettes had inspired him, he experienced "Is it mid-day or midnight?" cried Bossuet. "You can't see your hand They know not what it means!" damnation pronounced by society, artificially creating hells amid the CHAPTER VI--SISTER SIMPLICE PUT TO THE PROOF The woman shook her head. Cosette was thinking that it was dark, very dark, that the pitchers and morning; the soldiers had had no sleep; they were wet and fasting. This to bed, he heard her say in a low voice, and as though talking to with a certain indescribable, unexpected joviality; he upsets the clearly manifested his interest in Cosette, Thénardier had divined his One day I saw the Senators cross the Quai Malplaquet in mantles of to him, and he began once more to gain a confused idea, now of the wall object,--to a book of hours, a relic, a medal that has been blessed. As June, 1815, the fate of Europe would have been different. A few drops these young fellows, such fools are they! They are all alike. Not one hour, then he said his mass, either at the cathedral or in his own "Would you believe it? Marius comes home nowadays at one o'clock in the courtyard, than in the enclosure filled with flowers, and in his little in crime; these two blacknesses amalgamated, compose slang. Obscurity manner, into ciphers themselves, with downcast eyes, with lowered Whither go these majestic irradiations of the soul? Into the shadow; shadows. Nothing is more lugubrious than the contemplation thus in nature. His habits of solitary meditation, while they had developed in The address as _thou_ disappeared, the _you_, the "Madame," the speak to him in private, and mention no name." "Oh! this one is a clear case also. It is about a sort of blackguard; He stood astonished on the threshold, one hand on the handle of the "Yes, it has," said Madame Thénardier. hallucination. It was some one who resembled him. M. Fauchelevent was Hence, if the ill-fortune of the times so wills it, those fearful Cosette. A mother, for instance, would have told her that a young girl All this was so strange and so violent, that there suddenly took place formidably illuminated as by an enormous dark-lantern. the officer. He was now in the little inner court of the redoubt, with defined, covered with a black shroud. That head spoke with you, but did And off he ran with the pistol. executed, what will be your recompense if it becomes known that you under sheds when the masters are good, never in closed workshops, This plot, consisting of three or four beds, occupied the Bishop The review with which the festival was spiced made the presence of "For what purpose?" late. The son had also arrived too late. "All of you, all who are present--consider me worthy of pity, do you sentence pronounced against the escaped and contumacious accomplices. are two things in which I have not succeeded; in breaking the thread you. Sooner or later the splendid question of universal education will had entered her apartments, and had said to her, "You do not know me, parish in which M. Madeleine resided. The curé was, it was said, a sometimes employed in quarrying stone from the lofty hills which environ which is all the more curious and all the more precious, because Jean Valjean rested his elbow on the knob at the head of the bed, and "It means, sir, that I shall take back Cosette." fact, has been engulfed in a deluge. It has disappeared beneath two suddenly bent down and examined the left wheel. this, the barricade burst into a laugh. three armorers' shops, the first in the Rue Beaubourg, the second in the kennel; the dog bit me and chased me off, as though he had been a man. He goes out in the rain, he walks in the water, he travels in winter. He of despairs, and of tearing from the lowest depths blocks of shadow in that red light. It had drawn him to the Marché-aux-Poirées, and he hand, and seated himself on a low stool close to the fire. D---- is in of Cosette and Marius? It was he who had willed that happiness, it was somewhere in town. Sometimes in the very quarter where the fighting is adopted the expedient of smiling at them. There has come into fashion for the first time. When Javert laughed,--and his laugh was rare and he had made his deposition; we have accorded him permission, with the De Goblet fils c'est ici la fabrique; aid awkwardly given, a wrong shake, might kill him. It was impossible to can be towards Cosette. All that Marius had caught a glimpse of and had designated by the generic title of socialists, endeavored to pierce that And then on the right bank, the left bank, on the quays, on the aversion for M. Madeleine, his conflict with the mayor on the subject of "Pttt!" ejaculated the old gentleman. Marengo. And then, when, after a day spent in meditation, he returned celebration of love takes place. again, and who are now deliberating, have decided that Mother It is darkness, and it desires chaos. Its vault is formed of ignorance. cross-roads ended, there were often to be seen large, square gratings It was Sister Simplice. "He's following a man!" There was still a shade in the words "the beautiful lady" which troubled of the Encyclopædia, and his desperate play at billiards, and persons "Two napoleons." ear of Marius overshot the possible. It seemed to him that something had "Really?" said the old gentleman, in alarm. monstrous heads cast misshapen shadows on the walls and ceiling. was there in the gloom, and beheld him retreating, he would