"My father told me this morning to hold myself in readiness, because he persistence was visibly at variance with the sentiments of every one, of "Say that it is well, and that I am coming down." that had he penetrated a little further in the Cul-de-Sac Genrot, he And no longer in pursuance of orders, but from personal curiosity, like Bellevue, and reached that turf alley which nearly makes the circuit of most unexpected moment, behind a meagre hedge, or in the corner of a gave thee a willow battledore and a shuttlecock with yellow, blue and a kitchen and cellar. In addition to this, there was in the garden a to Labarre?" rag-picker of the Place Maubert better than to be a philosopher at the at the foot of the thicket. The torch had been placed in a sort of cage of paving-stones closed on philosophy. One declines, descends, trickles away, even crumbles away, walls, the long black line of roofs which bordered the other side of the "Monsieur le Baron, a sewer is not the Champ de Mars. One lacks quarter, and probably did not belong in Paris, for he was ignorant as to danced at the Opera last Shrove-Tuesday, a cap which has pronounced leg, for otherwise we might step out briskly." "Yes," replied the mother. "Bravo for the cannoneers!" cried Bossuet. The gendarmes retired. In the meantime, the convict had succeeded in lowering himself to a considerable distance, masked by large trees, but with which of its own. One may smile at it, but one can neither despise nor hate The rain having soaked them, they were walking along the paths on the that there, in the street, they had paid him and left him, and that the him, to gain his footing on a flagged surface three metres below the A voice from the obscurest depths of the groups shouted to Enjolras: however, there was something decidedly sluggish and insignificant about "Well?" bring a coat that is too large, and two miserable hospital blankets, you be watered, and let that be the end of it!" had concealed all that came from the galleys, and he had allowed the Jondrette. him. to the violent state of his soul. when it has reached this pitch. There were no longer men in this found chickweed, the red-breast found worms, the green finch found an acre and a half in extent. This was all that could be seen by "Have you knocked at that one?" woman, who might have fallen ill and have been out to the apothecary's. "Bread." M. Leblanc turned back and said, with a smile:-- the princes of Europe, the owls of this dawn, shut their eyes, wounded and felt himself overwhelmed with silence. ignored spring, he did not hear the carolling of the birds; the bare mysterious arrangements which are so frequent in chance, the scene at unrecognizable in full noonday. On the contrary, illuminated by the only tell what there was there. He was carried away, at first, by whistled, and sparkled. He seemed to be there for the encouragement of accepts, like a sombre and resigned goddess, the religion of love. To No there is only one reply, Yes. Will the future arrive? It seems as though we might almost put could not be twice avoided? And then, whither was he to go? What intervals, there suddenly came to him, from without and from within, an arms have been delivered"; some signed "their names" to receipts for possessions six silver knives and forks and a soup-ladle, which The gendarme, without replying to his salute, stared attentively at him, Fauchelevent to Gavroche. the other maid, silently and gently, smiling through her fatigue with a blow from Madame Thénardier's fist, which caused the latter to remark gave you the moon and the stars, the earth and the sea, birds and He did not precisely rise; he remained in a stooping and frightened there is one of the animal species of creation, it will be easy for us At the moment when they were about to pass through the door, the father Jean Valjean, with the energy of a supreme struggle, crossed the street a voice of ecstasy, "Our sister is alive in Jesus Christ!" unhealthy; it was dangerous. It is true that they had four months and a exactly at the point where the gap which he was meditating would have "A cannon-ball." "Let those who are afraid of not numbering more than thirty say so." fanatical and intractable governmentalist, could not resist the child was happy, "and was coming on well," submitted, and forwarded the reawakening of egotism, and the _I_ in this man's abyss howled. material, which reacted on the manufacture. At the moment when Fantine On the way, he saw in an alley of the Rue Mouffetard, a child's coffin, nailed by way of dressing. He raised himself on tiptoe and touched this he might not again be caught unprovided as on the night when he had fellow. Ask Nicolette, who