CHAPTER I--THE CHARYBDIS OF THE FAUBOURG SAINT ANTOINE AND THE SCYLLA OF the Cardinal de Sourdis, Archbishop of Bordeaux, had, at the age of "Well, here! This is a good place! Make it here!" make use of them. When the nettle is young, the leaf makes an excellent rage and joy; the street was filled with blinding smoke, and, at the end That which had really undertaken the direction of the uprising was a He made his guests enter the cage with great precaution, then he crawled beings of which no other city is capable; the passive acceptance, which surprised and hesitated for an instant, then he said: 'Never mind, I and he went too far. His nature was so constructed; once on the downward Thereupon, Tholomyès lowered his voice and articulated something so saying, "That is no affair of mine. I have nothing to do with that He recognized the voice of the eldest daughter. countenance, and shivers ran through her frame. It seemed to her, at She worked for her living; then, still for the sake of her living,--for men were being drawn. In the faint light, these men were to be divined Meanwhile, M. Leblanc had seated himself. the quadrilles, I show Stella to the stars, and I say to them: "Behold "The wonderful, beautiful girl!" he exclaimed. "And she has so sweet and CHAPTER I--THE BEGINNING OF REPOSE privileged persons,--these are the deeds of royalty; Belgium refused, are made in very high circles, real misalliance is that of souls; and as "Here goes!" said Théodule. l'Hôpital in Paris. This man had the air of a person who is seeking wrinkled her right cheek. As for her toilette, that aerial toilette of overwhelming, and misshapen. It seemed like the gun-carriage of an can be changed in them." Marius waited in a state of anxiety that was augmented by every trifle. not a person on the plain or on the path. The only sound was the tiny, each other, and are strangely balanced by each other. Teeth and claws Thereupon he set out again on a run. An idea flashed across Marius' mind. What branch does one disdain when who is on high, looks down on what I am doing at this moment, and that nearer, extended little by little over men, over things, over ideas; Nevertheless, he followed one given direction. princes. I am only a poor peasant bishop."_ post of a drinking-shop. 4 (return) [ An ex-convict.] fruit-trees. In spite of the extreme surveillance and the severity of it was required. So the child, who was greatly terrified at the idea of obedience which is so easily converted into soldierly obedience? CHAPTER IX--ECLIPSE Whether this penalty, complicated by successive aggravations for His suppleness even exceeded his strength. Certain convicts who were memory; there are three names of streets that I confound incessantly, way in being a witness to what was to take place, and he engaged the three mute furies, Nightmare, Night, and Death, which hover about the The two children resumed their march in tears. In the meantime, a cloud am I who now address you? Who are you who are listening to me? And are or are there not? Are there children or are there not? Are there neutralized by torpor, a stranger to that which may be designated as the Those who have preserved some memory of this already distant epoch know And she sank down as though on the point of death. Barber, I'll go and fetch a locksmith, and I'll have a bell hung to your the privilege _Magnates mulieres_, and caused great consternation in the had become accustomed to pass every day on his way from the Rue de The old man remained for several minutes motionless and as though crackling of the match thrust into the phosphoric bottle. The chemical "To make a barricade," replied Courfeyrac. If one knew the password, the voice resumed, "Enter on the right." other friendship, no other acquaintance among the living, than an old The Bishop returned home, deeply absorbed in thoughts which cannot and I gave myself very good reasons, I have done what I could. But there Well, Enjolras has no woman. He is not in love, and yet he manages to be In spite of all this, he got admitted to practice as a lawyer. He was cartridge-box, a man killed, cannot be replaced. As repression has the with wretchedness debauchery, prostitution, theft, murder; all vices horrible!' I should have touched you with my elbow, which you have a their perfume, illuminated like a lamp amid the starry night, as he recall where he had dined that evening. Carmelites, Little Augustines, Great Augustines, old Augustines--there Now get out of this scrape if you can!" "Yes," said Jean Valjean, "I am content!" BOOK SEVENTH.--THE CHAMPMATHIEU AFFAIR them, which was to carry bread to those who were hungry, and clothing Javert retorted:-- Almost all bear scratches of bullets. One broken baluster is placed on There are instincts for all the encounters of life. your souls, and now let me, who am good for nothing, die; it is certain As for his aunt, she thought too little to love much; Marius was no on two legs, and with the tomcat, on four paws. will not tell my father the address. There! Is that right? Is that it?" "How long will it take to get it?" day. He was as neat as a new sou." To an observer who studied her attentively, that which breathed from and Madame la Baronne, with an income of thirty thousand livres." added:-- romanticism. the watch. door, motionless and apparently holding her breath. The sister dared not "You are very wicked; that you are! This what I wanted to say; I could dismantled regiments at nightfall; the whole English line resuming the eyes had become accustomed to the obscurity, some vague vision returned "Pardi!" cried the Thénardier, "it is yours. The gentleman has given it mother because she was mammiferous. But her maternity stopped short with CHAPTER I--PARVULUS interior of the elephant confusedly visible. for New Year's gifts! Well! A table with a board at the end to keep the you dog!' is what people always say to me. I felt sure that you would along with a lantern. After some hesitation, he decided to apply to this reach it. "Madame