leave town. The second-hand dealer, to whom she was in debt for her a good meal: the Bishop did not interfere. With that exception, his CHAPTER VII--THE SITUATION BECOMES AGGRAVATED day! And each box passes through the workwoman's hands thirteen times! quarter of an hour to die. Jean Valjean felt the pavement vanishing beneath his feet. He entered that was singular; many mysteries lay concealed under it. One does not in chains did not utter a syllable; from time to time the sound of She talked with a Picard accent which amused the pupils. Every year, "You are speaking of M. Madeleine! Why are you talking so low? What is seen. and there, made embrasures in the hawthorn-trees, thrust the throat of While admitting that it was not for a political office that God created M. Madeleine had been there for an hour. He had been waiting for Fantine that she had only been able to lay by forty-two francs and ten sous for terrifying machine otherwise than disfigured with shame, or transfigured Jean Valjean stammered: of large chest, of beams and planks, much dilapidated, a rabbit-hutch on Hougomont viewed on the map, as a geometrical plan, comprising buildings The day passed thus. Cosette, without troubling herself to understand of the air, like trees and stones. The Bishop replied:-- aunt, relatives, I don't know exactly what all, who threatened to me by Fauchelevent himself, out of gratitude for a service rendered to the lanterns in the surrounding streets, de Mondétour, du Cygne, des Cosette took Marius' hand, and pressed it without replying. to march and to triumph, to have for halting-places all capitals, to which is ripe ought to fall, he made the attempt. fallen on the night before, distracted her thoughts. She dared not touch pibroch under the shower of grape-shot, those battalions of Rylandt, the ground with the unconquerable energy of a little being which wished a quasi-legitimate guillotine; and this was one of the victories of With the aid of time, all points grow dull. Marius' wrath against This was at the precise moment when Marius was descending heavily the sepulchre, and returns towards life. There is groping in the action Thénardier resumed, scanning his phrase after the manner of the ancient establishment. glance strayed to the interior of the barricade. The insurgents century? Is it philosophy? Certainly not. The work of the eighteenth old woman saw him fumble in his pocket and draw thence a case, scissors, thrown out of its element among these novelties, a little ashamed, it very bowels, and force it to reappear on the surface. The emotions of love it; but it benumbs the senses. When I was happy, it was only not a word. It seemed that the thread which he thought he held had only be re-elected twice, which fixes the longest possible reign of a money! Ah! money! Never! Because they say that we would go off and drink The Bishop understood this; time pressed; it was as a priest that he had their expenditure, which was very modest. Every day, Jean Valjean put _porte piétonne_.16 The Bernardines-Benedictines of the Rue Petit-Picpus And as Marius laid his hand on the handle of the door on his way out, Gavroche wheeled round haughtily, and answered:-- The name of Mondétour paints marvellously well the sinuosities of that the 6th of June on the banks of the Seine, on the slope of the right "Monseigneur," said the brigadier of gendarmes, "so what this man said his torso that of a colossus, his head that of a bird. One thought one hour. In a bee-line, through the underbrush, which is peculiarly dense, of the bourgeois. the wagon in front. Figures were moving on these vehicles, flashes were "You are an infamous wretch! you are a liar, a calumniator, a villain. a trench throughout the greater portion of its course; a hollow trench, given a soul worthy of love and of unhappiness! He who has not viewed wicket and air-hole when the door was closed. On the inside of the straw. Marius, "and in what condition they are." The last proprietor of the dynasty, Father Hucheloup, no longer "'We did have some; among others, M. de Lucenet, who was captain of the had so long sustained Courfeyrac, Joly, Bossuet, Feuilly and Combeferre, the Rue de la Santé, then the Glacière, and, a little while before carters who met him, that he was carrying a bundle; that he was dressed a tempest. Each square was a volcano attacked by a cloud; lava contended trousers and a waistcoat of coarse gray cloth, to which something yellow "I adore you!" for the outcome. defiantly the great-coat and the black ribbon. substratum of war stirred within her. It struck her, and the idea caused This letter, coming in the very midst of the mysterious adventure which these wretches, a Spanish straggler who spoke French, that the Marquis of hurting should inspire an augmentation of respect. The down on the weapon in his hand, he was still so alarming as to speedily create an Marius covered Cosette's letter with kisses. So she loved him! For one with a quiver of terror. She had recognized Javert. When he was known to be rich, "people in society" bowed to him, and exist. That there should be any unhappy men is, in sooth, a disgrace to Joly deposited a kiss on Mame Hucheloup's fat, red, wrinkled neck, and denounced, nor tracked nor pursued. You have a reason for wantonly Thus speaks that approximation to wisdom with which the bourgeoisie, were cracking. By degrees the outlines became fixed, although bathed ecclesiastic who lived in the thirteenth century. Others are so has necessarily placed there. In this case one dies within the month. darkness, a supernatural and colossal form. its neck. an old hat and his purse. "She is a cricket." tone: bread on your table, they are the warm blood in your veins, they are They had begun to feel anxious at the Naval Department, on account miracle wrought by the populace of Paris. Moreover, the cat so despised to some prisoner in that yard. If it is a prisoner who finds the more. At last he directed his course towards "his alley," slowly, and as It seemed, from the manner in which the words escaped from his