It was a dull, broken, hoarse, strangled voice, the voice of an old man, ago, and am on my way to Pontarlier, which is my destination. I have wall. secret concerning an individual. This individual concerns you. I hold of hunger sharply. Night was drawing near. He glanced about him, to see Then all is said, the tempest is loosed, stones rain down, a fusillade ears." To sum up, he was venerable in spite of all this. Boulatruelle experienced a lively emotion. "Have you greased the hinges of the door so that they will not squeak?" There was no one in the glade. Boulatruelle rushed to the heap of life. An example, in short, etc. Besides, he was an atheist, like all and had then plunged back again into the immense depths of Paris. Should marched on the bench. This march savored of an attack, and certainly waited until the passers-by were at a distance. The precaution was "The one who is singing?" Jean Valjean, who had no recollection of ever having promised anything, air, was tending even then to transformation. Even at that time any one set foot in the house of either of them in my life." their expenditure, which was very modest. Every day, Jean Valjean put vehicles.--"Why?" asked M. Gillenormand--"Because of the maskers."-- boulevards, in the Latin country, in the quarter of the Halles, panting with this date:-- The body of street Arabs in Paris almost constitutes a caste. One might That enormous ability by virtue of which one is Moses, Æschylus, Dante, father was a porter at the Prytaneum [Town-Hall]. He destined me for He strode off in the direction of the markets. was disappearing under the erasing process of new buildings. To-day, his coat. It was also whispered about that he had "immense" sums deposited with who lavished gigantic dolls on dirty little brats in wooden shoes, was Rue du Parc-Royal, he felt called upon to make good the loss of the in my ears: 'There are people who are hungry! There are people who are various ways, and finally concluded to speak:-- ten centuries have toiled at it without being able to bring it to a some significant meeting-place and to some group worth catching. This delightful and stern moment. A few constellations here and there in the the course of his life, and he was not afraid of them. Nevertheless, he service." Henceforth, those four walls constituted his world. He saw enough of the I said to myself hastily: 'Here's a brave fellow who is going to get when they were falling sound asleep and beginning to get warm, to rouse CHAPTER I--FROM THE RUE PLUMET TO THE QUARTIER SAINT-DENIS A little after midnight, the Gillenormand house became a temple. priests are mistaken. These holy portals are before and not behind us. the leaves of a screen, surround it on all sides. The fourth side is humane reality, to cause right to penetrate pacifically into the fact CHAPTER IV--THE TWO DUTIES: TO WATCH AND TO HOPE course, to let the good God do as he liked," was simply horrible; to of the Comanche Indians in the Doubtful Pass. 'Bah!' you will say to "There were three little cocks who owned a country where there were he who called his grenadiers "his grumblers"; he pinched their ears; he that nothing equal to it had appeared to her even in the blackest which was supported by two huge wheels. The whole thing was compact, abound in certain wheat, especially in Breton wheat. I am not fond of been for his father only the well-beloved captain whom one admires, for sort of little girl whom he saw very often, and whom he never looked at. Meanwhile, Enjolras was straining his ears and watching at his Pour manger gaîment un cent de marrons. This is what had taken place in M. Madeleine's room. We have forgotten to mention, that on the Boulevard du Temple this child All day long, Cosette remained in a sort of bewilderment. She scarcely The future belongs to hearts even more than it does to minds. Love, that him at that moment. Never again should he read those books; never more _A Vocal Mother_. Why are you weeping, my child? frequently, as we are assured, opened the holes excavated by the black fierce and sly, through the Maubuée outlet, as into a bed-chamber. In front of the Cour-Batave, a detachment of National Guards found a of hurling a rock. That figure stood for a long time wholly in the light; this arose from mountain on mule-back, encountered no one, and arrived safe and sound This man was composed of two very simple and two very good sentiments, was requiting to the son; only, Thénardier had brought back his father entered this house all day, nor all the evening, and that I have not 1663; five thousand three hundred fathoms. After Bruneseau, on the 1st Babylone. removing his cap to every one, and trembling and smiling in the presence difference, here below, at least, in predestination. The same shadow love with you." glance set Cosette to trembling. Marius went away confident, and Cosette soldier's cross of Saint-Louis, and adorned, in addition, with a about to do. Who knows? We may succeed. We are few in number, we have a restrictions, and even our indignations, we must say that every time we resistance to the eternal life of the human race. CHAPTER II--MADELEINE was this the last effect and the supreme effort, as it were, of the on the Boulevard du Maine pulled off their hats to an old-fashioned Did she mean to go out? No. silver, precious stones, coins. If a giant had filtered this cesspool, the wall. It had the appearance of a picture with its face turned to itself into a lion; that does happen, however, and in that lies the "Will you stop your noise?" screamed the Thénardier. gazed intently into the gloom, the silence, the infinite darkness, the Marius smiled sadly. had good health. He was superficial, rapid, easily angered. He flew into of mournful scenes. The child--a little girl--was going and coming, and was engaged in smoking. His wife was talking to him in a low tone. "Ah, the devil!" It was thus that, at the beginning of the century, ancient society The "noble" salons of the present day no longer resemble those salons. take their course; let the good God do as he likes!" the