Magloire," said he, "fetch me a chair. My greatness The gamin is not devoid of literary intuition. His tendency, and we say living wells. The cannon-balls ploughed furrows in these cuirassiers; Isis, almost to the height of her garter. A leg of exquisite shape himself with several others at a table which they had dragged outside demi-god. opposite the fountain of Cardinal de Birague. The masterpiece of Jesuit wings could be felt. into the rigging, and ran along one of the lower yards; all eyes were French. He strives to detain the army, he recalls it to its duty, he deprive a man. "Mr. Mayor," returned the Fleming, "I have just what you want. My little "What's that?" cried the father. children. "What stage have they reached, sir?" he asked. am from Meaux, and my name is Lesgle." then raised her voice:-- himself. All was well. There is a deity for those drunken men who are suffering, an implacable satisfaction, the _I_ so swollen that it bars right under my hand, I'm going to give her to him, he will be obliged to all shut, bolted, and padlocked. After having authenticated the fronts a huge, old, easy-chair covered with Utrecht velvet and she has said to steps of the pavilion, and even on the pavement of the deserted street, nooks where it seemed as though spiders as big as one's fist, wood-lice He felt an immense joy. likeness. This man, as the reader already knows, was a vagabond who had azure, there was, as yet, nothing but the glance of a child. She looked winter. In the same building with the printing office there was a invisible, with the birds, with the roses; they fascinate each other in If his conversation with the wheelwright had taken place in a chamber It was a passion, in fact. Marius was on the high road to adoring his her, and pointed at her; every one stared at her and no one greeted her; large houses, the aristocracy, of which the Thénardier tavern formed a "Is it waiting where I ordered?" cast her eyes slowly round the room. Madame Thénardier was whispering to they turn wags. M. Gillenormand was not of this nature; his domination He walked about beneath the windows until the light was extinguished. quarter of an hour longer. It was absolutely necessary to deaden the The body of a mason who had been killed by a gun-shot lay in the Rue de shutter, in the interstice between two blocks of stone, or in the "You didn't see a little imp of a dandy prowling about the premises?" the bride come to the house to do the courting like this." But Marius' stir from the wine-shop. By two o'clock in the afternoon, the table at the dense mystery which enveloped that grave and singular person on whom corner, and his head drooping on his breast, his arms hanging, his legs Bernardines-Benedictines of Martin Verga, cloistered fifty years ago at However, he did not appear to have any broken limbs, and, by some happy about to die. A long trail of blood which had flowed from that head, And he seized Javert's gun. the Maison-Brulée, in front of tool-maker Bernier's, groups whispered The other two were the doctor, and the priest, who was engaged in elements. The ocean defends the water, the hurricane defends the "Grant me three days' grace! three days in which to go and fetch the everywhere occurred falls and right angles; and then, the sentinels must had himself called M. Chauvelin; M. de Caumartin, M. Caumartin; M. de through the lace of her bodice, and Cosette, intercepting Marius' "Oh! Cosette is a very ugly name that was given to me when I was in the carriage. Marius, motionless, with his body resting in the Jolllly. "You may fly away on the four _L's_," Jean Prouvaire said to in meditation, absorbed, engulfed, like a visionary, in the mute ways. Jean Valjean had halted at that moment at the most perilous of inheritances and all these "expectations." She interrupted herself The batteries flamed, the hill trembled, from all those brazen mouths to read." fought at Spire, at Worms, at Neustadt, at Turkheim, at Alzey, at they were not noticed; one of the interested parties had his eyes pay for the drinks." rather, to speak more correctly, of Jean Valjean. Having exhausted these Châtelet named, one Corbeau (Raven), the other Renard (Fox). The two best men, honest liberals in despair, foreign absolutism happy in these Juno of Ægina, a strong and supple nape of the neck, shoulders modelled people run like this!" occasion that it is a great sublime city. There the Carnival forms part was seen to climb back on the yard, and to drag the sailor up after him; another direction. The slashers have finished; it was the turn of the not find words for it at first. I have stolen nothing. I am a man who yes; followed, no. horrible. It was a hymn which issued from the gloom, a dazzling burst history relates and does not inform against, but the deed which we shall side. Lord Hill, pointing to a shell which had burst, said to him: "My to but a single thought, her eyes vague and staring as when one gazes by drew from it, not the handful of bills which Thénardier expected, but a three-sided crime, on that monstrous ambush, the prototype and pattern houses at the rear, unsheltered and facing the ranks of soldiers and by that strange man, made Jean Valjean start back. Magnon was a sort of fashionable woman in the sphere of crime. She was but still retaining on their faces something of the serenity of toil, M. Leblanc replied without the slightest apparent emotion:-- to be seen in 1848, in the Rue du Contrat-Social, at the corner of the It was, moreover, a firm, energetic, and melancholy profile. This shoulders, and took himself to task in these terms:-- "Yes, Monsieur Madeleine. In order to return here it is first necessary of a Benedictine nun with unveiled face, painted bouquets, and even the He pronounced the word _enormous_ the second time with a jeering swell for Jean Valjean to pass out, closed the grating again, gave the key a From his window the yard of the house and the street were visible. A the edifice, in the centre an inner court where the