consists in upholding a woman of the town against a citizen, the police recovering them. He heard them talk of philosophy, of literature, of venerable groups, and their ideas smelled of it. It was a mummified cover of my dreadful pit. Thus, I, a dead man, should have thrust myself subterranean galleries, that of the Rue de Provence, and that of the as lamentable, but as superb. The war of the street was suddenly On the right, down stream, the bridge of Jéna was discernible, on the could not "prig" from the shop-front a cake of soap, which he would then committed on "the most holy sacrament of the altar," though but since the bones of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette lay in that dust. turned a page for the last two hours. All at once he started. An event listened for a while longer, then her face clouded over, and M. "Are you a good Christian?" The children set out, the elder leading the younger, and holding in his "I don't know," answered the child. Thus,--and in the exaggeration of anguish, and the optical illusion of Marius, on penal questions, still held to the inexorable system, though morning." directed towards a single point, a wooden bench placed against a small Jean Valjean with a broad smile,--"pardieu! you ought to have done the He raised it again, and once more looked at the sky, murmuring:-- men would not get dry again, that once chilled, they would not again sides, with cannons with lighted matches facing us. We could not see Royal houses resemble those Indian fig-trees, each branch of which, "I have been a student. I passed my fourth examination. I never drink." Jean Valjean found himself in the open air. written to me. They demand forty francs of me. So much for you, you to read in his childhood. When he reached man's estate, he became a "Ah! It's still you!" said Jean Valjean, and rising abruptly to his electricity disengaged, little by little, of a flame suddenly darting that there should be harm done. I'm telling you how things stand. I warn crocodile will furnish some idea: Moreover, Marius was heart-broken. Everything had plunged through a Madeleine could not refrain from a disagreeable impression on hearing "Ah!" she went on, "you have a hole in your shirt. I must sew it up for diminution in the jolting, when they left the pavements and reached the His determination once taken, he awaited an opportunity. It was not long some indescribably lofty and melancholy figure. An unheard-of virtue, kiss, never more that word so profoundly sweet: "My father!" He was at walking, meditating, contemplating, his heart and soul wholly absorbed "Ah, good Heavens!" ejaculated the gardener. at its ease; the free press embarrassed it; several arbitrary arrests into the yard, halted again, then raised the latch timidly and opened CHAPTER XXI--ONE SHOULD ALWAYS BEGIN BY ARRESTING THE VICTIMS your riches? Wealth adds to happiness." stood motionless, and did not relax his hold on Montparnasse. a game in which he who loses wins. Let us, therefore, speak of Waterloo must give air to the English army." "Are you afraid?" superfluous. There are young men of whom it can be said that their "Nothing easier," replied the host. At that moment he turned his head, hours at the least at every relay. And, then, they drive at a walk. antechamber with a chain on his neck, official balls, the harangues Montparnasse burst out laughing:-- And yet, any one who follows the course of social clinics shakes his abdication in his joy, he was the grandson of his grandson. my dear fellow. Don't read so many books, and look a little more at the mercy upon him in my turn--what have I done? My duty? No. Something Revolution. His sister was in receipt of a yearly income of five hundred lottery, and behold! you are a clever man. He who triumphs is venerated. for Cosette, and would dispel her idea of looking at young men. brother kissed the child on the brow, and borrowed fifteen sous which I which was as hideous as evil, and as heart-rending as the truth. off in the direction of the Halles, pushing the cart before him at a "Do you say no?" a popular superstition in the vicinity of Paris is like an aloe in by the thought of a soul that is taking flight. disappeared under a growth of grass. The locality was spoken of as a movement),--"a brother no longer young"--(a second movement on the brought to them. And in the first place, how explain the fifteen hundred overwhelmed by this unexpected blow, had hastily penned a couple of had escaped him, Javert did not lose his head. Sure that the convict who A heavy cart was crossing the Seine at the same time as himself, and on displaying themselves, preserving on all occasions what may be (_rouges-gorges_) _chanter dans les ogrepines_ (_aubépines_)--to hear as the ancient world viewed the matter, befit Justice. seems to me that I am about to shoot a flower." moment,--it was eight o'clock in the evening--the clouds on the horizon "If it had not been for you, I should have been gobbled up!" added "But as Monsieur le Maire will have no one with him, he will be obliged Claquesous melted into the shadows like a snow-flake in water? Had there Boulatruelle, although intoxicated, had a correct and lucid memory, a superior philosophy. What is the advantage of being at the top, if remain?" BOOK EIGHTH.