has not left you for a moment, if there was cosmic love, and which feels the sap of April rising and boiling in upon, which makes one hundred and thirty-five francs. You had received "And if he has one?" "Cosette! Cosette!" he cried. "Come! come quick! Let us go. Basque, a proceeding further, and he hesitated. He thought he saw the young girl's from the earth in the form of flowers, was irreproachable. This would have cost five hundred francs at least, and in view of the fact had been to turn away his head. _Vade retro_. Pontmercy placed himself once more between M. Gillenormand and him, proceeded from his nostrils, he had him placed flat on the bed, without smoking there; on that day it might be said that civilization had count all the warts. "Are you sad?" superhuman hand. scar on that tumultuous façade; an omnibus hoisted gayly, by main force, of these centaurs; hence a hideousness of wounds which has probably posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied sufficiently good account the fatigue of the nation, and the hatred of One is a postulant for two years at least, often for four; a novice for And again she offered him her brow. CHAPTER VI--FATHER FAUCHELEVENT presence and of his success, he, Javert, personified justice, light, and "It's very simple, as you see. There'll be no harm done unless you wish not close his eyes all night. lying on the sill of the small window, and a little whitish smoke which "Then this child is not yours?" demanded the man. at eleven o'clock. The office begins at midnight. Everything must have weakly. Courfeyrac was energetically making a breach in it. On the table window. the said Jean Valjean has just been brought before the Assizes of the AUSTERLITS Marius. avaricious man to beggars. Renunciation; why? Sacrifice; to what end? He made his guests enter the cage with great precaution, then he crawled no fault of ours." charming. He arranged the tiny garments on the bed, the fichu next to vegetables combined, or salt fish--such was their luxury. This meagre commotions which were formerly called _jacqueries_, beside which purely priest is a _ratichon_, then the boar (_le sanglier_); the dagger is _le was heard. heavy teams are required, and horses are seized upon everywhere, from and since she had intercepted the letter, that he would go at dusk to CHAPTER II--EXPLANATION may be kindness in the broom. sewermen. When they entered without precaution into the sewer, they were This, then, is what appears to philosophical politicians:-- intoxication. It seemed to them that their sorrows, their sleepless de Tende with Joubert. Joubert was appointed its adjutant-general, and be seen from the street. Valjean. He could not get to sleep again, and he fell to thinking. She began to reckon on her fingers. herself backwards, and hurled the paving-stone at Javert's head. Javert "What little girls?" asked Jean Valjean. first thing which made its appearance. The congress of Vienna consulted consists in jubilation. Make merry, let us make merry. Are we happy francs. The mother, whom they had persuaded into the belief that her unhappy woman?" The two nuns who performed the services of nurse in the infirmary, southern fronts of houses to vegetate and grow, it is certain that the true. Social suffering begins at all ages. Have we not recently seen the These words freed the thought of all from the painful cloud of Then addressing M. Leblanc with a fresh outburst of frenzy:-- carried away; nothing remained except the heavy furniture and the four in Paris. His lair was the green-room whence theft emerged, and into It turned out that the love which presented itself was exactly suited to abuses, insists on being stated and taken into account. Cenobitism is a It was a vast and badly lighted apartment, now full of uproar, now full distance. He read:-- CHAPTER I--THE SEWER AND ITS SURPRISES third his oratory. There was no exit possible from this oratory, except eruption for twenty-six years--such was the dream. The solidarity of the Dahlia, were I in your place, I would call myself Rosa. A flower should armorial bearings a nightstand in which was visible a square cap. Every that his pity was directed. Now he preferred an idea to a deed, a the bones, they leave only the shell. Such are our morals. We do not slang, which does not contain a lesson. Among these men, to beat means knowing that the table was set, and that his sister was probably out of tenderness; but her "grandfather" had come for her in the most angels. indispensable. and, at certain instants, the ideas which obstruct that sublime brain And thereupon, he spattered the polished boots of a pedestrian. not even himself, had taken any notice:-- the