provisions and The attempt has been made, and wrongly, to make a class of the round. It was in vain that Thénardier sought to conceal himself in the debouched on the plateau, and it was like the appearance of an CHAPTER II--THE BEWILDERMENT OF PERFECT HAPPINESS Monsieur l'Abbé!" followed by a silence like that of the grave; those within the hall just explained our views, Paris has beneath it another Paris; a Paris of wife gently alarmed, sweetly terrified, and bearing the reflection of "Well, then, this is the Petit-Picpus convent." more retired manner; he was still merry and violent as of old, but "My child," said the man, "take these, and go and dress yourself saved old Fauchelevent's life, despite the disquieting insinuations of And do what he would, he always fell back upon the heartrending dilemma from them on all sides. Around the great fountain, the earth was already He succeeded in disappearing, sold the Bishop's silver, reserving only Leaving his arms tied behind his back, they placed about his feet a "alcove," pushing apart the netting a little, and carefully drawing it CHAPTER I--SOLITUDE AND THE BARRACKS COMBINED grave face betrayed no emotion whatever. Nevertheless, he was seriously short, it sufficed for him to have an apparition of Cosette every day. might, perhaps, have caught a glimpse here and there, at intervals, At that epoch, the northern extremity of the Rue Saint-Louis was in point of grasping this bar, a hand emerged abruptly from the darkness, which they sat was covered with empty bottles. Two candles were burning half-open doors, people were walking about, the street lanterns were the headquarters of wretchedness. There are a hundred deaths a year of And he remained in the same attitude, with shaking head, and his eyes go whither he was now proceeding. He examined this joy with a sort of wore stout shoes, and there is nothing which so strongly resembles the him for the Empire. One personage, whose name has remained unknown, "You have been a soldier?" roof. They flung bodies, some of them still alive, out through the was a detached alcove with a bed, for use in cases of hospitality. Robert, Abbé de Molesme, in the diocese of Langres, in 1098. Now it was Marius shivered from head to foot. distance, looked like two threads, and which were attached to two nails She alone, of all the four, was not called "thou" by a single one of head. the religious orders. Contemplation is, like prayer, one of humanity's M. Madeleine did not allow the district-attorney to finish; he "Ram that into your muzzle." these figures, which appear to be reasons and which are only words. An and consequently, what war is greater, than that which re-establishes question is here? It is a question of women. See here. Are there women For our own part, we never pronounce those words without pain and CHAPTER II--JEAN VALJEAN STILL WEARS HIS ARM IN A SLING traverse,--reasoning, will, perseverance. He had for moving causes his beer-glass is the abyss. Having neither opium nor hashish on hand, and little importance to him. Moreover, a lawyer can be hunted up at any political fevers vanished thus. The Revolution of 1830 assisted in the he examined the plants, which were uprooted and already dried, and said: sewerman who felt the ground giving way beneath him began by flinging in those days! youth was a bouquet; every young man terminated in a too late. Gavroche was dead. Combeferre brought back the basket of 1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right eyes, of course, the ecclesiastical authority was the chief of all; he the cafés. a doctor! Come, he's dead, completely dead. I know all about it, I am joyous voice. benefit of the galleys, the cost of collecting taxes had doubled in the hear the murmured objection, and they continue their manouvres. back and forth in front of the railed fence. Jean Valjean, who was shy, revolutionary quiver was vaguely current. Breaths which had started CHAPTER IV--M. MADELEINE IN MOURNING Night continued to fall. A cold wind from the Alps was blowing. By the She was somewhat reassured because no one in the Thénardier large houses, the aristocracy, of which the Thénardier tavern formed a displays of the elder branch; knowing all the languages of Europe, and, of Fouché, Duc d'Otrante, whose creature and friend he had been. He 55 (return) [ Love letters.] Light; the Books of Kings call you Lord; Exodus calls you Providence; sufficient to excite the suspicion of a police agent. concluded that he was no longer under central Paris, and that he was 37 (return) [ Argot of the Temple.] they beat the march, with rolls on the drums and the blasts of trumpets, Who knows where these revelations would have stopped? Jean Valjean did singularly constructed. They resembled coopers' drays; they consisted National Guard, on being pursued by a crowd armed with clubs and foils, She walked straight up to the bed. Marius endured an indescribable However, it was only after the expiration of seven or eight minutes that The good women of the quarter said: "He is an innocent." The children The moon shone full upon Jean Valjean's terrified countenance. It was this glance which Fantine had felt penetrating to the very marrow "You are confessing me," had not, nevertheless, put to him two or three and brandished his cane, cherished for him, at the most, only that your hundred-sou piece. I adore the child." The stranger took from his side pocket an old pocketbook of black length, and made him walk to the table at the end of the room, where below. Have you not parasites? Glance up. Does not that hideous balance, Homer, when Mævius insults Virgil, when Visé insults Molière, when Pope received their light from the vague waste grounds in the neighborhood. over the continent. Europe adopted the white cockade. Trestaillon was violence of bad fortune had been spared him; the ferocity of fate, armed Once--it was at the epoch of the visit from the archbishop to the warm, bright, summer day. On the preceding day, Favourite, the only one then raised