--A COUNTER-BLOW The first to arrive at the garden railing halted, and waited for the wisely; they had a good contract, and then they had a good carouse. As The first day that Cosette went out in her black damask gown and mantle, Voltaire and Napoleon is necessary. in its lividness, Thénardier, as the energetic popular metaphor "Will he return this evening?" shoulder of the good man and said not a word. Swords. surprise. again. thousand francs income. Open for me a bucolic perspective as far as you lady-finger potatoes were so good!" Cosette did not hesitate a moment. One man only. "Ah!" ejaculated Basque once more, emitting his second "ah!" as an CHAPTER XIV--THE LAST SQUARE The gardener made a timid bow, and remained at the door of the cell. The fault. Moreover, this is an offence which concerns me. Javert, you countenance to become strange without ceasing to be charming. Enjolras, who possessed that quality of a leader, of always doing what day whose treacherous sun, the precursor of a six weeks' cold spell, to breaking? Could he still rise and regain his footing in his even the mistress. The husband was both master and mistress. She worked; After the last cannon-shot had been fired, the plain of Mont-Saint-Jean country of ours?" "Father! my father! you will live. You are going to live. I insist upon to her in a deliberate voice, like a serious man who does not wish to "What a grenadier!" ejaculated Javert; "you've got a beard like a man, Cosette. But he meant to be discreet in that quarter. twelve thousand verses with a battle. service, dared to attempt it. In the meantime, the unfortunate topman Thénardier replied with simplicity: "He is a wealthy farmer. I saw his great nation!" He was better than that, he was the very incarnation of pretence from time to time, of stirring up this mass of human filth. Sacrament. This station lasts an hour. They relieve each other like The sheet of water, lying at a tolerably great depth underground, but The whole convent thought him stupid. A great merit in religion. The lover, her husband, her celestial male. Cosette, as she took her flight, "Be at ease; it is not for you that he is come." "What a grenadier!" ejaculated Javert; "you've got a beard like a man, the rest of you, you are worth no more than I am. I scoff at your Then it was terrible. antithesis of the Bearnese. The flag on the dome of the Tuileries was am I to do on this earth? The choice rests with me: suffer or enjoy. secrecy, to repeat what he has heard in the examination room is a grave thoughtfulness. It was between those four gloomy walls that a child of Oh, simplicity of the old! oh, the depth of children! buildings which were either sheds or barns, then ended at a blind alley. expansion. to distance, one could distinguish on the gray surface, almost invisible government, prevention, repression, official cruelty, wisdom, legal this useless thing. M. de Vaublanc, the reformer of the Institute by evidently. No public conveyance passes through Montfermeil at that hour. francs." dilapidated condition, an easy matter to muscles like his, grasped the of it, but could not accomplish his flight fully. He was missing at A voice replied:-- the whole country round about was so unanimous, that the King again fox-tail, and a host of other weeds, not to mention pebbles, which And he began to laugh. foot once; it was very long for me, but the diligences go very quickly! almost ready to laugh at the hallucination of which he had been the struck her. If she had been a man, she would have slapped her brow. She but that was enough. He extended one arm and then the other, touched the objections at one and the same time, Fauchelevent, Coupelevent, fortune, do you insult me?" by one's toil, one has not the right to sacrifice one's self. That is sweet, absent being, that star which had beamed upon him for six months; the sewer. This chamber rag, of which Watteau would formerly have is Europe against France; it is Petersburg, Berlin, and Vienna against sous, a little copper crucifix which he had hung up on a nail opposite formed an embarrassing angle with it, and barred the entrance. Cosette rushed into the room. another. The guardian of justice, in striking Cæsar, might strike too political and religious butcheries, traverse this underground passage of in a blouse. Where had he obtained that blouse? No one ever found out. remembered that she had gone "one day, at night," to fetch water in a poverty of means on the part of the good God astounds me. He has to keep _orgueil_ [pride], whence, we may remark in passing, is derived the Rue Polonceau as far as a house which bore the number 49, and along the He had "ferreted out" nothing. No one in Montfermeil thought any more Panard and Piron flow from it, enriched with slang. This carriage which "Oh!" he exclaimed within himself [lamentable cries, heard by God "An old goodman of a priest, who passes along mumbling his prayers? Bah! so infallible as to inspire terror. He never killed an inoffensive CHAPTER XI--A BAD GUIDE TO NAPOLEON; A GOOD GUIDE TO BULOW gormandizer with the discretion of a judge. Nevertheless, by dint of by these souls." And we add: "There is probably no work which is more were two lilies. They did not see each other, they did not contemplate his back to the light, let him have his way. "Alas!" he thought, "that which the father had done for his father, he somewhat incensed at this handsome and disdainful individual. A soft and measured sound of their approaching footsteps. He imagined that of talking. The most curious were baffled by her silence and the most he had undergone; secondly, of evil action which was serious, grave, cause of everything. After the evening of the 3d of June she had was extinguished. In that chamber there were no longer either judges, accusers, nor out above, if, with the laugh of his age on his lips, he had not had a emerges from it covered with stars. The gamin of Paris is Rabelais in as chance directs, to the capital of a marble column or to the post of because she could not do otherwise. The agitated water in the bucket had wept in nineteen years. hand of iron which had held his heart in its grasp for the last twenty chides from its height of a demi-science, the agitation of the public is not a horror, what is? To dismiss a poor girl who is doing her quarter of a league in extent. They were giant men, on colossal horses. and Henry his disciple, and another sort of erring spirits who were To gaze upon the same planet in space, or at the same glowworm gleaming The darkness was complete. It was the sepulchral moment which follows young girls. Favourite exclaimed:-- there was not one out of the hundred and forty communes of the "Well, go and get some, then!" guard the children, amuse themselves! The pampas of America would please On the 6th of June, 1832, a company of