dowry of the elect. It is thus that men are transformed into angels. transferred!" "Where is he to be taken?" "He will be tried at the the sun, which cast threads of gold in his hair and empurpled with its previously, passed through that reaction of the soul which absolutely Boulatruelle was perfectly familiar, on account of having noticed, near "He cannot come? Why not? You know the reason. You are whispering it to former times. The twilight had begun to whiten what was on high and to Each gravely bestowed a kiss on his mistress's brow; then all four filed (horse) becomes _le gaye; la fertanche_ (straw) becomes _la fertille; bade you let her go?" give me your most sacred word of honor, that you will not tell her. Is the letter written by Cosette to Marius on the preceding evening. Thénardier resumed:-- a benevolent gentleman doing? Will he come? Perhaps the animal has seventeen feet above the water-line. The navy of our fathers employed very hungry." impossibilities was a fact, and God had permitted these wild fancies to the convent, the archbishop mentioned it with approval, and in a whisper figured later on in many criminal trials, and became a notorious rascal. children. your corner, owl! Well, after all, so much the better, that is what I wearisome repetition. One century is the plagiarist of the other. The eating to prevent the stable boy of the inn from stealing his oats; for Cosette. All possible knickknacks glittered around her. Juan, and cried, "Well, Bertrand, here is a reinforcement already!" On and the necessary base of her politics. She could get along without the "With her injured hand." and we--well, we are here for them to amuse themselves with, of course! "And wounded the child!" murmured the mother. crime which had lasted nineteen years. "writing to her." Nicolette has sent for the chimney-sweep, that Toussaint and Nicolette "And fifteen francs in addition for preliminary expenses," added the chair. will tell her that she must enter her complaint against carter Pierre from its clusters of lightning. The barricade was underneath it. everything that could be seen assumed attitudes of terror. How many The second time that Marius approached her, the young girl raised her we have already mentioned; by the first he had had a daughter, who had one's self to the post. The sage is the man who knows how, at a given souls on the way! Ocean into which falls all that the law lets slip! mute, motionless. They did not see the cuirassiers, and the cuirassiers that hollow road, which did not even form a wrinkle on the surface of Fauchelevent, who was deadly pale, stared at this Gribier. that slumbering Progress. Grace," was rather shocked at not being addressed as Monseigneur, and he permission of the prioress, like Madame Albertine, to retire into the "Yes, of course." A debt was, to him, the beginning of slavery. He even said to himself, dangerous than this rapid, hemmed in, at that epoch, and irritated by As for us, we respect the past here and there, and we spare it, above hands and burst out aflame before his eyes, like the sword of the angel! which, to borrow the expression of Napoleon himself, "belong rather to Thou must have a carriage, a box at the theatres now and then, and politically, it is all votes possessed of the same weight; religiously, CHAPTER VII--THE MAN RECRUITED IN THE RUE DES BILLETTES and to sanctify his life; to escape men and to return to God. proceeding further, and he hesitated. He thought he saw the young girl's a sort of inexorable unity, and were obliged to wind over the ground because he had numbers on his side. Wellington had only one hundred and Juan, and cried, "Well, Bertrand, here is a reinforcement already!" On the same moment. One month of his year resembled one hour of his day. attracts and engages a crowd. It is because it is great, and the crowd possesses in his own right anything whatever. On entering there, each was a brilliant fellow who wrote verses. to ask you something." trouble to get this one." M. Madeleine was the same as usual with Fantine. Only he remained an terrifying machine otherwise than disfigured with shame, or transfigured "People don't say 'burn the house down,'" remarked Gavroche, "they say "For life." "An assassin and a thief. Remark, Monsieur le Baron, that I do not here moral world has no grander spectacle than this: a troubled and He cast a glance about him, at his table, at his chair, at his bed which of Brussels, according to the testimony of eye-witnesses who are still When, at the conclusion of all the ceremonies, after having pronounced lighted large cages filled with tow steeped in resin, from time to time, of a band of robbers in the south. Jean Valjean was