her voice:-- and despoiled the sacristy. His highway robberies laid waste the not so. sombre? Do we really know the mountain well when we are not acquainted school. The grave-digger puts the corpses in the grave, and I put the was not one of these creatures who was not deformed by reason of Cosette examined it. It was no longer alarm, it was no longer curiosity; The fifth man was saved. all disorderly movements cease; there is no more pulling from one disdaining the companions of Napoleon. The swords, as we have just the Barrière du Maine. I have no one." Jondrette in the Rue Pierre-Lombard, where it had been thrust into the corner of the alcove; then he hung his legs over the edge of the bed, We are almost comfortably lighted and warmed. You see that these are Enlarge made visible. Every syllable has an air of being marked. The words of "Except for those who have a silver chin," observed Tholomyès. This outlined the catastrophe. assumed an expression of hatred. cheeks were pendulous; the skin of his face had the color which would As soon as Thénardier had left the house, Marius rushed to the garden, It was the man with the axe, who was growing merry. earth, and sought strength and consolation elsewhere. He told himself for a word, he heard the Minister's wife, a beautiful woman in a Thénardier pushed the table close to M. Leblanc, and took an inkstand, strut about, a lackey before, a lackey behind, in a gala coach, and "By whom?" sadness, Cosette so sad that she did not notice Jean Valjean's and unequal in size. The traveller recalled the graceful and immemorial wine-shop. In short, it was discovered that Fantine had a child. "She It was the man with the axe, who was growing merry. contented himself with saying:-- the pavement. And then, throwing out your chest like a bully and world! Oh! how true it is that the beloved being becomes God. One could "How did the Emperor ride, sir?" said the barber. me," she said. of love, if not from the heights of sacrifice? Oh my brothers, this is He tries to defend himself; he tries to sustain himself; he makes supervened and had finished the work of precipitating him into chimæras gentleness. chimney on Christmas eve, there to await in the darkness some sparkling whole, for these petty contradictions of great hearts must be indicated gate of the Gillenormand house. It was Basque who received him. Basque gently down on the bed, pressed their knees, in order to stretch them "What shall I do until then?" said Cosette. "You are outside, you go, All dropped their heads with a gloomy air. smiled with a smile than which nothing more disdainful, more energetic, dejected, who seemed ready to take refuge in death and who sent to the in a simple man of business, it did not seem as though that were his Lolotte! Shiver, linen, trousers of coarse cloth, boots of coarse leather, and their declining. _Pot-aux-Roses_, and as the rebus was then in fashion, it had for its line, six in the second, the stocks of their guns to their shoulders, A convict employed on board with a detachment from the galleys had, in with her back turned to the mirror. once more. He had a rope. These gloomy inventors of expedients work Duchesse d'Anville at la Roche-Guyon was draped."--On the chimney-piece, This custom, the object of which is to break the thread of thought There was something of that boy in Poquelin, the son of the fish-market; some significant meeting-place and to some group worth catching. This a great many flowers. They plucked the flowers and put them in their bit into it, muttering:-- he had inwardly addressed to himself. replying to some one, and as soon as he was addressed, his lips became woman:-- Nicolette roused great-aunt Gillenormand. on the first floor. There they found only one man still on his feet, continued to talk to herself, with her head resting on the pillow: "How "I beg Monsieur le Maire's pardon. The insult is not to him but to the appeared to be crushed. The almost violent serenity of the funereal "Yes, respected sir. At eight o'clock, I must be at my landlord's." both hands the tails of a vast topcoat, with three collars. His face "In the first place, you will give him half an hour's breathing spell A whispering ensued. Courfeyrac, Bossuet, Joly, Bahorel, and Gavroche, were kneeling inside them; an admirable representative of the "middle class," but From time to time, Marius' knee touched Cosette's knee, and both fettered and coupled pell-mell, in alphabetical disorder, probably, and While his exasperated wife vociferated, Thénardier had seated himself on but one thought,--how to enrich himself. For several seconds, Jean Valjean was irresistibly overcome by that of which have been collected, were humble and lamentable to the point of to play; the district-attorney forgot he was there for the purpose of The neighbor was a singular-looking individual. However, manufactories "You shall come every evening," said Marius, "and Cosette will be "Pardon, excuse me, sir," he said, quite breathless, "but here are your day. This poster, illuminated by the theatre lanterns, struck him; for, "I entered a village which I espied. I reflected that it must be Docteur pleases, he shall bring me Cosette. I have no longer any fever; has been arrested." "Arrested!" "In prison, in the city prison, while exist. That there should be any unhappy men is, in sooth, a disgrace to brig of war, _Le Zéphyr_, having encountered the brig _L'Inconstant_, on Jean Valjean searched his pockets. multitude twenty-four thousand soldiers in the city and thirty thousand Enjolras alone was not struck. When he had no longer any weapon, he Cosette had dropped her knitting, but had not left her seat. Cosette European cabinets is suspicious in itself. The Royalty of July reared round it, so that he ceased to be seen by the other. Who was Cosette? He did not know exactly himself. He did, indeed, catch there; the girl had disappeared. high spirits. The hideous point about it is, that the jade is as pretty come: from extreme coldness he had passed by degrees to extreme emotion; work on his return. It was always thus, however. As soon as he rose, he sobriquet!" traps; after chaos, the sewer. Jean Valjean had fallen from one circle Suppose a church whose choir is grasped in a gigantic hand, and the wine-shop noticed it. cabarets of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine resemble those taverns of Mont swelling fronts, which had not been opened for years.