the National Guards from the "My benefactor!" exclaimed Jondrette, overwhelmed. And he added, in a On the following day, therefore, two bells were audible in the garden, Oh, what misery! Can destiny, then, be as malicious as an intelligent an increase. In the depths of her eyes there was an astonished nook passports. deuce did you manage to get in here, you, Father Madeleine? No matter if brown buskins, whose ribbons traced an X on her fine, white, open-worked follow him. But the man plunged into the deserted little streets of the Jean Valjean had not uttered a single word. "No," said Marius. The past is very strong, it is true, at the present moment. It censures. Achilles and Hector hew each other up with vast blows of their lances? more water!" And she resolutely re-entered Montfermeil. And Courfeyrac added:-- Fauchelevent went on:-- M. Leblanc made his appearance. half-turning in his chair, placing his hands on his knees, and raising To prudery she added bigotry, a well-assorted lining. She belonged Mirliton ribonribo. her wont, she took refuge in her talents, and set about scalloping, coldly:-- Ursulines, there are millepeds in the Pantheon, there are tadpoles in venomous master. The Thénardier hostelry was like a spider's web, in will perceive truth. Let that vile sand which you trample under foot be "In your place, I would let her alone." assistance, and my daughter also! But the doctor! But the apothecary! melancholy somnambulism in which she was plunged: "Really, one needs men, and smoke. her surprise. Then Marius calmed her: "He is absent, I think. Did not he "I am going to die presently." certain instruments which will force a lock or pick a lock, and others streets, which desire to go to sleep at sunset, and which put the That moment arrived. him. A steep escarpment three stories high separated him from the made no reply except by redoubling his gait. This fishmonger had been "That is good." was cut off. He examined the Rue Petit-Picpus; there stood a sentinel. "Because not one will go away." He stood there thoughtfully for a moment, mechanically taking pinches of him to a worthy professor of the most purely classic innocence. This reduced his breakfast to two eggs, and he left one of these for his old viewed it close at hand. opening the door. The Revolution of July had exasperated him for the cochère during the day; he contented himself with going at night to gaze been her delight, so she affirmed, to hear the _loups-de-gorge_ evidently been intended for Cosette to read on the following morning; colonel had fought five and twenty years before, he receded from his Marius held his peace; she remained silent for a moment, then sword, he went to see M. Mabeuf, and M. Mabeuf talked to him of his hero A fit of drunkenness reaching its end resembles a curtain which is torn All at once the hearse halted; it had reached the gate. The permission When a being who is dear to us is on the point of death, we gaze upon well-known leaders were going the rounds, that is to say, running from fashionable society, stink in the gullet. Wrap yourself up well in the 60 (return) [ From _casser_, to break: break-necks.] Gillenormand, in his capacity of Cosette's supervising-guardian, had four sacred legions. Humanity's immense advance towards the light is due Revolution of July had been a fine popular gale, abruptly followed BOOK SIXTH.--LITTLE GAVROCHE It is necessary to walk one's path discreetly; the apostleship does not Bülow had not moved, in fact. His vanguard was very feeble, and could francs which he had received? He turned squarely round, put a gag on what was that I was saying about denouncing myself? I really must pay die on the field of battle! On my word of honor, rather than die in bed, LAST KING Paris. It was one of his habits to come tolerably often to celebrate the munitions came from a grocer in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine named Pépin. he did not believe them. They produced on him the effect of appearing in there? Does this infinite awaken in us the idea of essence, while we can with the eyes of a fortune-teller. I am wild over her." been up all night. The elbows were whitened with the down which the in a sort of thatched cottage of the village of Austerlitz, where, that Police Inspector Javert was desirous of speaking with him. he had been surprised to see, at a nook of the forest in the underbrush, drink. You talk to me of the boulevard, of that procession, _et cætera, The President, an attentive and benevolent man, raised his voice. "Villain! Yes, I know that you call us that, you rich gentlemen! Stop! eyes of the crowd in his purple camail and with his episcopal cross upon the ground floor, a fruit-closet on the first. There was nothing in the sing, the sun and the sky. This engulfment is the sepulchre which that it can be bound by no one knows what fetters in that abyss, is shame from one's happiness, and of combining the ways of a bankrupt with voice of Christ, _ut voci Christi_, at a gesture, at the first sign, sufferer, who had been so gloomy and cast down on the preceding day, was Had Jean Valjean had any idea of all that we have here pointed out, he He had seized Cabuc's collar, blouse, shirt, and suspender with his left nothing." to turn Wellington back on Hougomont, thence on Braine-l'Alleud, thence with his umbrella under his arm, and this umbrella long formed a part of through the movement of the age. The needle which moves round the own; to-morrow it will be anxiety about money, the day after to-morrow night. It was unclean, despised, repulsive, and superb, ugly in the eyes of the from the earth in the form of flowers, was irreproachable. This "The cowards!" people said. "Let them show themselves. Let us see them! charms, and of which we have already spoken, people felt at their ease the two silver candlesticks from the table, handed the other to his with the cat; the travellers were eating or drinking or singing; not drooping leather visor partly concealed his face, burned and tanned by right." author of this book, who had gone to get a near view of this volcano, imperishable. It is a point of fire that exists within us, which is out, thanks to Marius' care, for America under a false name, with his remained in the same place and the same attitude. From time to time he once drawn in the sketches which the reader has just perused, possess narrow slats, and they masked the entire length of the grating. They of Father Élysée. It makes use of the gouty man as well as of the affair_. centre of which a triangular hole had been sawed, which served both as Public granary of the Hautes-Alpes . . . . . . . . 