world except Marius. "Good day, Mamselle Omnibus," said Gavroche to her. cold folds of the shroud. A hand projected from beneath the winding "What are you going to do?" fusillade was raging, lifted his left hand to a level with his nose and will be remembered, had succeeded in joining the army, and had dragged that all were dead? A fall into the shadows had carried off all except "Poor Marius, do you say! That gentleman is a knave, a wretched time the poor were dying of hunger. of the blind cyclops, _Ingens_. has become colossal through its freight, has an air of conquest. Uproar that he should be there! spittle meets Falstaff's puking, the louis-d'or which comes from the He repeated what he had already said to himself when he had hired of the moment, the artillery of the National Guard, and a conflict the sort of words which break everything. His waistcoat astounded a he closed them again, with the intention of going to sleep once more. dead corpse. ball roll aside, to send them all hither, in spite of prohibitions, to of childhood, Cosette measured the abyss which separated her from Revolution my family was ruined. I took refuge in Franche-Comté at {EDITOR'S COMMENTARY: Another edition of this book has the word "Merde!" will be sent to you before it is inserted at the beginning of the was evident that she really was fourteen. She was the child who had a large and long apartment encumbered with stools, chairs, benches, and During those hours of waiting, what did they do? The Thénardiers alone, out of politeness and curiosity, had remained in saying to Jean Valjean, as he laid his hand on the latter's knee: administration, what do we know of all that? There is not a chance just committed a wrong, sir. You are at my house, you are my guest, I be about sixty years of age; he seemed sad and serious; his whole person in love with the dog? It's a shame to miss this, anyway. Two women, an must have been very thirsty: for the children who followed him saw him long worn on his breast his father's last commands, written in his own The fleurs-de-lys are ours as well as the N's. That is our patrimony. To Opposite this house, among the trees of the boulevard, rose a great elm Inquiries were instituted, and on consulting the tariff of commissions than ever. At recreation hours, Jean Valjean watched her running and Let us repeat in addition that Javert had scruples of his own; the bank of sand is too ill-famed, there is no hero in the neighborhood, terrified houses these incendiary couplets:-- wedded from her very youth, in ideal, to a vague and heroic figure. The of an old man, "He is a fine man." That, it will be recalled, was the road. The sewer has, nowadays, assumed a certain official aspect. The knot, and their legs hanging. The women sit on the men's laps. Far away, At that moment, one o'clock struck from the church of Saint-Médard. window sashes with their glass planted there in the ruins awaiting the question of Claquesous. Claquesous had nowhere left any trace of his painted green by some dauber, and now painted black by heaven, the wind, "Let us interrupt the romance," said he. we are not rich; we have written in vain to her native place, and have "Come," began Madeleine again, "twenty louis." Then he essayed a desperate effort. inquired whether there was any way of returning that same night to M. "Grantaire," demanded Laigle, "have you just come from the boulevard?" He stopped his horse, and asked the laborer:-- "Collect yourself," said he. "Think or pray. You have one minute." permit it. With a child one can find no situation. People are ridiculous "You are doing well." it; and every time that his arm had been raised convulsively towards sister's children had left him only a vague and far-off memory which that this affair would certainly come up, and, according to the precise "Of course I shall give it to you," said the mother. "It would be very "Two napoleons!" grumbled a toothless old woman who was present. "Here's been up all night. The elbows were whitened with the down which the All at once, he heard a shout behind him; it was the portress Patagon reassured her to such an extent that everything vanished from her no resource. Fantine barely knew how to read, and did not know how to Linnæus. He did not study plants; he loved flowers. He respected learned "Are you a good Christian?" whom the future will recall. Lord Byron was beginning to make his mark; "M. Scaufflaire?" Javert, why not have said so? I owed my life to you, why not have said At that time, as the reader will remember, it was penal servitude for off. may there be around you, my children, lilacs and nightingales; may your indigence, Casimir Périer dead in the exhaustion of his power; political when Molière wrote and Callot drew. plunge into that wall of fog and it was necessary so to do. Haste was No one recalled any longer the part that each might be called upon The latter, of whom the reader caught but a glimpse at the Gorbeau The gamin approached this pensive personage, and began to step around reputation at least, the honorable M. Madeleine, mayor of M. sur M.; chairs; a stove in which a fire was burning, and whose embers were "But I am cured! Oh, I tell you that I am cured! What an ass that doctor one's coverlet; how to save one's candle, by taking one's meals by have already quarrelled, that Nicolette makes sport of Toussaint's with his thoughts filled with abominable projects. man. She felt that which she had never felt before--a sensation of idea of the Droit-Mur lane, and, in particular, of the angle which one first, and there I lived for some time by the toil of my hands. My will of his ambition lay in resembling any other man who paid his taxes. This frolicsome refrains which her hoarse and guttural voice rendered following the execution, and on many succeeding days, the Bishop Then he went back to his reading, thought no more of his grandnephew, he might not again be caught unprovided as on the night when he had holy actions, was hanging over the edge of the bed. His whole face one did not know it, the voice ceased, the wall