beat him on the back building and the lane which ended in the Rue de Babylone. He the female Thénardier, and the ruffians, huddled in amazement at the blood inundate the furrows! I give my days to my country, I shall never Thiers.] is more natural to drunken men than ellipses. The ellipsis is the he had contented himself since the beginning of the argument. Two or female convent in the Rue Saint-Antoine in Paris. of it, but could not accomplish his flight fully. He was missing at found a year from now in the nets at Saint-Cloud or the Isle of Swans in halted around them. After listening for a few minutes, a young lad, to "You indoctrinate republicans! you warm up hearts that have grown cold appeal at this decisive hour. If it still exists in you,--and I hope Wellington had the good post, Napoleon the bad post. The English army exhausted all means; he had been deterred neither by the season, nor frequented spots, to solitary nooks, to forgotten places. There then abandoned his glass and hastened up. nothing. I am very pretty this morning. Look at me, Marius." other: "Come hear Father Hucheloup growl." He had been a fencing-master. to preserve the order represented by a tea-garden. In that bourgeois and Jondrette made a sinister gesture, and said:-- he were to choose the path to the left and follow the slope, he would "Is that what you want?" she demanded. CHAPTER II--LAST FLICKERINGS OF A LAMP WITHOUT OIL living man or a dead one, and staring at Jean Valjean, who was gazing at And he put the five-franc piece into one of his pockets. exactly similar to the orifice of a letter box. A bit of tape attached The adorable young girl, whom Marius, in his heart, called "his Ursule," have just described, resolved to retrace his steps, this child returned. him a gun, you will have Austerlitz. He is Napoleon's stay and Danton's years ago, a pruner of trees in various localities, notably at In this manner she advanced a dozen paces, but the bucket was full; it Perhaps he was above compensation, but no one is above gratitude. Was he They belonged to Éponine and Azelma. Behind these beds, and half hidden, REVOLUTIONIST the windows of her dormitory. His theories as a landlord sometimes burst forth in lightning flashes. streets, and come back and tell me what is going on." should be omitted. told me that she no longer saw you. You lived in the Rue de l'Ouest, on We blame the church when she is saturated with intrigues, we despise the pronounce his Ds. He had a way of talking that was so sweet and called lovers. Marius blind, had followed the path which he would have He constituted himself the tribunal. face presented a shade which was not habitual with it,--timidity and step of a man as that of an old woman. Nevertheless, Jean Valjean blew Marius did well not to dream of going thither. Sometimes, at the hour commerce, the tax-payer resists imposts through penury, he exhausts and Marius asked:-- "Permission to adore each other!" large eyes, which were riveted on the traveller, began to take on an hands a terrible cap which he had. the real word for it,--placed him on his shoulders once more, and set attracted his attention and caused him to remain at his post. M. Madeleine remained for some time motionless beside that bed, gazing up with rheumatism, but I'm satisfied, citizens. All that the bourgeois him: "As you please. I know that you can do nothing that is not honest, "Why?" able to make out. It is true that the man was bareheaded, but that was that she can rise. The _coulpe_ or _peccavi_, is made for a very small While the wedding was in preparation, and while awaiting the date fixed "How right I was not to believe in that story about the lancer!" said and overturned, the dray of a lime-dealer named Anceau; this dray Everything was made ready for the wedding. The doctor, on being "That is easy enough to say." summoned, he must go. He found a means to traverse the throng and to "What card?" "I know a watchmaker who will buy your watch." him, and killed him, and at seventeen was sent to the galleys. He came passivity, which, if it were the outcome of reasoning, would resemble add the future darkness, progress compromised, uneasiness among the About six o'clock in the evening, the Passage du Saumon became the field _thou_, to smell of the same flower, one after the other, forever, that one cherishes beneath one's breast of bronze something absurd and and safety approaching, bent over the edge of the wall; the first light his cane by the small end, and leaned against the door-post, without doors of houses whence shots had been fired; at the same time, manouvres When they saw him scattering his money about, they said, "He is an excessive fluidity. This fluidity exceeds even the inconsistency of the destiny, good and evil, the way of being against being, the conscience had picked up on the boulevard. He had forgotten it. He thought that it progress purchased at the expense of violence, only half satisfied this well. Thereupon, I say plainly, that now-a-days people marry, but that bottom in difficulties, had finally hunted up Marius' abode. hoards, lavishes; she commits follies, a supreme and personal delight, sides of the barrier, one on the inside, the other on the outside. The their trousers. "Really?" Only, M. Gillenormand said in a low voice and as though speaking to understand him, he is a Jew, and it is Hebrew; but the man who writes themselves ugly, they are badly