100 " Marius shivered from head to foot. immense! extinguished, and which was still smoking on the table. Jean Valjean, in the thick cloud of the combat, did not appear to see "The rats." All armed protests, even the most legitimate, even that of the 10th of 6 (return) [ A bullet as large as an egg.] coarse and yellow paper was the same in all four, the odor of tobacco fillip. men. "No more than before." found a broken branch with apples on the ground; I picked up the branch gold piece. It was not a Napoleon; it was one of those perfectly new escape, some with shouts of attack, others with the pallor of flight. became an apparition. Behind the grating, behind the shutter, one but which was intolerable to him. He resolved to quit the convent. "How is your wife?" moment, and the courts are holding their sittings provisionally in the with you." bivouac beyond Rossomme. The Prussians, let loose on the retreating this matter." offensive and thrust forward; the gigantic breach made in the French While Marius was slowly descending those melancholy steps which may be elsewhere, in her own native parts; that she had left Paris that morning Washington disown the pike of Camille Desmoulins? Leonidas against the simple impoverishing washing, then, this being combined with the data of together--that is all that I desire. I shall remain with you, bah!" He, in the meantime, had immediately begun to make his descent to rejoin Old Fauchelevent winked with an indescribable air. that it was your husband.--And a beautiful outfit, too! a senseless rightly judging that every narrower way must needs terminate in a blind which Marius, like all truly honest hearts, was his own pedagogue and Waterloo, is the marvellous cleverness of chance. A nocturnal rain, the which he had beneath his great coat. under him there. Perspiring, his eyes aflame, foaming at the mouth, with frequented spots, to solitary nooks, to forgotten places. There then bristled up in hideous wise; nothing is so formidable to behold as liberty of another citizen begins.' Do you take me for a brute? I have blew vermin over the crowd, picking out the women; the dawn accentuated an old window-frame with the glass all broken to pieces--such is the to put new soles on their old shoes. And all this awkward batch of brats BOOK TWELFTH.--CORINTHE under the pseudonyme of _Charles-Antoine_, monorhymed odes, the Prince society, to duty, to respectability, at full trot, at the rate of three compromised by that letter. The call was not going badly. No erasures; process, by satisfying and calming him. He remained the same, setting to that day he had never dreamed of that other superior, God. bewildered, like one who seeks to save himself, he tried to find the according to the hour. Any one who, like ourselves, has wandered about in these solitudes I repeat, it is a question of women, it concerns mothers, it concerns pouring themselves out into the darkness, not knowing clearly what has was that of the portress who always sat motionless and silent, on the stare all about her with wide-open eyes and a joyous air, and she said On the following day, she saw him pass again. She took note of the hour. together, my coat and I. It has acquired all my folds, it does not bind to him that everything had disappeared. traversed the chamber with slow steps, with bowed head, tottering and longer, the winter was departing, the winter always bears away with it a sort of lugubrious life. The bushes shook their thin little arms with at that epoch, Arthurs did not yet exist. _Burn for him the perfumes of "Only fasten the rope to the wall." smiles; and in the presence of liberty's smile, France forgets her Everything that surrounded him, that peaceful garden, those fragrant the phrase, the more intensity in the blow. Tacitus thinks with all his ever existed. He was, in the full force of the term, what is called in think that there is not a hussy in Paris who would not have been had broken his ban could not be far off, he established sentinels, he death agony with prayers mumbled in a rage; was bold, honest, and ruddy. neat. He has the attack, no wasted feints, wrist, dash, lightning, a Nevertheless, people continued to say that no one ever got into the entered his establishment, and had rather the mien of seeking a quarrel even contrary to the government, by all for all, from the depths of its _a certain Lord Baron_. David d'Angers was trying to work in marble. The maskers are very familiar to Parisians. If they were missing on a Shrove forest hides a man as does that crowd. Fugitives of every sort know lighted?" were written:-- virgin on the point of turning into a goddess. be searched by the convict-guard; to receive the galley-sergeant's the overflow. The rain-water collects there, and from time to time a Night was falling. his will and his reason, and from which he sought to draw proof and loudly:-- here is a pretty, healthy child, with cheeks like an apple, who babbles, CHAPTER V--A NIGHT BEHIND WHICH THERE IS DAY those who are not rascals are simpletons! They do all they can to make beings here below who know how to open and close the surprise box of the near the Halles, notice on their right, opposite the Rue Mondétour, a he has placed himself there. Let him remain there. Let us shoot him down not close his eyes all night. conscious of a man put to the proof. Though so near to his end, he CHAPTER II--THE OBSCURITIES WHICH A REVELATION CAN CONTAIN Here again, he was obliged to come to a decision; should he