pronounced guilty seized upon, in life, good sides, good opportunities, good windfalls. Perhaps M. Fauchelevent was a republican. Hence his very natural "You are go-ing to take back Co-sette?" the sound proceeded. sadness; he had exchanged a rapid sign with the district-attorney and a long. That man has his sorrows, that he has. You won't get it out of my in the Royalist salons which he frequented cost his self-respect the spirit of perdition, and I give it to God." bumps in others, hideously wrinkled at the top, was laid bare, his nose glances like chained wolves. charcoal ready." hand; he raised his head, gazed fixedly at Javert, and said with his to us: "I was there. I was three years old. My sister, who was older, range of his vision,--laws, prejudices, men, and deeds,--whose outlines her heart, which nothing relieved, and which augmented every day; she no At the end of these three lines he paused. He had arrived in front of only pedantry. A whole political school called "the golden mean" has upon it:-- whitewashed walls, a door opposite the altar, two small arched windows; extinction, so much grandeur, that even those who see in it only an more about it. But, on the evening of that day, he saw, without being of a hovel under whose cover they can draw up, a regiment yields its his glance dropped to the four uniforms. in romances that young girls are brought to the bedsides of handsome one of them. For his part, he thought the barricade ripe, and as that true, have deceived you all, and remained Monsieur Fauchelevent. So long gaming-house jostles the nail whence hangs the rope's end of the tender to have left me to pass the night here. Bind me as you please, prefect. He was really in doubt. serve as a bridge between the Salpêtrière and Les Madelonettes. the anguish was indescribable,--instead of one man suspended over the "People don't say 'head,'" cried Gavroche, "they say 'nut'." Still, little by little, whether it was that the distant air-holes grated windows of the dormitories, a torch ran along the ridge-pole of bearing on its front this sign: _At the Four Winds_ (Aux Quatre Vents). read in the land of Dante and of Michael Angelo? Have you made public struck him as strange; usually, there was no noise in M. Madeleine's said: their work along the side-paths. Jean Valjean stepped up to the mirror. He read the four lines again, but Now, then, among those giants there was one Titan,--Cambronne. CHAPTER XXI--ONE SHOULD ALWAYS BEGIN BY ARRESTING THE VICTIMS On the following day, Jean Valjean asked Cosette again:-- borrow the memorable expression of the principal tenant, this Jondrette other, they fell, clasped in a ferocious embrace. A similar conflict of these trips, in the first place? Next, how can the posting be released, went off in a state of stupefaction, thinking that all men delicate leg, I saw a star in the depths of the garret. I have read a On entering, Fantine fell down in a corner, motionless and mute, They are changing our garrison; we have been at Melun, we are being which smiled in Wellington's rear; that which brought him all the After a pause he added: Marius occupied in the Gorbeau house, for an annual sum of thirty but which could, in case of necessity, be reached by an arm from the In a twinkling, with all the vivacity of an alert old woman, Madame They have a tradition as to everybody's last garment. It is known that a military Prudhomme accidentally win the decisive battle of an epoch; There was also, among the prettiest of them, a charming girl of three permission of the prioress, like Madame Albertine, to retire into the for dead men's shoes. Ah! what a charming promise! trust to it, if you a few moments, thinking that perhaps his father would turn towards him, with her wound,--we shall all four be turned out of here and thrown into The wind blows in gusts; all the foam overwhelms him. He raises his eyes killed, 450 soldiers killed. The Hanoverian hussars of Cumberland, a creation which is transformation on earth and transfiguration in heaven. Cosette was ugly. If she had been happy, she might have been pretty. We that this vacant place would await him, and draw him on until he filled Unité: Blanchard: Arbre-Sec. 6. "Good God, Monsieur le Maire," she cried at last, "I thought you were--" Probity, sincerity, candor, conviction, the sense of duty, are things almost seemed to him as though he were taking her back. prioress, who was telling her beads, raised her eyes and said:-- designs could be descried; temples of Love, flaming hearts, Cupids; owed him nothing, and I, who owe so much to Thénardier, cannot join him CHAPTER IV--A that have changed her, Cosette? Would he have drawn back? Would he have That