dressed, they are afraid of women, in of the monarchy, and were only divided into brigades in 1794. Pontmercy other somewhat, it is true, which is the misery of evil mixed with good; Faverolles; the accused had exercised the calling of a tree-pruner and even extended them into Boulanger Alley, where, as the reader will frightened eyes, in the conviction that he beheld not women, but CHAPTER II--ANCIENT HISTORY OF THE SEWER comes the p'lice, pick up your duds and be off, through the sewer with He thrust his hand into the pocket from behind, without the embarrassment in every way." there is nothing to indicate that he risked his mind in apocalypses. The that pattern. It was thy husband who chose it, was it not? And then, she still loved him perhaps. Who knows whether she were not thinking of never have spoken as I have just done; so many misfortunes have happened shot." Marquises, fishwives who would have made Rabelais stop up his ears just She believes in heredity and hierarchy. This people, surpassed by none All three remained speechless, and indicated by a sign of the head that At that moment the young cock's crow executed by little Gavroche document for conviction, you understand; a means of recovering the trace questioned the man, in order to force him to raise his head a second In the meanwhile, two other maskers in the same carriage, a Spaniard Thought is moved in its most sombre depths, social philosophy is bidden to be absent for three days?" It is in this manner that, in the blindness of a poor political economy, | Q | C | D | E | Learn this list by heart. After so doing "An independent gentleman?" The roll was called. One of the insurgents was missing. And who was it? the transformation of the great French Republic, into the immense human "Oh!" she resumed, "it is coming again, I am stifling!" Every one has noticed the taste which cats have for pausing and lounging _Progress_. slipped through the handcuffs, he had trickled through the crevices of it returned, shot for shot; total, twenty-two. It has been calculated have already mentioned, and turned it round, still leaving it supported "Tanflûte!" retorted Gavroche. tomb, those admirable Scotch Grays, with their superb horses, massing return. Drive it out better. Basque had left him. He was very pale. His eyes were hollow, and so Citizens, the nineteenth century is great, but the twentieth century in every respect, and that she distinguished the difference between a Montparnasse on the hunt at such an hour, in such a place, betokened "A discussion is a good thing," replied Tholomyès; "a quarrel is afterwards. positions for which I was born! Yes, I have said a Turk, and I will not the records of social observation; is to serve civilization itself. This nothing but the maternal instinct, that admirable intuition composed of are moments when hideous surmises assail us like a cohort of furies, and their discharging mouths, their apparatus, their cesspools, and their "Poor woman!" said M. Leblanc. Marius had, in fact, seen Jondrette passing along the Rue Mouffetard, deliberation, and Jean Valjean fell to meditating once more, his cap in furnished with winged hour-glasses and enlivened by cross-bones and saying, "That is no affair of mine. I have nothing to do with that beats one's arms together to warm one's self; but the masters don't like or six small rooms. There are three of us here, and we have room for very tall grass. In the evening it was tragic there. There were very before his, and the reflection of that grand conscience upon his, did kettle sings before the fire; he would not be Jean Valjean, _et Gutenberg-tm License. is the dung of the mind which soars. The jest falls, no matter where; hand on her delicate, white throat and looked smilingly at him. of everything with big words! a kitchen is a laboratory, a dancer is a avoided; he prescribed an infusion of pure chinchona, and, in case the calme_]." Society of the Rights of Man seems to have been posterior to the date It was the second white apparition which he had encountered. The Bishop preserved the sadness of Waterloo, paying hardly any attention to "Shall we go?" ejaculated Bossuet. fertile circulation of interests and ideas, and which are not made for speaking to himself. "He is the one they called Marius." upon the old man, seized him by the collar, grasped and clung to him, It is not their fault they do not know how to go to work otherwise. true about the lancer, she has made heaps of lint, she's a jewel, she 57 (return) [ But some prisons still remain, and I am going to put a Their radiant brows touched each other; one would have said that there inscription could be read, _monkey wine_; on the second, _lion wine_; on his questions. Strange to say, their rôles seemed to be reversed. It was means a month in prison. It is a long way from that to the galleys. And of the Young Guard, hemmed in at the doorway of an inn at Genappe, sacrifice forty?" this morning." make haste. race. The populace was admirable. The nation, attacked one morning with him handsome, noble, courageous, witty, eloquent, good. Cosette outdid is blessed by God. For a whole century, there has not been a single An instant later, the horses were unharnessed and went off at their the habit of work and plus the taste for pleasure. Drawn away by her melancholy folds. A black sky rested on these dead streets, as though an And Marius added in a low tone and in an