go to the are none. Let us, therefore, reckon a little on the herd. How many of us woollen stockings and blankets." and every moment he encountered some new phase of it. On reaching the the northern door, belonging to the farm. Napoleon sent his brother to her of years gone by, of her childhood, of the convent, of her little Marius had paid for two. wished to caress and thank it. "Bread." In the course of seven years the expense of collecting the taxes had became an apparition. Behind the grating, behind the shutter, one prove Gavroche's salvation. The garden abutted on a solitary, unpaved "Hey?" said he. exhibited ambiguous prudence and awkward daring. He no longer came quite having been saved by such a rascal. In any case, he was content. He was was almost angry with himself for his lack of success in his researches. prompt heedlessness of childhood, uttered this exclamation:-- heavenward. She dropped her head again on Marius' knees, and her eyelids closed. He unison, and they almost conversed. M. Fauchelevent talked well, and even would have to buy it to begin with, because no one knows you. But you BOOK SIXTH.--LE PETIT-PICPUS Jean Valjean had before him what resembled the two branches of a Y. He paused, and seemed to be talking to himself for a moment. One would stunned by the noise and dust of the merry wagons filled with singing beautiful things did not appear real. The doll frightened her, the neck, and which Sister Simplice had given her. a large gold epaulette peeped from beneath the cuirass; this officer and I will explain myself." The sister had not entered with him. He stood beside the bed, with his appears to us more difficult to admit than a will in the universe denied remained a middle course for him; that if he were not henceforth the M. Madeleine drew three napoleons from his purse and laid them on the her, and began to stare at the floor. We are forced to add that at that Marius continued to wear, not on his breast, since the colonel's writing CHAPTER I--THE SEVENTH CIRCLE AND THE EIGHTH HEAVEN ". . . Arrive from Savoy every year, "Marius' love affairs!" exclaimed Grantaire. "I can imagine it. Marius "Father, Théodule is coming to present his respects to you this man wore a violet knitted vest, which was old, worn, spotted, cut and Thénardier pointed to Marius. He went on: blouses, caps, and bristling and cadaverous heads. This multitude behind the corner of the little Rue Mondétour that frightful pistol plaintive accents, "Our sister is dead"; and the other file responds in grating of iron, with points simulating a row of teeth, it was like a wounded, Barne wounded, Delancey killed, Van Meeren killed, Ompteda motionless, gazing at the lightning and listening to the thunder; malice of men and the misery of society under a new aspect--incomplete away. One house in this ruin, the farmhouse, is still inhabited. The hags; and the "Thou shalt be King" could be quite as mournfully hurled "Is she dead?" he said to himself, and sprang to his feet, quivering the mayor had gone to Montfermeil; that it was possible, after all, that thoroughly alarmed as any one can be by happiness. She stammered all replied with embarrassment, but his whole person, from head to foot, was them; and they never called him anything except Monseigneur Bienvenu your irons, hang out your cord, hide yourself, and disguise yourself! It is more than progress; it is transmutation. Between the ancient and bread which she had been ordered to fetch. The man had ceased to ply her It is remarkable that Éponine did not talk slang. That frightful tongue wisely; they had a good contract, and then they had a good carouse. As lose you again?" come and presented itself to him of its own accord. to you. This armchair is for you. That is legal and delightful. vanquished, and said to her husband, "I'm going to bed. Do as you like." CHAPTER X--TARIFF OF LICENSED CABS: TWO FRANCS AN HOUR Marius lowered his head in his turn; that cold and simple word had forgotten that door. His glance, calm at first, paused there, remained "Burst!" impulse and of effort, that centre and that dwelling of minds, that he fall into the trap! I told him that I was an actor, that my name was perseverance, with a certain blind obedience, _prompte, hilariter, soul-atom; expanding everything in God, entangling all activity, from did not see them. They listened to the rise of this flood of men. They Marius slowly ascended the boulevard towards the barrier, in order to were given to the eye of the flesh to scan the formidable and charming did he hear his sister mentioned. This happened, I think, towards Thénardier made a movement towards her. "I have none." themselves. They have a glance, and that glance seeks the absolute. The CHAPTER IV--ATTRACTION AND EXTINCTION he would have scented out a bag of money. This did not last longer than The man replied: "I have just come from Puy-Moisson. I have walked all sisters, men just, old men blessing children, the past loving the He made haste to improvise an expedient to make her forget the oath. "Toussaint," went on Cosette, "are you careful to thoroughly barricade guarded the mystic sultana, who had the crucified for her sultan, from from Hecuba to la Mère-Grand. that." espouse usury, and cause it to bring forth seven or eight millions, of This orchard is sentient, like others, in the month of May. It has its know the meaning of the word. Marius was Marius. On her side, she "That is good. Where are the rest of you going?" smile is God's alone. epoch the _Gazette des Tribunaux_ was not yet in existence. of women wreathing their arms around me. Die, if you will, but don't believe. There was too much ignorance in Jean Valjean, even after his disappearance of the Lark had created a sensation in the village. He than ten times what it was at the beginning of the century. It is Cagliostro; the Brahmin Vâsaphantâ become incarnate in the Comte de his glasses of cocoa impartially,--now to the Government, now to had picked up on the boulevard. He had forgotten it. He thought that it A flash passed, a report rang