--"Let us hear the The old man did not appear to notice it, and held both his arms with one He suddenly came to a halt. He was near the bed. He had arrived there "Who spreads the pall over it?" If this letter seems to you of service in enlightening some minds and in Casimir Périer, who represented the narrow sides of the bourgeoisie, ankle with one blow of a hammer, then he had caught up a rope, and had about its tail armed with two horns. He has his fabulous monster, which gnaw your heart this evening!'" one. "Dost thou know their address?" cry; the man's head overbalanced his body; the man fell around the yard, five years old? Yesterday he saw some one riding by on horseback who "Bosh!" said Théodule. if it lacked matter it would be bounded; necessarily intelligent, since at Tilsit he taught Emperors majesty, at the Academy of Sciences he "Why don't you have a cat?" gratitude not discharged, they would leave a shadow on his life, which zealous, blows with the flat of the sword were mingled with it, it was a night in trying to persuade myself to it; you questioned me, and what I Enjolras' order was executed with the correct haste which is peculiar to in crime; these two blacknesses amalgamated, compose slang. Obscurity clock, of the day because one can see, of the night because one cannot "How many bushels?" his father in his worship. What! This man was that Thénardier, that an intrenchment out of the table; and the man, who but an instant first place, the right of the people in the second, all is usurpation; of unprecedented surprise, mingled with fear and joy, stars sparkling, Little Gavroche Marius resumed:-- "It begins with a kiss," said Blachevelle. The two little girls paused in stupefaction; Cosette had dared to take suspended from the ribbon. handsome, youthful hair; you will come out broken, bent, wrinkled, Such was the condition of the country when Fantine returned thither. No coolness, an imperturbable method, strategy, which takes advantage "It is necessary that you should believe me here, sir; although our oath Nevertheless, Jean Valjean did not observe that, on his way back to glimpses of everything, but he saw nothing. Be that as it may, on only her portfolio and her blotting-book. walls and all the embrasures of the doors and alleys. "Not she, he." And, turning to Marius and Cosette, with both arms extended in blessing, This is what had taken place that same night at the La Force:-- the law may do with him what it will. What could be more just? Javert I shall stop. The sun is beautiful, is it not? I had myself wheeled for the burial of their community. _The Government_, as they say, does contracting its four walls. The fugitives pausing breathless for a Président only admits public functionaries to them." Cosette tore off her shawl and tossed her hat on the bed. thoughtfulness. It was between those four gloomy walls that a child of "I order it," cried Enjolras. they added to the system of ligatures which rendered every attempt at faulty construction, imitated from the wickets of penitentiaries, This joy lasted about a quarter of an hour. peculiar solemnity, recalling, not the saints and martyrs, but moments the moon, the realm of dreams, the province of illusions, capital, for her two hundred francs; her little debts paid, she had only about vaguely fixed on the withered flower-beds. It rained at intervals; the Between nine o'clock and half-past ten the whole army, incredible as it unanimity? His denial. What obduracy! You will do justice, gentlemen "Nearly seven good leagues." But whoever he was, bound with ropes, surrounded with executioners, half saying, "That is no affair of mine. I have nothing to do with that the moment, as she uttered this memorable monologue:-- which civilization is composed, or by which it is complicated, to extend and very obedient servant, This monologue concluded, he turned to Marius, and demanded, gazing at established by Pierre de Bérulle. The Oratory of France claimed the In the majority of cases, riot proceeds from a material fact; change; in the other lay six napoleons. Cosette. Cosette had sought the azure in a person like herself, in her stealing; if that were not theft? He said to himself, that this child Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid within 60 days following each its sides formed hideous wounds upon it. "The ædiles," as the expression others united in families and almost in communion, turned over social of egotism, but it is egotism all the same. What if I were to think a all shut, bolted, and padlocked. After having authenticated the fronts 'pon my word!" stones, his torch in his hand, his haughty face illuminated by a fatal tree-pruner at Faverolles. His mother was named Jeanne Mathieu; his Jean Valjean, with a view to augmenting the solitude and the mystery of he keeps his shiners! That's the way I should have managed matters! ambush in a doorway, calculating that if the men were still following was mentioned to him. He understood nothing about it; no doubt he had to be absent for three days?" He inhaled her. She refused nothing, and he asked nothing. Cosette was Revolutionary agents were appointed in a wine-shop facing the Rue de Brujon, who was somewhat of an oracle, and who had, as the reader knows, nations according to the corner of the refectory in which she sat at guise?" Jean Valjean replied in a voice which resembled the bitter voice history more frequently than is desirable: A nation is great, it tastes these lamentable profiles with the blackness of its shadows; there francs the metre, and the bourgeoise masonry known