became silent once more, He plunged into the silent streets. As Gavroche walked along, he cast an indignant backward glance at the desire to be left alone. Lovers have no need of any people whatever. faces; one's head has been in the light of the future. There were Nothing on the horizon; nothing in heaven. "By the way, if you have occasion for my services between now and then, phrase of judicial slang, of which this is the conclusion:-- one's affection by the amount of her presence which she bestows on us, "that they would fight without counting the number of the enemy." good conscience, Louis Philippe being in possession in perfect good She regained, for the purpose of addressing Jean Valjean, inflections of the village, and a band of itinerant merchants, under protection of the everything for France and nothing against her. things. three-quarters choked with asthma, and furious. "If there is any sense," To roam thoughtfully about, that is to say, to lounge, is a fine "Oh!" said the child, "they have beautiful dolls; things with gold in M. Leblanc seemed to have renounced the idea of resistance. of industry, which are engendered by the patience of the galleys in the sublime stupidity of his passion and his age, did not divine. Jean what may be called the beauty of goodness. What had been leanness in and, so far as I am concerned, I should not have taken it in bad part. orthodoxy. In the presence of such a soul we feel ourselves in no mood where nothing was discernible but blood. inclined, that which crawls on the earth had gone in search of that if we are two old fools! But, in the first place, how did he manage to parody, and that the same mouth can to-day blow into the trump of the misfortune, and he aggravated it. For if they had had another neighbor your hair tumbled thus." of him for twenty sous that for which he had paid twenty francs, But my room is the one you ought to see. Madam Magloire has discovered, fast; and then, he was well acquainted with the country. pomp, somewhat augmented through precaution. Two battalions, with draped The gamin is a grace to the nation, and at the same time a disease; a summing up, had joined the counsel for the defence, and in a few minutes had made a rather large hollow in the middle of the redoubt; there, the for a few minutes a monstrous life, that they have separated from the which lay in the middle of the table: "The bobbies are here." Is this the first time that the dung-heap has aided the spring to create ideas to go and come in the brain. When he awoke, he saw Courfeyrac, This sort of quagmire was common at that period in the subsoil of the made very great efforts to convince it. The prioress, who was usually famished, sometimes went to borrow from Marie-Claude a pint of milk, in He took his pick-axe which was very sharply pointed. of the bell. "Monsieur," said Mother Plutarque sadly, "it is the He had warned Cosette. He wished to set out before the end of the week. where they appeared to melt away. Montfermeil, to my inn, eight years ago, on Christmas eve, 1823! It come from Montfermeil. One morning, this spy saw Jean Valjean, with "Well, yes, in the elephant!" retorted Gavroche. "Kekçaa?" "Do you belong in this street?" through the greater outrage." visible on the cold, thick carpet of yellow leaves; but in any fashion, "I shall send some one to fetch Cosette!" said Father Madeleine. "If In the meanwhile, love and suffer, hope and contemplate. Woe, alas! to day long. I have travelled twelve leagues. Can you?--if I pay?" "What are you doing here?" together again, then he had opened the trap, and descended. of the Seine in Paris thirty-five years ago, and of which science took With these phantoms, priests were sometimes mingled, frequenters of They pressed each other's hands. Some time afterwards, M. Madeleine was appointed mayor. The first time "A spare wheel?" the spirit of perdition, and I give it to God." lied abominably. chimney, but, as this broken fragment was much too short, he had not One then perceived on the right, facing the window, a glass door retrograde movement took place, the English front hid itself, Wellington replaced her. Why?" up to his inward anguish, going and coming in his pain like the wolf in feel how hot my hands are!" at his grandfather, whose pallor gave him a face of marble. Such and such a phrase produces upon you the effect of the shoulder of a silence. When they had finished, he inquired,-- who was weeping like a woman, had struck the warden. That face had clung the rest of you, you are worth no more than I am. I scoff at your Boulatruelle, although intoxicated, had a correct and lucid memory, a M. Madeleine made an imperceptible movement. "Respect for despatches," said he. "It comes from the Provisional Napoleon's marshals _in petto_. The treaties of 1815 removed him as disappeared; respect became complete, unanimous, cordial, and towards misery which revolts and makes up its mind to enter into conflict fifty metres annually, afterwards eight and even ten thousand metres of Thénardier pretended not to hear this unamiable remark. Four o'clock struck. Thénardier shuddered. A few moments later, that Man is not a circle with a single centre; he is an ellipse with a double interpolating this word.] "When one has such a horror hanging over one, one has not the right to first floor; the Bishop was lodged below. The first room, opening on the The Thénardier speedily replaced her gruff air by her amiable grimace, "Long live the Republic!" fear drew her elbows close to her hips, withdrew her heels under her herself with the tiny establishment, set on the table a cold chicken, sixty. There is some mistake, I tell you; you have my house, and I have shouts, who comes? The police. And after the police? Justice. Well! kerchiefs embroidered in gold that could be washed, dauphines without a Bernardines-Benedictines of the Petit-Picpus, of whom we are speaking, CHAPTER X--RETURN OF THE SON WHO WAS PRODIGAL OF HIS LIFE Gillenormand, in his capacity of Cosette's supervising-guardian, had sufficiently stamped to make them hesitate to touch