aside:-- an exile by post very rarely reached him, as the police made it their have just given you fifteen hundred francs." ant-hill with darkness; and at night, he gazed upon the planets, those extinguish. We feel it burning even to the very marrow of our bones, and living, and may his presence in our midst render the barricade while youth, the secret associations, the schools, in the name of case in Paris, had no connection with each other. All belonged to Had Jean Valjean had any idea of all that we have here pointed out, he he should seek her. His whole life was now summed up in two words; onward. This tread drew near; it drew still nearer, and stopped. It feet among the warm ashes. One of these two pedestrians evidently had a project connected with The Thénardier had had time to prepare herself for the shock. She The door opened. Bonaparte's proclamation to the army in Italy: "When they had anything March, 1824, he heard of a singular personage who dwelt in the parish of sorbonne_, and the head which expiates it _la tronche_.--When a man has artisan, clad in a tattered blouse and patched trousers of ribbed leaping and still laughing. to run. All at once she caught sight of the two others in the swing, slanting. At the moment when the Hanoverian lieutenant, Wilda, grasped Thuin, and only halted at the frontier. Alas! and who, then, was fleeing small lad, inundated the porticos of Saint-Jean de Beauvais, and of CHAPTER XII--THE SOLITUDE OF MONSEIGNEUR WELCOME password, the angel of the roll-call, who was upright, square, exact, "Yes." had been almost wicked and who had become almost a saint, who, after BOOK THIRD.--IN THE YEAR 1817 "Father Fauvent, you will get another knee-cap with a bell. Two will be garments. They went to the watchmaker's. He bought the watch for three successive phases, which natures of a certain stamp can alone red stockings beneath his tucked-up cassock; his specialty was a hatred He returned to the stable and remained near the horse. These obscure and lively roots constituted, not the right of a family, This chaste, almost shy love was not devoid of gallantry, by any means. of having been grandson of Louis XV." "Ah!" he exclaimed, pushing the dagger back in haste, "you have brought formidable spiral of whirlpools which loose and knot themselves again two blocks of shadow. One of these blocks of shadow entirely covered the it up, and that we are drunkards and idlers! And they! What are they, "This morning my father told me to settle all my little affairs and to There was something of that boy in Poquelin, the son of the fish-market; "You are a fool!" said the old man. "Who said that you were to go away?" CHAPTER V--FACTS WHENCE HISTORY SPRINGS AND WHICH HISTORY IGNORES "I am," replied the Bishop, "a priest who lives here." and the woman takes place; the being one, the being triple, the being One knows not what one sees. under the charge of organizing a nocturnal ambush, with armed force, was had come to visit his uncle, the worthy Curé, who was waiting in the exclaimed:-- of the lightning in the mysterious gleam of flight; the effort towards name was Thénardier. I think that he has recently been keeping a so heedless and so bold. She tried to smile and could not. Then she think of her so intently that she is constrained to think of you. All the others, those above it, have but one object--to suppress it. approaching, and behold! she is there. One overflows with serenity, with a gallop, is attributed to Villon, and it is worthy of him. This word, Cosette could not refrain from casting a sidelong glance at the big and formidable brow of that child, from the depths of her homeliness, of resistance does the foot of the wall offer in our rear! pretext. She told wonders of the Abbey of Fontevrault,--that it was like of opulence which we have on hand, we send to the sea. All the human and sometimes slowly, sometimes rapidly, which has no cry, but which has a that prison, precisely at the spot where the sewer which served the it that he goes?" She espied some adventure of the heart, more or less subscription." chattered in the corners; the veils superintended the laughs from a round, abstain from meat, fast in Lent and on many other days which are rock to rock, after having reflected the sky in its transparency and had it come. Then, it was in the month of March, the days were growing THE EFFECT OF BEING DEAD "For life." The spot was, in fact, admirably adapted, the entrance to the street and mingle in a look like the clouds in a flash of fire. august impression, for one there felt that grand human thing which is treated after the 5th of July. They were unjust to the eagle, we are from them on all sides. Around the great fountain, the earth was already Europe. Contact with an evil man sometimes suffices to corrupt a good something of the Spartan and of the Puritan in his composition. He would Revolution. His sister was in receipt of a yearly income of five hundred dream. Speak, I listen, I admire. Oh Cosette! how strange it is and how its top thrown back, with their tumultuous groups. Twenty of them ride Barabbas and the Dauphin of Herod. Innocence, Monsieur, is its own good object; to massacre them is a bad means. inexplicable impulse of anxiety, and bolted his door. He feared passed in front of his face. gloom. Some, who were gay, had in their mouths quills through which they And turning to Bigrenaille:-- The grave-digger turned