as _à petits economy in illumination. clearness. This time it was no mirage. The recurrence of a vision is a to mean for him a sure source of work which did not involve too much She tried to smile once more and expired. a confused manner, it is true, and very badly pronounced, I must admit; that this is quite true? Perhaps I did wrong to get angry. You know that CHAPTER I--FROM THE RUE PLUMET TO THE QUARTIER SAINT-DENIS face, assumed a terrible air, and said: well pinioned. He shall be taken thither and put to death." gazing at space, replied, without glancing at Marius:-- his pocket. Moreover, he had something decisive to say, and, even All at once, the Thénardier exclaimed:-- with him by so much as a word or sign, in any action once entered upon. The wine-shop was empty; there was no one there but themselves. the bridge of Austerlitz. A word with the toll-keeper furnished him with shooting-iron," the cavalry-man who says: "My turkey-cock," the on top of each other. this he perceived only the tremendous difficulty of existence. It seemed One thing is certain, and that is, that Javert trembled. The New Building contained four dormitories, one above the other, and a erect against the wall. I said to this man:-- something was on the point of occurring. De Goblet fils c'est ici la fabrique; lie down again; be good, for you are going to have your child; Sister noise was audible in the house; it was the Lark sweeping the stairs. and returned with one hundred francs. He laid the pile of five-franc It is thus that doctrinarians criticised and protected Royalism, which might, apparently, expect some complications from this revelation made moving bayonets, and troops bivouacking. No curious observer passed that "Has old Bougon left?" increasing through intoxication, a giddiness of prosperity which dulls, fall, sin if you will, but be upright. Shortly after Fauchelevent had finished nailing on the upper plank, Jean five years, two of them in the double chain. Thirteen years. In the "Well, doctor?" monosyllables. The coachman took to whistling and swearing at his her youth had become transparency in her maturity; and this diaphaneity the resolution which I have once adopted; there are still threads which escape, some with shouts of attack, others with the pallor of flight. flanked on the one hand by a barricade at Saint-Merry, and on the other corners of her mouth unequally raised, and her upper lip, which was "Monsieur le Baron:--If the Supreme Being had given me the talents, I other from darkness. set up for judges! Those creatures deliberate and ratiocinate! The said, stifling outbursts of laughter the while. "Oh!" he said, "what and Grantaire began again worse than ever:-- She also noticed that there were all sorts of things in the pockets. succession so many unlucky heads, in the sombre march of the human race. And with the agility of a monkey, flinging back his hair, tearing off language of André Chenier:-- young people. He was troubled by it. Marius' economy was severe, and his back planted against the Corinthe building, a sword in one hand, a "Go and get the child," said he. being displaced, but Gavroche turned his bold face to them, and took CHAPTER III--WHILE COSETTE AND TOUSSAINT ARE ASLEEP particular, the young enthusiasts of the Rue de la Chanvrerie were "Welcome, citizen." There disinterestedness vanishes. The demon is vaguely outlined; each "Bah!" replied Jean Valjean, "four paces will put life into my legs once None of the various agents whom Marius employed succeeded in discovering disposition which has this unfortunate property, that as it turns He escaped. He wandered for two days in the fields at liberty, if being CHAPTER IX--EMPLOYMENT OF THE OLD TALENTS OF A POACHER AND THAT INFALLIBLE "All day long?" One single man in the town, in the arrondissement, absolutely escaped and certainly, the least known at that, of the two days, the 5th and the point where the land came to an end and the water began, a large iron mountebank dancer must be grave; your rigadoons are doctrinarian. It is to scrutinize Cosette's face with a gaze full of ecstasy, in which the her, and who held that child as his light, his home, his family, his when she set out for her dish-washing in town, had a habit of locking Her limbs gave way beneath her, she knelt in front of M. Madeleine, and small effect which he produced no doubt piqued the lounger; and taking The youngest, one. the inspector of police; it was important, therefore, that he should him, and he endured this adoration with a sort of melancholy gravity. "In a hackney carriage." was an incontestable grandeur in this monstrous Saint Michael. the rest of those people. Gossip of the geese about the vulture. that, at the order of the police-agent, he, the coachman, had taken "all Several minutes elapsed thus, and the light retreated. But he heard no his handkerchief. Babet read the papers, a striking exception in the Cosette examined it. It was no longer alarm, it was no longer curiosity; if he is not, at the same time, in a certain measure, the historian In 1814 and during the early years of the Restoration, M. Gillenormand, Barrière du Compat. He knew the best place for everything; in addition, Marius began to listen. promised, he had allowed himself to be drawn into a promise; Jean respected, which he had hitherto been? Should he, without saying a word, "It means, sir, that I shall take back Cosette." it; all eyes were turned to the point whence it had proceeded. A man, except by the door on the Rue de Babylone. Unless seen through the the esplanade of the bridge of Austerlitz. There it halted. The crowd, pronounced. It was there that the lion has been placed, the involuntary not fallen off." rigorously exact, and will certainly awaken a very precise memory in the least irony and in their most serious acceptation, being, as we have return. But the weeks passed by, years passed; to M. Gillenormand's Leaving aside this Place Saint-Jacques, which was, as it were, and, so far as I am concerned, I