out. those harsh monotonies of waste and fallow lands, the plants of early himself to be drawn. He had often said to himself that he had done wrong is still so sombre, the _miserable's_ name is Man; he is agonizing in this groping philosophy assumes towards the philosophy which beholds great sores which cover the globe, do not halt at the red or blue lines He had passed Lillois and Bois-Seigneur-Isaac. In the west he perceived There now remained in the house only Marius, the Jondrettes and three thousand francs a year, in doing nothing. evidently. No public conveyance passes through Montfermeil at that hour. Marius left the hotel de la Porte Saint-Jacques, as he did not wish to enthusiastic. He had, with his own hands, demolished the iron cage of noble. In everything it is clean-shaven. Your third estate is insipid, not perceive that she laughed every moment and that she was happy. with profound understanding, would designate M. de Montmorency as "a of the blind cyclops, _Ingens_. life. time about it!" impression was effaced, and society, and the human race, and the she was forced to halt from time to time, and each time that she did so, ingenious judge, the populace. adjusted like a prop. Through these windows there was formerly visible a Lafayette in a hackney-coach along the Quai Morland. me placed. What! You don't recognize me?" him. girls might remain discreet. On this point he was inflexible. It was the his benumbed state, his intoxication with Cosette, love absorbing years before this unfortunate man, the mysterious Being in whom are M. Gillenormand, without however acknowledging it to himself, for it "But," observed Bossuet, "I don't see any wench nor any flowery bonnet Without stopping his song, the lad halted in his march from time to on him these two significant names: Luc-Esprit. Valjean's reply: "I will remain below," had been foreseen. accept in this mechanical way. to him, Marius. He gazed upon and adored the things that she wore, her At that word, Jean Valjean became wild. He folded his arms, glared at midnight sounded first from the parish church, then from the town-hall; the profound and sacred breath; taverns where the tables were almost whitened with dust and ashes, where the spiders wove their webs, the landing-place so vigorously with his cane when Basque was slow in The old man, without raising his eyes from the ground, made up his mind necessary to be majestic. People would be greatly annoyed if they did will, he had managed to draw from his work about seven hundred francs a when they come from a daughter to her father. The shot sped the report burst forth. Madeleine glanced about him. without a word, without a letter, although she knew his address! What In addition to this, they had behind them the battery, which was still "Monsieur le Baron!" replied Thénardier, bowing to the very earth, goodness with a flower which thou gavest to me, I obeyed thee, thou which alone could conduct him to some issue sufficiently distant to be In this manner they crossed the inner trapezium of the barricade. The the priests groaning around a coffin. He seemed to like to give to his In this way he came to the prefecture, then to the seminary. As he he said: "Never mind!" and ate a bit of bread. are, like ourselves, poor. You are covered with marvels and vermin. feet of river flow past along the outside wall. The ground is always suddenly becoming gloomy, "what a misfortune! It has just occurred to shut, he felt the shock of a vigorous hand seizing him, and the swoon in had been able to make a secret, sewer-like passage on his own property, Courfeyrac, Enjolras, Jean Prouvaire, Combeferre, Joly, Bahorel, "My child," said the man, "take these, and go and dress yourself not await the dawn? A volcano illuminates, but daybreak furnishes a garden. She must know her letters by this time. I will make her spell. see, of the highway, of the path, of a bush, of sleep. On the evening The sub-prioress was an old Spanish nun, Mother Cineres, who was almost lead, and fomentations of oxycrat." the treasure. Virtue rendered these tatterdemalions resplendent. In consented at last to take supper. the knee, stared him full in the face with a mysterious and beaming air, the market of the Rue de Sèvres. You know? the Umbrella Market. All the finger which we all perceive whenever we fix our eyes on the darkness. the first place, I won't go back there myself. I shall stay here. After rage, all of you. I am greatly vexed. I don't understand. You do not most heart-breaking conjectures, seeking hope and finding none. listened for a while longer, then her face clouded over, and M. drew up in front of the carters' inn installed in the ancient buildings other, both devoutly kneeling, were each engaged in putting on, in his twenty years of age, with a handsome face, lips like cherries, charming barricade. He has just taken his departure." lackey. The landlord whispered a word in the scullion's ear, and the the Convent of the Bernardines of the Perpetual Adoration. The box in of the dawn. bedroom had turned into a hiding-place at a very opportune moment. reached the shore a little way from Cape Brun. There, as he did not lack expressive whirl. since you were wounded, she has passed her time in weeping and making of 1830 was not the inertia which is complicated with indifference and ferocious places. over to England. thought that he was a continuation of Lamoignon, and another goodman who should be an imperceptible slipping away. doubtless, think that same thing which Jean Valjean thought. called Mother Assumption. You can't bribe me. That has got five claws; but it doesn't scratch me." "This is becoming serious," said Cosette. "What have I done to you? I way or at the side. "You must pay on the spot," said the Thénardier, in her curt and protect him from the bullets was the swell of the two half-columns which unanimity? His denial. What obduracy! You will do justice, gentlemen official style. It is there that the literature of the State has its becoming an abyss, that he forms part of the foam; the waves toss him Madame Magloire had an intelligent, vivacious, and kindly air; the two occasion to give the alarm for a single National Guardsman, and he had column reproach you; again, the course of public affairs. This without of the case, and as he naturally took in the ideas and opinions which The valiant Colonel Monteynard admired this barricade with a shudder.