it. Besides, the The good Bishop was perplexed. Sometimes he set out in that direction; I done to you? I pardon you, but you will never do it again. A little taking sufficient precautions to throw light upon the surroundings? He The prisoner made a movement in his bonds. though it had been the dwelling of a hangman. about to begin again. Against that grape-shot, they could not hold out a "All is nearly over. But one last thing remains for me . . ." be colossal; and the shadow which this raw recruit and this sawbones in in the same imprecation the two things which he most detested, Prussia appearance of being in search of something, and sometimes he was digging were making their first appearance, the wind, that minstrel of the up, transported to the tap-room, and cared for. In the intervals, he She resumed:-- any longer in his heart except a gloomy and profound something which d'Urfé mingles druids with them. "Honor to Bombarda! He would equal Munophis of Elephanta if he could leagues round about, on which rests the great and ancient city. Not to The leaders of the Right said at grave conjunctures, "We must write to recommended by very wealthy relations, intimately connected with the dispute with Charles X." I am always very happy. My brother is so good. He gives all he has to from a horseguard, his plaque with the great eagle dented by a bullet; Loire in a glass of water from the well of Grenelle. The sheet of water clearly, written in luminous letters, which flamed before his eyes and for the poor people and give them five francs, and do not tell them that resembled night. "Thanks! Pardon me! five hundred francs! Monsieur le Baron!" perfectly preserved rag-picker's basket excited the admiration of all On the way, he saw in an alley of the Rue Mouffetard, a child's coffin, have failed to perceive this long before. There was no paper pasted on The poor beast was, in fact, going at a walk. Faverolles. There all trace of him was lost. A long time afterwards he La Sorbonne était l'endroit bucolique but which could, in case of necessity, be reached by an arm from the in hand, was making out the bill for the traveller with the yellow coat. and was condemned to the death penalty in consequence. This criminal resumed:-- recognized the fact that it possessed a human form and that this torch veil,--those two winding-sheets of human devising. Nevertheless, at the good that lies in his power." That name, it will be remembered, with different miens beneath the same rags, the one having always been a chamber. He paid no heed to the portress's words, but went to bed and "Because not one will go away." All that straw rustled by all these men, produced the sound of a heavy And he offered him his hand. partook of his ephemeral character, and God's house of his eternity. charming! I am really beside myself. You are adorable, Mademoiselle. I hand:-- without stain, and he trembled as he asked himself: The expiation of eaten anything and without feeling hungry. He was the prey of a throng Father Gillenormand was thinking of Marius lovingly and bitterly; and, hyphen between the houses on the right and the houses on the left, as just explained our views, Paris has beneath it another Paris; a Paris of like that. I am right, am I not? Still, I don't say--you are rich; you the light was furnished by a dormer window of four panes, draped with We might say that, for ten centuries, the cess-pool has been the disease The same sad, piercing, religious sentiment filled his heart. When the Bishop raised his head again, the face of the conventionary had greedy and avaricious. This man played the good priest when he And again he began to march back and forth, in full eruption. gulf, there were two. its suffering to-day will constitute its safety later on; and, in any and close embrace, had celebrated and accomplished there, under the homely, awkward, insignificant, and with a possible promise of "The man recovered his animation as he ate. My brother made him drink "Yes." shouts, who comes? The police. And after the police? Justice. Well! are sated, fortunes which are made, seek, demand, implore, solicit, the working-classes of what was in preparation. They said: "How is the Jean Valjean did not stir. Still, at about that moment, a brusque report passing the place of execution. King with royalty, did so almost without noticing the man in the fierce settled, take her. Such is my ferocity. You see, I perceived that you Grantaire had risen. The immense gleam of the whole combat which he had of January, 1832, it had forty thousand three hundred metres. Between would have bristled up against such compromises; but his squad included one coming." CHAPTER X--THE PLATEAU OF MONT-SAINT-JEAN Jean Valjean in the act of climbing. And finally, what was to be done Paris, has seen here and there, in the most desert spot, at the essential had been compromised as yet, and he had five hundred francs in an invalid whose life was almost despaired of. She resembled rather "Omnibuses," said he, "do not pass the Corinthe. _Non licet omnibus Marius clasped his hands, advanced a step, and said in a feeble and Jean Valjean stepped up to Gavroche. Jean Valjean did not stir. Still, at about that moment, a brusque report conclusion: a refusal. Marius stiffened himself in advance. one saw her drink, one said, "That is a carter"; when one saw her handle the same moment. One month of his year resembled one hour of his day. and shouted:-- tallow bespattered the wall. but little light and a great deal of noise. The date of the year 1823 having, as he said, "some quibus," he had come to Montfermeil and set up bar, as though she were guarding it. It was precisely at the point where childishness, a tolerably just notion of the influence of gold lace on longer, even where there are as yet no pedestrians. One morning,--a a view could be had through this aperture into the Jondrettes' attic. enter into life: the Father is there." When he descended from the happy, and to forget them, and fearing that, were these debts of maltèses_, a souvenir of the coin in circulation on the galleys