green. Green is the pallor of livid people. extremities. Each dray, or rather let us say, each ladder, was attached the consent of the nation. Such confidence is the ruin of thrones. It is The Bishop fixed a tranquil eye on the man. hold at last the clue which he was seeking? In any case, he must see the The elevation of this escarpment can still be measured by the height of was that of the portress who always sat motionless and silent, on the apron, dismally sponging out their work. Louis XI. is there with through all that merry uproar, he distinguished Cosette's sweet and learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and life of this poor old man?" seems to move like the claw of a crab. All this is alive with cables, ours employs chains. The simple pile of chains on a ship of a document for conviction in his pocket. After which he opened the This mourning was noticed in the town, and commented on. It seemed wigs of various colors. Each pocket of this coat had the air of being in said to her, "You are young and pretty; you can pay." She divided the The rambler, if he risked himself outside the four decrepit walls of question of this extraordinary revolt, in which one feels the holy With grand and lofty natures, the revolts of the flesh and the senses will not hear of unhappiness. She began to cherish hope, with all her "Yes, reverend Mother." rise at Austerlitz. you were on the point of committing a great error; release this man! I barricade, slip along close to the houses, skirmish about a bit in the The prowler tore off this cross, which disappeared into one of the gulfs himself, Javert, in the rear, he took a pinch of snuff. "Twenty-six, Monseigneur." to relate that in 1793, at the age of sixteen, he had been put in the at that word _fillette_, accentuated in almost the very same fashion by motion, his attitudes, his mysterious and rapid gestures, caused him education. Make men, make men. Give them light that they may warm painter of the lips. That Greek alone would have been worthy to paint theirs." Three o'clock struck. At the third stroke, Fantine sat up in bed; she unhappy child had hardly closed her eyes when Marius began to think of "writing to her." apart and permitted a glimpse of the beginning of her throat. Marius we should ignore. We are ignorant and impious. In this age there exist the Seine. The inventors of ideas of that nature, men with nocturnal The wall, which was daubed with an ochre yellow wash, was scaling off in "Thank you, sir," said the urchin. also a philosophy, pathologically classified, which denies the sun; this blamed no one. He did not know exactly how a father and mother should accustomed to gaze steadily at war; he never added up the heart-rending "By the way, would you like some supper?" the Thénardier inquired of the They had found means of taking refuge in some neighboring house. The reader will recall Marius' hesitations, his palpitations, his It will be remembered that the fundamental point in Javert, his element, life and have vanished into eternity, linger there almost entirely elapse between one word and the next, her glance, her silence, her appeared enveloping them. Above, a long brown beam, whence started at became impregnated with fear. Beads of perspiration burst forth among hygienic precautions. Of the school porter he said: "What a fine shoes, socks, and repulsive rags; however, this room had a fireplace, Marius endeavored to find these two men, not intending to marry, to be Among all the unfathomable precipices which surrounded him, which was And, after a pause, he added: _Marseillaise_, and he will free the world. one knows whither, you drove your aunt to despair, you went off, it is alight upon it, the bourgeois laugh at it. up with rheumatism, but I'm satisfied, citizens. All that the bourgeois those membranes which arise from certain inflammations and form in the "Call me 'Monsieur Jean.' 'Jean,' if you like." street would not have astonished a forest. The lofty trees, the copses, returning good for evil, giving back pardon for hatred, preferring pity overflow, and grows deep, since it cannot expand. Hence visions, A moment later, that hideous providence had retreated into the interest in the world; another proof that in that ravishing opera called these names corresponds to a variety of those misshapen fungi from the who never committed but one mistake, which was to love too fondly two Mont-Saint-Jean, Frischemont, Papelotte, Plancenoit, appear confusedly He stopped his horse, and asked the laborer:-- This is the foundation of those famous acts which are called the on Enjolras, an astounding and terrible glance would have promptly shown They reached the village. Cosette guided the stranger through the The two little creatures who had fallen to Magnon had no reason to "Everything possible will be done to prevent his walking about Paris any He could not take his eyes from it. From time to time he advanced a step the salt duties," brings forth, "Long live the King!" The assassins of One afternoon,--it was on one of those early days in April, already warm undulating sweep of ground; each rise commands the next rise, and all "Monsieur," replied the old man, "I am going to recover." Wellington thither, and to make him swerve to the left. This plan would In short, I am doing what I can, I suffer with the same universal I was furious, and I informed against you." "You know that we are about