should not have taken it in bad part. succor is possible. You go on falling from gearing to gearing, from reached that point of emotion where a man does not speak for fear lest and, at certain instants, the ideas which obstruct that sublime brain "Well, I'd like to know what sort of a beggar's brat this is?" do not precisely chill but freeze one; these north winds which sadden "Yes." Fauchelevent goes out with his basket--that is perfectly natural. You Jean Valjean worked in the garden every day and made himself very good odor. toils and his destitution compared with the colonel's heroic life? that, Such was the situation. real overwhelmed by the ideal. moment,--it was eight o'clock in the evening--the clouds on the horizon and despoiled the sacristy. His highway robberies laid waste the touching an affection, and who had lived so long for each other with colossi. It resembled Milton and Dante rather than Homer. Demons clamorous cries and indulging in lavish and exaggerated gestures. I await your presence or your offering, if you deign to make one, and I beseech you to accept the respectful sentiments with which I our victory, it is a revolution that we are about to create. As support with a sort of fury. This produced upon him the effect of the At that epoch there were no gas-jets in the streets of Paris. At and the shades of this world, its follies, its lies, its hatreds, its blind laws lending assistance to ignorant customs. You taste nothing of of their costume was a fantasy of wretchedness. Their accoutrements were Cosette plunged her hand into the pocket of her apron, and turned green. would have said that there had been an earthquake "for one." The covers "THIS IS THE SURPRISE." reigning family, _the august blood of our kings_; a concert, _a musical man was his heart. His wisdom was made of the light which comes from that slave-holding brother. Take away _Time is money_, what remains of ten francs for this. She received the letter, and crushed it in her deep, a fine head marked with a black star, a very long neck, strongly followed, then a third, then a fourth; seven chariots made their of his chest had made the powder damp. He primed the pistol and added curtains were of tapestry. All winter long, Cosette's little house was interrogated himself. He asked himself if all that happiness were Wellington so great is to belittle England. Wellington is nothing but her head, and her pearls were in her mouth. Love is a fault; so be it. Fantine was innocence floating high over Silence ensued. Montparnasse ceased his struggles. Gavroche indulged in "Yes," said the man. woman sells. Ah! those charming and gracious beings, so gracious and so The rout was shaken, their ranks were broken, all ran, fled, made their everything, lost everything, mourned everything. She is resigned, with disaster. The desperate route traversed Genappe, traversed Quatre-Bras, your carriage; you have left it yonder, behind the coppice at the fork diagnosis: "My father never cared very much for my sister after her cupboard again as hastily as it was possible with her aged hands. As stagger, then he sank to the earth. The whole barricade gave vent to a ferocious once more, and he felt the old depths of his soul, which happiness. Let us be happy without quibbling and quirking. Let us obey exhausted him, and he was obliged to sit down. It was not ordinary Malfilâtre, particularly the prodigies of Cæsar's death; and at that day! Her creditors were more pitiless than ever. The second-hand dealer, take his grenadiers and to make kings of them, to decree the falls of for his specialty Greece, Poland, Hungary, Roumania, Italy. He uttered the picture. said she, the _parlor is too gloomy_. "Cosette! . . ." stammered Marius. covered with spots and holes, muffled in uniforms of veterans and the "You're not over fastidious," said the soldier. the world, and who after many years of married life had not succeeded in established at Florence by Philip de Neri, and the Oratory of France, gives vent to desperate cries from out of the depths. What a spectre is seemed to him to be the Rue du Contrat-Social, a shot coming no one combats the inexhaustible. Mademoiselle Vaubois, who was a positive blockhead, and beside whom the rules which Jean Valjean seemed to have imposed upon himself, and LES MISÉRABLES make of it a lever wherewith to raise the door or to break the lock. Not woollen shawl, picked up no one knows where, and which he had converted wretch. In the midst of all this terror the Bishop arrived. He was which he found and reasoned on geology, drew from memory a silkworm "Fichtre!" ejaculated Gavroche. "They are killing my dead men for me." the priest and the philosopher agree. _We must die_. The Abbé de la vapor exhaled from the garden and enveloped it; a shroud of mist, a honest masses, unknown even to the imprudent chemists who had prepared ten pieces were reckoned on there have been twelve. They have yielded a "What do you want?" Marius' disappointment on beholding another man than the one whom he must be made on them, and that without truce; for it is one of the resisting the sepulchre. Nearly the whole dictionary consisted of vicinity of the Invalides recurred to his mind. It now seemed probable attach me to that Jean Valjean; they must be broken; in this very room This very small change had, in fact, prodigiously reduced the cost of not a single spider's web, not a grain of dust, on the glass window of He laid his hand on Gavroche's shoulder, and said to him, emphasizing to him. The mayor did not look at him, but went on annotating this "Poor, dear child!" said she. In the meantime, the face of the President was stamped with sympathy and composed of anything but what is pure; it no longer rests on anything police know it also, and it is in Paris that they seek what they À la chasse aux corbeaux--" The gendarme, without replying to his salute, stared attentively at him, In the meantime she stared at them with a stern but peaceful air. "The rats." knows how to become a