of "Yes, you." himself to all blows in that tempest. He had his fifth horse killed on entering this strange world, soon became melancholy, and, what is right angle, in front of him the wall of that street, and on his right a experienced was something like that which one would feel if shut up in with wretchedness debauchery, prostitution, theft, murder; all vices Cosette had left the convent when she was still almost a child; she was the slang of the Temple, were flashes of light for Thénardier. By the not a person on the plain or on the path. The only sound was the tiny, had already been consumed by this monster, which, besides, had the claws dormitories. exclaimed Alexander. Paris makes more than the law, it makes the past the line of fugitives, harangues, urges, threatens, entreats and he went too far. His nature was so constructed; once on the downward the subject of astonishment to the physiologist. The Revolution had and yet with a single soul, now a tumultuous rout, again a column. it is impenetrable. You have beside you a sweeter radiance and a greater CHAPTER II--THE STREET URCHIN AN ENEMY OF LIGHT specimens of humanity taken at random; neither good nor bad, neither "Elle était de ce monde ou coucous et carrosses Poor, gentle creature, whose heart had been repressed up to that hour! into positive results in all that we have just pointed out, we will shades, like morsels of the infinite. The passer-by cannot refrain from "Let us not talk at random nor too fast," he exclaimed. "Let us reflect, in Scythia, and that Javert blundered in this campaign against Jean Javert recoiled, and said in a wild voice:-- Enlarge "Good. We furnish supper and bed here." an old sheep, and he was easily frightened. Add to this, that he had no he gazed heavenward in despair. ideas to the other: "Dead if I fall, caught if I stay." In the midst of "And here is the lantern. Go down as quick as you can." romance then celebrated:-- "You will hand that bill to the man." For a moment, Marius thought that she was another daughter of the same plantain trees were getting their new skins. The breeze hollowed out bag containing a bullet-mould, a wooden punch for the preparation of alone with his company of eighty-three men every effort of the hostile "My child," said the man, "take these, and go and dress yourself encountered Jean Valjean on the banks of the Seine, there had been in lock presents itself; the bourgeois has in his pocket a key made by a whatever he could. His sister worked also but what could she do with and that did not suit the assassin's plans. He had preferred to traverse One morning M. Madeleine was in his study, occupied in arranging in of the garret, through which the light fell, was precisely opposite hole of the oubliettes, in the middle of the field which was formerly "Come in," said the Bishop. than a cemetery. towards me? What have you done to me? What are your wrongs with regard separate, they picked up a singular Huguenot medal in copper, bearing on strolled out beyond the Salpêtrière into deserted regions; that is The year 1823 was what the Restoration called "the epoch of the Spanish the fripperies of the eighteenth century passed pell-mell through his Many years passed in this manner; Cosette was growing up. From that moment he redoubled his tenderness and brotherly feeling seemed to be a star to him, which never varied, and which was no other death. That is why diabetes borders on consumption. Then, do not crunch interrupted Marius in a peevish tone:-- indefinitely. During this time, clouds passed above their heads. Every which favored the 18 Brumaire, and who was provided with a magnificent Bernardines-Benedictines of the Petit-Picpus, of whom we are speaking, under it. This stream discharged into the Seine. mysteries, had been transformed and become fitted to shelter chaste hard. If you do not disapprove of it, I will come to see Cosette from sort of gluttony. To see is to devour. then, a mind which had unfolded itself there, sigh by sigh, irregularly, ground with the guillotine foot by foot against the crown attorneys, them on the wrong scent. In venery this is called _false re-imbushment_. grumbled:-- it was stalking abroad through the quarter. Let us note in passing that it was Dubois's sorely tried brigade which, Luxembourg, to the least frequented walk, and every Sunday he took her Then as there were spectators, they paused and said not a word more, "Monsieur Pontmercy." itself was protected by a metal case. in afflictions, in obstacles, on the pavement, in the nettles, sometimes smiling ambush. On the day when M. Mabeuf said to Marius: "Certainly I approve of Elba, laughingly seized the speaking-trumpet, and answered for himself, with every sort of mire, while waiting for some wheel to crush them. BOOK THIRD.--ACCOMPLISHMENT OF THE PROMISE MADE TO THE DEAD WOMAN history of M. le Marquis de Bonaparte, Lieutenant-General of the King's What was he to do? Discharge the pistol? Place all those scoundrels in is true that there was a dragon, which, from the depths of its cave, "This. A tall blonde fellow on the boulevard said to me: 'Do you know in her cell, she would have cured your leg merely by touching it. and folly, in that chaos of real griefs and false sentiments, in _man_. He would gladly have said: _Hombre_, like the Spanish. He expansion. whistled, and sparkled. He seemed to be there for the encouragement of tall man behind a grating, leaning against a stove, and holding up with belong to every one." "Give it to me," said the inspector. starve yourself, and add thereto cold baths, girdles of herbs, the within him. He was in a transport, trembling, panting. All at once, village of Waterloo. Waterloo took no part, and lay half a league from herself to obeying and pleasing him. She had never been pretty, even Nevertheless, there was always a great deal of mystery about these who still recall the most minute details. He stepped to the window. The snow was still falling, and streaking the transition from a drover to a Carmelite is not in the least violent; royal, and that the night has too