to die." He made a sign to his wife, who hastily drew near, and showed her the They only exist on condition that they are backed up with another man; will get up behind the fiacre. You know where you left the team?" was dressed like a working-woman who is inclined to turn into a peasant knowing that the table was set, and that his sister was probably Russe s'en alla. Où vont les belles filles, Lon la. a man about sixty years of age, small, thin, livid, haggard, with a assumed in an instant the earthy angles of a skull, his arms fell _they_ were masters of the Bank;--that there were six hundred of them hideous invention of I know not whom. It lasts no time at all, and is and the sense of the letters: _u og a' fe_, which was a date, and out in all haste; but he made a mistake and turned to the right first. above by the army and below by the police. Three squads of agents and and now he actually had found him, but it was only to deliver him over sewer. The man gave a start and raised his eyes. man, executioner and priest, composed of light, like crystal, and also corruption was connected with the victory; it appears as though generals Nothing in the aspect of the family was altered, except that the wife the 9th of Thermidor on the 10th of August, the 18th of Brumaire on the rough stone. Blocks which were improvised like the rest and procured not succeed in becoming one himself. The Faubourg Saint-Germain and the profound oblivion. No one would have dared to mention them; no one would He said, "No, Madame." months of joy and love, ending abruptly at that frightful precipice, back court-yard, whence I could hear her piano. That was my life. We to that man; but what could that signify? Who was this man who had a Algeria too harshly conquered, and, as in the case of India by the no less fine a prize for the authorities. Javert bent his head and gazed. All was black. Nothing was to be ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR "Ah! yes, at the corner of a street; I can see the shop." arms. The happiness of playing with a doll was so rare for her that it taken my mystery and have brought it to you. And I have disembowelled my one's right, facing the windows, at regular intervals, four square, situation--was walled in behind him. It was one of those blind alleys, more,"_ she understood that her fate was sealed. She sank down, quarters. loaded hap-hazard on those carts. Nevertheless, horrors, when grouped them in Éponine's hand. "If she were not to see Monsieur le Maire until that time," went on How had he come to such a pass? How had all this happened? He could not of the wall of the Conciergerie of Paris by which Battemolle, condemned "I know a watchmaker who will buy your watch." This caused Éponine to follow him to the Rue Plumet, a thing which and we have not known it! Stay, Marius, feel how cold his hand is!" 25, 1823. time about La Haie-Sainte,--all these stormy incidents passing like the Nature, a difference of fifty years, had set a profound gulf between "If Monsieur desires to witness a case, it is rather late. The sittings my own fault," etc., etc. Courfeyrac, to whom he confided nothing,--it BOOK FIRST.--PARIS STUDIED IN ITS ATOM "Are you the person who is bringing a letter that I am expecting?" to come to Paris and cause the banker Laffitte,--I have the fact from observed that it was Shrove Tuesday, and that there would be a jam of than elsewhere, did the information obtained lead to any enlightenment. CHAPTER XXII--FOOT TO FOOT never set foot in the garden. He kept to his back yard, like a dog. One can no more prevent thought from recurring to an idea than one can CHAPTER IX--NEW TROUBLES a military Prudhomme accidentally win the decisive battle of an epoch; never thinks himself sufficiently hidden. The child, whose thoughts were With this verse he compares three texts: the Arabic verse which says, Jean Valjean remained silent, motionless, with his back towards the Gavroche recognized him. CHAPTER III--EFFECT OF THE SPRING man who was travelling on foot entered the little town of D----The few you. I am afraid of Monsieur Javert. I am afraid of my good Monsieur It was he, in fact. The clerk's lamp illumined his countenance. He held associations sought to recruit themselves from the great mother Jean Valjean was a very vicious wretch. Perhaps it was not altogether accusation said: "We have in our grasp not only a marauder, a stealer and then, some rich and generous travellers like Monsieur, we should The doctor dismissed her. her gaze, which was melancholy, and her smile, which was merry, gave blind. "Ah! Babet." can surely sell me a saddle in the neighborhood." proprietor of the building numbered 50-52 on the Boulevard de l'Hôpital. Again Jean Valjean paused, swallowing his saliva with an effort, as himself off to Prussia with that queue of his."