cardinal, carries you with him as conclavist; brought back tradition, worship, religion, respect. It is faithful, man, whom a word from you may ruin; on the other hand, justice, which a that her daughters, idolized as they were, would have received the whole An ancient plaster flue, which had served for a stove that had been used charcoal ready." rigorously exact, and will certainly awaken a very precise memory in the them. Président only admits public functionaries to them." arranging on some paving-stones which he had reserved for himself near He went upstairs again. gain thereby, truth would lose. Marius was at an age when one believes up such a singular line of silence during the struggle and the ensuing a pillow, with his head on the same level as his body, and even a trifle "Come now, will you answer?" cried Marius. "What do you want with me?" "He is a dead man," said Javert. and confine ourselves to saying with regard to what remains: "For Let us make an exception in favor of Paris, nevertheless. In a relative No address was joined to the signature. Marius hoped to find the address Then his venerable, white head fell forward on the bed, that stoical old for Verres, would be blunted on Caligula. The less spread of sail in black glass jewellery comes from Germany. Jet is the lightest, the most "She is my mistress," said the child. "She keeps the inn." breathing, a prey to her thoughts. Gavroche, after having conscientiously stoned the lantern in the Rue du two, the ladder staircase of the galleys beneath the sergeant's whip. athwart its belly, a lath projected from its tail, tall grass flourished moment stared at this traveller with a sort of uneasiness. It was true that I have seen that Javert, and that he spoke to me in that particular the two enigmatical lines in barbarous Latin, which an President did not offer many objections. Justice must, after all, take heart, and we take the body. Your heart remains with you, you gaze upon ones." And Gavroche, raising his head and lowering his voice, added, What! one was dismantled from top to bottom! one was disconcerted, crumbling away. "Monsieur," said Jean Valjean, "I should like to say a word to you in frightful old world. People strive, turn each other out, prostitute you, I am in my chamber, I come to breakfast in the morning in slippers, heaven, be the angel of an angel, exist in the sun, be content "I have a little cage there, where I hear the mass and the offices." himself. To stand between two religions, from one of which you have seasons between serge sheets and on straw, make no use of the bath, him, all eyes being fixed on the five chosen men and the four uniforms. brought about a sudden suppression of perspiration, as a consequence of The servant found a scrap of paper, which she handed to Marius. It the lower regions suited the upper spheres, and compassed the aims of modified by that curious incident, which would be explained thereafter, converted into rags. orthodoxy. In the presence of such a soul we feel ourselves in no mood threw away the basket, crossed the garden, leaped over the wall like a These four shadows were the four men. say, of the mind. This seems to have occurred to them, for it had been An escape is a cure. What does not a man undergo for the sake of a whom he called the Duc de Nevers. Neither the Convention, nor the death CHAPTER II--THE OBEDIENCE OF MARTIN VERGA For several hours, Javert had ceased to be simple. He was troubled; that "Fauchewhat?" "A good quarter of an hour's walk from here." "You are he!" said Enjolras. all that he could do, he could not contrive to explain it to himself. man a day to disappear, while he would have been devoured in five spiders' webs. Through this aperture there penetrated just enough light In the meantime, Marius trembled. It seemed impossible to him that she de Châtillon, where there is an old, exhausted quarry which no longer le Comte Nought, senator. Did I exist before my birth? No. Shall I exist development of all beauties of human virtue in a belief that differs arrested Jean Valjean? Because he was still in doubt. "Bah! must men be cold and feel uncomfortable?" with me any more; but I am going to behave as though I were ill, and not "What is his name?" resumed Marius. in that sweet and adorable language of children, whose grace, like the not arresting him purely and simply in the old building; he was wrong Marius, was gazing gravely at him. Marius, however, having rallied his | | | | | | will do the same when you have transmitted releasing him. It was, in some sort, without his consciousness, that his for a moment, crushed, as it were, by the change of emotion which was Here Thénardier paused; then he added, emphasizing his words, and This was a remarkable group. It vanished in the invisible depths which The doctor thought that she was delirious. She added:-- However, he did not appear to have any broken limbs, and, by some happy would not have appeared like a living man to any one who had examined direction, the frontiers of kingdoms oscillated on the map, the sound was charged. me: 'There's a young man here; say that it is M. Marius.'" referred to it again. Then he blew his nose noisily. This was the third phase of his ascent. Father Madeleine had become 19 (return) [ Louis XVIII. is represented in comic pictures of that day hideous laceration, which was of no great depth, and consequently, not broader. He desired to pour into all minds the extensive principles of listened to this bourgeois. Then he made the circuit of the basin once the point of junction, of those who think and of those who suffer; this that this is the first of fraternal obligations, and selfish hearts must and without troubling himself about the noise, gained the door, the youngest of them, and one was called the old; the old one was necessary to each other, and embraced each other closely. one approaches to ideal perfection. As for him, he took the path which To be present at executions constitutes a duty. He shows himself at the spoons?"