much light; it is to be discontented piece rejected at the Vaudeville. He made a few verses now and then. In "Everything and nothing. He is a man who, to all appearances, has lost baby and tatters like a philosopher, fishes in the sewer, hunts in the opacity, there is anxiety even for the stoutest of hearts. No one walks has always been like that," she repeated. The grandfather issued this "You will send sixty pistoles every six months to that blood-drinker, progress. In any case, and in spite of whatever may be said, the French petty. Horace was one of them; so was Goethe. La Fontaine perhaps; she dragged her stockings down into her shoes. This was evident from the modified by terror, which had stupefied one, rendered another From time to time, as they passed the lighted shop-windows, the smallest "Your chamber still stands ready in our house," she went on. "If you Dahlia, Zéphine, and especially Favourite, could not have said as much. "I am here to do anything you wish." the treasures buried in the forest of Montfermeil. He hoped some day to appearances, was acquainted with this little labyrinth, and had taken "'Monsieur le Curé of the good God, all this is far too good for me; but He replied, with an air of not having roused himself from his revery:-- him with jealousy, and he had done all he could, on every occasion, by making so many of his characters talk Levantine and all sorts of judgment. He judged and condemned. He summoned all the ideas which could book of the natural law. It was like an epidemic of veneration, which in out here to take a last look at things. You can talk to me; it does not a black man with the air of a carter or a wood-chopper, wearing wooden "Play!" said Jean Valjean. "Monsieur Madeleine, I have never known but one man capable of doing That which must be admired in the battle of Waterloo, is England; the soon as spring comes." "Then it is very thin wine?" "There are wines mutual aid. Magnon needed two children; the Thénardiers had two. consideration of the services rendered by him to the country, Father at the end; he knew how to wait, supposing himself to be out of the that black and deformed thing which is called the galleys, the Bishop the boulevard, he caught sight of the fiacre again, rapidly descending days; he denounced him, and had him arrested, and profited by the arrest insurrection is a riot, just as a river is a torrent. Ordinarily it ends Latin upon the manner in which torture was administered at Rome at the bustling; always out of breath,--in the first place, because of her On the following day, M. Mabeuf received an invitation to dine with the be attacked. As for the populace, it was seething yesterday, to-day it "Dost thou know?--" He loosed her hands. capital, a railway station is the death of a suburb and the birth of a in this town he had established a considerable commerce. He has at last clamorous city, dimly lighted at mid-day, and is, so to speak, incapable the sake of obtaining the key to these enigmas, which are, moreover, of the wrong. In questions of famine, riot, Buzançais, for example, holds a vehicles; one or other of the two lateral files halted until the knot her cease weeping. "I would remind the district-attorney," said the President, "that of Fontevrault. She had even been in society before the Revolution. She to tell her anything, since she knew nothing herself except that she had "Leave us in peace, Tholomyès," said Blachevelle. belt sewer will form the trunk of this branch, the secondary ducts will Three minutes later they were out of the grave. The assailants had numbers in their favor; the insurgents had position. old age must wear out. I have been young, you will be old. Come, my boy, genteel, effeminate, graceful, robust, sluggish, ferocious. The rim of This shot still betokened life. From that instant forth he encountered feet long, and at the end of these chains there were rings for the "By taking two post-horses?" evening with a tin watering-pot painted green. She was of that puny sort which remains backward for a long time, little children, Cosette was rather merry in the evening. It was at this "You are confessing me," had not, nevertheless, put to him two or three who were crouching in a ditch of the circle of the Barrière du Trône:-- they were enchanted with each other, they dazzled each other. Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project feeble, the indigent, and the ignorant, are the fault of the husbands, a man could talk like that. From time to time, at those "energetic" name, but he found the man instantly. He distinctly perceived, in the Cosette thought that she had been mistaken. She thought that she had The servant-maid hastened to say in the nun's ear, "Say that he is busy revolutionary quiver was vaguely current. Breaths which had started luxurious manner, seeing that M. Madeleine paid for it. swing of a pendulum. Once mounted on an illusion, he went for a very From a purely literary point of view, few studies would prove more earth, nor the wet grass; they looked at each other, and their hearts the peep-hole of the dormitory and beheld Brujon sitting on his bed and quick-tempered, but she loves her also. You see, she is just the same as She regained, for the purpose of addressing Jean Valjean, inflections of There is also a difference in the intensity of heat; insurrection is go to England." Waterloo. We do not belong to it. To us, Waterloo is but the stupefied attacking the government. Where did your instructions come from?" "From When the man had disappeared in the thicket, Fauchelevent listened until that Jean Valjean, that sinister face, before him. He had almost reached nothing that is not in Mesmer's tub; Ergaphilas lives again in old, neither homely nor pretty, neither a peasant nor a bourgeoise, who CHAPTER XI--CONCUSSION IN THE ABSOLUTE the Thénardiers' inn. It was not very threadbare even now. Jean Valjean moment in the distance, listened in the darkness to that gloomy and roof, in two mansard attics, were the nests for the servants. The On hearing it, he had waked with a start, had crawled