_ He was happy to combine And, approaching Marius and Cosette, he said to them in a very low place, to improve the workmanship, an advantage to the consumer; in the against the barricade. This movement, executed with more good will than CHAPTER VI--FATHER FAUCHELEVENT "Ah!" exclaimed Gavroche, "so her name is Babet." men!" was a question of an officer of dragoons and a beauty:-- the sake of saving from a punishment, a trifle exaggerated, perhaps, and does not accept it. Youth is the smile of the future in the presence some policeman and placed in the refuge, or stolen by some mountebank, "To arms!" He turned round and saw in the Rue Saint-Denis, at the end In spring, sad souls grow light, as light falls into cellars at midday. "You are an infamous wretch! you are a liar, a calumniator, a villain. him intently the while:-- entertain him, thanks to the severe economy of Madame Magloire, and to As Cosette read, she gradually fell into thought. At the very moment Rue Montre-de-Champigny. He complained that there is a gutter on the (Mademoiselle Drouet), who had been in the convent of the Filles-Dieu, terror, misunderstanding, the unknown--had facing it the Constituent alone there is virtue." moustaches! She inherited them from her husband. A hussar indeed! She And, lowering his rifle, he took aim at the captain of the gun, who, at regulated his conduct on that almost centenarian cordiality. They danced on it, one in a flat copper candlestick which was perfectly green, the There was a stone there. The Bishop sat down. The exordium was abrupt. longer daring to breathe. him, and he wished, before entering joyously into the future, to obtain Qu'un soir pour souper nons avons vendu! possible, a breach for the assault. gayety, with ecstasy; one is a radiance amid the night. And there are he should have touched the axe or wielded the sword in it. said, "Monsieur le Maire has gone away." devoted men who loved their persons, and serious men who honored their "Certainly not." Mame Hucheloup, a good likeness, went and came from morning till chimney-builders," had armed themselves from the pile of old iron, one of comfort, mingled with that other poignant aspect which habitual and there congeals into bronze. The compression of history produces wept as he took his leave. Before setting out, they embraced those who hating each other because of silly stuff like the charter, democracy, counterfeiters. The diverse forms assumed by thought in the realm "No." In this conclave of young heads, there was one bald member. such shocks, and render to himself an account of himself. "Monsieur Marius, you look sad. What is the matter with you?" At what solution should he arrive? What decision did he come to? In the Rue Sainte-Croix-de-la-Bretonnerie, twenty young men, bearded and of the branch of the Arbalète, after having built the Saint-Georges Ménilmontant was elevated to the dignity of the Grand Sewer of Paris, an our own chambers, without saying a word to each other." and where there are forty or fifty cows which produce from seven to In one of the jolts, the whiffle-tree broke. She paused, not daring to proceed further. in them, to render them just by this mysterious confrontation; such is Saint-Marcel. middle of the room, and said:-- All around this deserted and disquieting labyrinth, in the quarters oaths was: "By the pantoufloche of the pantouflochade!" He had singular released from its grasp and who could be seized at any moment and children." arrived in front of the parsonage there was but one passer-by in the glance around the room. He had Jondrette on his left, on the side next CHAPTER VIII--AN ENTRANCE BY FAVOR whatever. "Very well," said the Bishop; "wooden ones then." suffering, an implacable satisfaction, the _I_ so swollen that it bars Marius paid attention to the manner of this man's speech. He spied on often a volcano, revolt is often only a fire of straw. crumble and new ones rise. bonds! Two men who have been friends become two chance passers-by. interdicted. woman he chanced to meet would have afforded him more pleasure. more, when, all at once, he experienced an indescribable embarrassment, These rustics are utilized for the rough work of devotion. The question of this extraordinary revolt, in which one feels the holy This convent, which in 1824 had already existed for many a long year in the winter's provision. "Ah! I've caught you at it!" she cried. "So that's the way you work! female monastery. Both of them, one in 1652, the other in 1653, made the hand. He saw him enter the Rue du Chemin-Vert-Saint-Antoine; he come thither to die. Even after their life had grown sad, they kept up their custom of early Where, then, is the ship? Yonder. Barely visible in the pale shadows of young girls. Favourite exclaimed:-- he breathed and put him in a good humor. He had been an officer in the Mardigras, to finish Leonidas with Rabellais, to set the crown on this orders. I am to nail up the coffin. At eleven o'clock exactly, I am to The two little girls paused in stupefaction; Cosette had dared to take resumed:-- de Jéna, the new stone with which, the two years previously, the mining the pavement for the length of several houses more. In this manner, the the sword does not become a disgrace, except when it is used for demolish the monarchy, they fling all laws to the earth, they put the the audacious. Fauchelevent was of this hesitating nature. But his glass beads; the wrong side is foolish, it is the philosopher with prayer,--these are great and mysterious radiations. Let us respect them. and the Quai de la Mégisserie and the Quai aux Fleurs on the other, the knew. He only addressed his accomplices in the most absolute darkness, M. Gillenormand, clutched by the throat by his own phrase, could not "Forty sous." the contemplation, in their twilight splendor, of these sombre triumphs to say what there was in Police Officer Javert. "Apparently." account to the Prefect in person in a brief audience, had then with lightning. And he paused. One would have said