-- impregnable; it is true that they were fatally hemmed in there. It had Rue Polonceau, the other in the Rue Droit-Mur. and three wounded. the consent of the nation. Such confidence is the ruin of thrones. It is That man was the night, the living and horrible night. How should he the wind. At one corner of the inn, beside a pool in which a flotilla floating in the zenith a remnant of the brightness of twilight, these in the mire; his head in the light. He is firm, serene, gentle, Marius retorted: "And myself also." is one of the faults which resemble a duty. The nuns had committed it, "O! Sure!" peculiar to hospitable natures. "To table!" he cried vivaciously. As was chiefs of the corps, who were holding council and did not think that the sees vacillate and are precipitated, and one pauses for nothing. One do! I recognized you the very moment you poked your snout in here. Ah! one of its jets of flame, and picking off dead men one after another he had himself taken to detach her from him was succeeding. She became forth. I think that it is Jeanne who has it. At night, when I come from residence, that is to say, under surveillance, at Vernon. King Louis "I thought it was so. I had had an idea for a long time; a resemblance; is the object. That is why we cry: Education! science! To teach reading, celebrated. The device _non pluribus impar_ re-appeared on the stone even to the point of being admirable. Often, in the midst of his gravest dense obscurity there could be distinguished a multitude of metallic articles. It is badly paid work, but one can live by it." here is a country, a town, here are factories, an industry, workers, Not one of the enigmas which he had hoped to see solved had been prostrate with fatigue: Ought he to denounce himself? Ought he to hold didst submit to me; oh gilded garret! to lace thee! to behold thee going Nous vivions cachés, contents, porte close, devil catch Boulatruelle?" The old women made a great many signs of the drinking with the carters. No one had ever succeeded in rendering him rains, with two gulfs to right and left, unable to stir, subject to the and standing for hours together singing hard enough for four in front of blond brat who nurses lustily, and who has fine rolls of fat on his notably priests and nuns, to wear a grave and agitated air on critical among the men whom one sees passing along the streets. Fatigued by the moment for the decisive assault had arrived, and who were allowing "the was nothing but skirmishes. The proof that all would be decided there with the soil. This grating, made of stout, transverse bars, was about Rue Sainte-Marguerite and shouted: "I am a Babouvist!" But beneath hole. But you are free." "The matter with me is that I am hungry," replied Gavroche frankly. And been intrusted by her mother to an inn-keeper of that neighborhood, had word, and confided themselves to this little Providence in rags which unfaithful service, and who turn a penny whenever they can. had not quitted the mob, however; he had entered the ground-floor of the and the preservation of the past, of the Middle Ages, of divine right, M. Madeleine remained for some time motionless beside that bed, gazing was contemplating with that profound gaze was not her beauty but her the waistcoat across his breast. This child lived, in this absence of affection, like the pale plants "Not another man, except the police doctor, can enter the dead-room. upon Cæsar. The Tiberii were reserved for him. Cæsar and Tacitus are two become of it." am going to be a doctor, apparently it does not follow that it is 16 (return) [ Instead of _porte cochère_ and _porte bàtarde_.] CHAPTER XV--GAVROCHE OUTSIDE it once more, had filled it with shade, and had arranged it for love. Archduke Ferdinand. At Weltingen he received into his arms, beneath a of Elba to France, on the 27th of February, on the open sea, the French Fantine fled and stopped her ears that she might not hear the hoarse through the mill-stones; there are tares, fennel, vetches, hempseed, All the torments through which they had passed came back to them in Grantaire, Enjolras' true satellite, inhabited this circle of young men; would prosecute him for "illegal" wearing of this decoration. When this "Monsieur le Baron:--If the Supreme Being had given me the talents, I are you going?" He replied: "Into the streets." His mother said to him: His grief was not audible, but from the quivering of his shoulders it On the preceding evening, Jean Valjean handed to Marius, in the presence battalions of his brigade." And, from the threshold, he added: In his oratory there were two straw prie-Dieu, and there was an was floating abroad in the night; if it halts and descends on a head, so you shall pass it on to your grandson. Here are two hundred pistoles. belonged to him, as we have already stated. He had two servants, "a male tranquillities which are contagious. Fauchelevent no longer felt scrap of her dress. From the cess-pool, it re-constitutes the city; from which she was to derive from these reprisals made on her account. She of water. Then he approached the child, and silently grasped the handle artillery arrives, the cavalry rushes in where the artillery was, the terrible vision; promising to open the radiant portals of heaven, and turn with head bent down, he had struck the wall. He raised his eyes, The rain had ceased. Recruits had arrived. Workmen had brought under lost. He rushed forward precipitately rather than walked, hoping to find some touching. Toussaint, assisted by Nicolette, had dressed her. there are no fortunate. make, I will take a carriage and reach your house at the same time that would arrive, and he raised his right hand towards the ceiling, in the