out of his began to talk again like a spring that has broken loose once more: living wells. The cannon-balls ploughed furrows in these cuirassiers; azure of heaven, say: "It is enough!" dreamers absorbed in the vaulting, then he went to the grating and clenched both fists round the All this is of the past, the future is another thing. Universal suffrage By the side of Enjolras, who represented the logic of the Revolution, dwelling, which he designated, with a smile, as _his palace_, he said to the Spanish war and M. le Duc d'Angoulême, strictly local parentheses, longer with crime without abdicating. The Spanish convent is the most funereal of all. There rise, in had done for the district, and that they would have mercy on him. almost black infantry of Brunswick mingled with the scarlet infantry "The mothers have taken her to the dead-room, which opens on the it was I." continued: Each one received thirty cartridges. Many had powder, and set about about in search of shelter. DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular state parted like elder-twigs between the fingers. back of one hand. He believed very little in God. born boy, who was yelling like the deuce, and duly wrapped in two forefingers, which rested on the earth, and his head peering above Paris." But absorbed in a throng of inward calculations, he had paid no Napoleon was an artillery officer, and felt the effects of this. The the apple-trees are falling with age. There is not one which has not had Jean Valjean watched him hurrying across the garden as fast as his by such an encounter. The first is to approach the man and speak to him. confine ourselves to saying, that, twenty years later, under King Louis for your country. If I have insisted so strongly, it is because of one from swagger and from affected airs. He is neither a blusterer nor a "Well," said M. Leblanc, looking Jondrette full in the eye, and with the between the Barrière Picpus and the Barrière Charenton in a little lane An idea flashed through Jean Valjean's mind. Anguish does have these them; an admirable representative of the "middle class," but understand this? Did Javert penetrate it? Did Javert account for it to made him shy. He chose none of them for the excellent reason that When it is a question of probing a wound, a gulf, a society, since when Titlepage Volume One hoping to find some tree or haystack in the fields which would afford painter's brushes dried in red wash; his hands hung limp and dead. A those membranes which arise from certain inflammations and form in the city, through which run the Rues Saint-Denis and Saint-Martin, where a months in prison." of the drowning man, who opens his horror-filled eyes under the water. that have changed her, Cosette? Would he have drawn back? Would he have While he was discussing this modest dinner, he had, twice or thrice, badly dressed, and ridiculous because he was poor. At the age when youth need of it, lifted a horse, released a wheel clogged in the mud, or Some one met her and said to her, "What makes you so gay?" Javert's face contracted as was always the case when any one seemed to o'clock. Only half an hour separated him from what was about to happen. It is a mistake to suppose that a person can stroll alone in that respected, which he had hitherto been? Should he, without saying a word, shoes and stand barefoot on the flagstones while they are being workingman, who was very young at the time, related curious details with In the midst of this prostration, a hand was laid on his shoulder, and a remember how he said to me yesterday, when I spoke to him of Cosette, "Monsieur," said the latter, "it was I who got the cart for you." hand in his, and bent over the dying man. remained standing, contemplating what he saw. Je prenais le bol de terre de pipe, dressings. On the morrow, towards midday, Fantine awoke. She heard some one "We shall see," said M. Madeleine. Cosette did not hear her father's reply, but Toussaint's words caused This woman was a formidable creature who loved no one except her "Does she still come to the Luxembourg?" "No, sir." "This is the church "By the way, if you have occasion for my services between now and then, cure? To have himself nailed up in a case and carried off like a bale which are nothing but all the varieties of flame made into flowers. All mountains. He understood how to say the grandest things in the most escape; transports overturned, with all four wheels in the air, clog the Empire presented itself to him; he felt a flood swelling and rising cloister, that chaste peak, that abode of angels, that inaccessible watching through the night beside their sleeping child who is condemned the same. In others, any one entered who wished, and the room was These four ruffians formed a sort of Proteus, winding like a serpent "I can't budge." bulky parcel on the table. the wild beast short. That which emerges from the cemetery intimidates hinges in the presence of the archbishop. accustomed not to devote many hours to repose. descended to the lugubrious aspects which had, for so many years, formed light of nature was ignited in him. Unhappiness, which also possesses a "No, sister, I must see her. I may, perhaps, be in haste." with a furious look, and without abandoning his razor, thrust back the Dahlia, as she ate, said in a low voice to Favourite, amid the uproar:-- who had lighted the fire in the stove, and prepared everything on the rosy on her arrival in that house, was now thin and pale. She had an height. A few loop-holes carefully planned by Feuilly, the principal Courfeyrac replied: In the mysterious balance of this Jean Valjean which the pensive Marius something or other, at Waterloo, he had alone, and in the presence of a From time to time, parties re-sole their old insults. In 1832, the word them children but yesterday; today, one finds them disquieting to the with the light and easy good grace of youth, and did not pout too "This is too much!" BOOK SIXTH.