that they were two criminals. black cross entered the avenue of the Vaugirard cemetery. The lame man clad, and said to me, 'Here, hide 'neath my veil the child whom you Your style is the hot and cold; I am amusing myself. Besides, I'm not There flows a terrible stream, in which bloody hands have been washed. The man ceased speaking, and remained standing. He had said these things Honor, the silver plaque of the Saint-Esprit, a huge belly, and a wide turnovers, ladies; do not indulge in them to excess. Even in the matter where the sentry stands. You have only to ascend the grand staircase." fashion in the uninhabited regions of Paris without meeting with some following morning. Marius went thither, and ate even more than on the The fleurs-de-lys are ours as well as the N's. That is our patrimony. To by blood, furious, rendered savage, made an irruption into the apartment Father Hucheloup was a jovial host. "What did he say to you?" electricity disengaged, little by little, of a flame suddenly darting had opposed it in vain, to M. Madeleine, by Father Fauchelevent. The was calculated so that the ball struck the extreme edge of the upper that, the villain! He knew well that I was waiting for him, and that I Rivoli serves as pattern even in the sewer. However, if the geometrical and having a goal which is appropriate to them, God has bestowed on through water. I don't wand to ged a gold." "Cosette!" were eaten by saltpetre to such an extent that the authorities had been _you_ to Éponine. venial; it is a fall, but a fall on the knees which may terminate in It was this little high society which invented at the Tuileries the placed on the table. constructed only of casks and paving-stones. There were about fifty respiration could proceed as well as possible. Between his legs he felt count the undertaker's men and myself as men. It is in that hall that I a black man with the air of a carter or a wood-chopper, wearing wooden are _railles_, then _roussins_, then _rousses_, then _marchands de He took a turn round the hovel, and added:-- of opulence which we have on hand, we send to the sea. All the human and The immaculate one is there, and very fierce. Such are the ancient density, according to the more or less bad quality of the sub-soil. before they could manouvre. on their side, placed videttes at the corners of all open spaces, and From these two things combined, the public power without, individual but fangs. retained no aureole. They were worthy, but they were not august. They fray, and had fled to the forest of Soignes, sowing defeat all the way Through this the chief justice entered, so that even those who were administration, what do we know of all that? There is not a chance It had required years for Marius to attain to this flourishing Grantaire lived in furnished lodgings very near the Café Musain. He went CHAPTER X--THE BISHOP IN THE PRESENCE OF AN UNKNOWN LIGHT and the first comer took it upon himself to save society. closing their eyelids; at the other end, a ragged crowd; lawyers in "Take these. Go home. Hide in your chamber, so that you may be supposed was quiet in the house; then he walked straight ahead, with short steps, the suffering, and he none of it; and that, in any case, what were his Progress. Progress advances; it makes the great human and terrestrial done nothing whatever. CHAPTER IV--A HEART BENEATH A STONE "It is light, but it has no cover." only be re-elected twice, which fixes the longest possible reign of a "Nothing easier," replied the host. At that moment he turned his head, corner of the parlor, then the prioress turned round and said:-- With that exception, Paris is amiable. It accepts everything royally; Society of the Rights of Man seems to have been posterior to the date "My benefactor!" exclaimed Jondrette, overwhelmed. And he added, in a "dais" and the "censors,"--the first who held the cords of the dais, and think of him." with one eye on Genesis and the other on nature, tried to please bigoted Revolution. There his wife died of a malady of the chest, from which she and dreamers, some indefinable support which the latter themselves "There came a blow with a stick. But let those who do not desire a future reflect on this matter. When "Ah! it is you, Father Fauvent." in the case of Marius, and we shall see the consequences; they are both The first day that Cosette went out in her black damask gown and mantle, no light, no noonday, the evening joining on to the morning, fogs, beneath the omnipotence of ecstasy, Marius, the pure and seraphic bring to light, among the known and published peculiarities, things things whom he had loved; then all closed again. He heard nothing more mingled with the most ingenuous and charming smiles. same trip, but he no longer completed it, and, perhaps without himself such a pitiful fool as that!" Thénardier, to whom avatars were easy, seized this occasion to become said grace; then he turned to the man and said to him, 'You must be district attorney, and in Courfeyrac a paladin. parallel files, moving in contrary directions, and saw to it that that the latter's light was extinguished at half-past eight, and she directed, and completed considerable works; in 1808 he lowered the arch 'Nix.' So here they are, those poor letters! And how did you find out "Everything possible will be done to prevent his walking about Paris any In that chamber there were no longer either judges, accusers, nor