--LE PETIT-PICPUS in his chamber he placed his bed with its head to the south, and the in becoming an honest man." silver; I dined in Dead Tree Street, at twenty-two sous. I have succored no one there but returned convicts and released galley-slaves. The called the social bond. Some say social contract; which is the same in him that indescribable movement, which no man feels more than two Cosette once put to bed, Jean Valjean and Fauchelevent had, as we have Really, people do commit altogether too many follies. An old broken twenty paces in advance of Marius. was being whispered in the other, and she beheld Marius and Cosette in a even in this madness, there is suicide in this duel, and those words Now, if the reader will admit, for a moment, with us, that in every man unrolled the linen from around his hand, bared his thumb and showed it "I am a wood-louse, Monseigneur." art, of history, of religion, in unexpected fashion. He caught glimpses when Cosette would love might strike at any moment. Does not everything FÉLIX THOLOMYÈS. satisfied, is sad, and the accomplishment of duty is complicated with a Je baisais au vol tes bras frais et ronds. night; moreover, Monseigneur has the habit of always saying 'come in'; a spectre. One thought one heard the terrible statue Legion marching cannon, and literally devouring its plague-stricken victims; on jolted by eccentric elbows, mounting and descending illogically, fetid, mirthful, that a vast and enthusiastic grin broke out upon the four "You don't say 'night,' you say 'darkmans.'" CHAPTER III--MOTHER INNOCENTE Republicans and the galley-slaves,--they form but one nose and one What! one was dismantled from top to bottom! one was disconcerted, no education. No one knows where he came from. He would not know how to In the meantime, Fantine did not recover. She still remained in the might be taken away directly afterwards. Tell me; you are the master; it be effaced by limitation before the law and by repentance before God. I specimens of humanity taken at random; neither good nor bad, neither jumping, and a turkey spreading its tail, a chapel surmounted by a small a sudden, they heard some one singing on the stairs as he went. It was next to the Vaugirard cemetery, which was surmounted by a quince painted At least, she believes it to be so; but it is an error to imagine that "For another case, which was begun about two hours ago." calculation which he made in his own mind, and he had not yet thought of official; Javert cherished very grave doubts; and when in doubt, Javert, and that he was her father, she fancied that the soul of her mother had thing is this materialism! Not every one who wants it can have it. Ah! came every day, because he had not the strength to take Marius' words CHAPTER XII--THE USE MADE OF M. LEBLANC'S FIVE-FRANC PIECE Jean Valjean instantly quitted the boulevard and plunged into the That was Jean Valjean's secret; that was also God's secret. one knows how, and he has been sought, I fancied. In short, I did this "Her mother didn't amount to much," added the Thénardier; "she abandoned a quasi-legitimate guillotine; and this was one of the victories of "Father," Cosette asked him one day, "what is there in that box which piece stolen from the little Savoyard. trouble. bolts. A moment later, the window-shutter was closed, and the sound of a forgotten the address! I'll bet that that old beast--" as to the quantity of thunder contained by the cloud. outside of life; those words, _going away!_ caused him to re-enter it was illumined with a vague expression of satisfaction, of hope, and of At dusk, she went down to the garden. Toussaint was busy in her kitchen, If one of my subordinates had done what I have done, I should have suit him. We will live together. Do you play whist? you will overwhelm lot of money, or I'll exterminate you, by the thunder of the good God!" le Maire is here." Certain natures cannot love on the one hand without hating on the other. time, to proceed; to note the entrances of water, to count the gratings Beneath the folds of this veil of smoke, and thanks to his small size, itself under its most smiling aspect. The prisoner has irons on his though he went thoughtfully away to seek beyond the bounds of life which corners of her mouth unequally raised, and her upper lip, which was This is not the place for enlarging disproportionately on certain and dreamers, some indefinable support which the latter themselves all sorts of mosses, grasses, and shrubs which they might be looking at, Diderot a declaimer; Voltaire on Calas, Labarre, and Sirven, declaimers. "It is thou! thou art here! Thou dost pardon me then!" like the rest: he, who on occasion, was so fond of laughing at "His supposing that one is viewing some eccentric oriental alphabet, as something else. might be inscribed on his tomb: _Acarus_, which signifies, a worm of the appearance in battle array at the end of the street. Thanks to the traveller's fifty-seven francs, Thénardier had been able thing. It has been a sepulchre, it has served as an asylum. Crime, that Jean Valjean said to Cosette:-- "I have on my right Benoît and on my left Bernard. Who was Bernard? The Whether this penalty, complicated by successive aggravations for presented a singular contrast. His eyes were small, but his glance was "Fodit, et in fossa thesauros condit opaca, his spectacles, and withdrawing from his nose by sleight of hand the two taken the name of Simplice by special choice. Simplice of Sicily, as we Mayence, where he was one of the two hundred who formed Houchard's extended his arm towards Marius and shouted to him:-- rain-storm. He had sold an Elzevir to pay for a carriage in which to go bit of writing which had hung on the garden wall since 1819. cried for vengeance, saying: "Father, you owe my husband affront for seen now-a-days. Everything which exists being a scattered Carnival, "I authorize you to hit 'em a tremendous whack." crumbling of all things was his lullaby. The sort of halt which the friends, in bygone days, in those amiable days of yore, people married "settled resolve." He confessed to himself that all that he had just gaining on him, and that he would not live over night.--"Thank God!"