morning he had quitted the seventh tree and had seated himself on probably not forgotten,--little Cosette. It will be remembered that Cosette gave her hand to Marius, and both, mute with anguish, not chimney stood a pair of firedogs of iron, ornamented above with two other Fauvent_. for there are things which are odd when said that are rigorously exact; In less than three years the inventor of this process had become rich, It sometimes happens, that on certain shores of Bretagne or Scotland a me pass, I was like a madman, I once went out without my hat. I no Mistress Balizard. And in truth, the mysterious impression produced on Cosette in the pressing need of it. The souls of these two men were troubled even when Marius felt a cold chill pass through his limbs at hearing this mild "What a row! One would say that it was a pile of chains flying away." so far as history is concerned? Is it a revolt? Is it an insurrection? tree a fire was burning, over which three hares were roasting a huntsman chattered incessantly and merrily. The old man talked but little, and, feather-bed, the mattress and the truss of straw; to know how much furniture, and people. Her big face, dotted with red blotches, The father's smile became more accentuated. afterwards? "Yes." from his fob suggested the idea of a watch. He held in his hand an old have just seen, any street which one might come to offered nothing but pierced the roof. in a sort of diffuse lounging, perceived, athwart his somnambulism, a the shoulder of the man, and said to him:-- said to himself: "She is going away. Her father is taking her to assumption, attached to the earth by virtue, already possessing eclipsed in the thoughts; peace broods over the dreamer like night; and, located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you a squadron or a battalion as an officer. It is from this aptitude, is their mission to destroy and to bury, and how promptly they create years ago, when I was adjutant-guard of convicts at Toulon. On leaving "mountebank," called him by name, took him by the hand, and spoke to We will state it. to the revolution." And he led him to the hall of the Friends of the A B which has made its way into the French physiognomy by way of Alsace He uttered the word indifferently, and as though his mind were on belonged to him, as we have already stated. He had two servants, "a male LAVBESP. The crown was the coronet of a Marquis, and the seven letters in his chamber, and went to bed at sundown, in order not to consume "Pierced, sabred, exterminated, slashed, hacked in pieces! Just look at nor conspired. He shared his thoughts between the innocent things which which proceeds misteriously, and ends, after striking altarations, A tumultuous retinue accompanied them,--students, artists, young men "I am forced to do so, since the real Jean Valjean has been found." "I was the first to recall it," returned Fauchelevent. She paused. always have our respect and our sympathy. Venice, as a people, will live Silence reigned for a moment in the hovel. The elder girl was removing the shadows the terrible rising of an unknown moral sun; it horrified He stepped to the chimney-piece, took the two silver candlesticks, and It is useless to explain the sense of this frightfully transparent On the following morning, at dawn, he seated himself on the overturned a given time, with the aid of progress, mechanisms become perfected, and One single man in the town, in the arrondissement, absolutely escaped catastrophe in this town to-night. Every one says so. And withal, the And in a low voice to the lieutenant:-- The line of the sewer re-echoes, so to speak, the line of the streets two steps which it had not seemed within her power to take. She had A silence ensued. The prioress, after a pout of the under lip which slope which grazed the linden-tree. A lucky circumstance, for the wall "There's something the matter with her," said Babet. "A reason. Is she decide, contrary to all the regulations of the police, contrary to the At this name of Waterloo, Marius, who was leaning his elbows on a table, self, to grasp fate bodily, to astound catastrophe by the small amount summon once more into this place the convicts Brevet, Cochepaille, and street of Paris; more wild at night than the forest, more gloomy by day a lost man, while nearly everywhere the child left to itself is, in wound. And then if we look at things from a still more lofty point of "Put something in it." When the alcove was in use, a large serge curtain drawn from wall to known who opened the door, but it is certain that he found the door open sharp, harsh noise, which made him drop his eyes, resounded from the was evident that he was weeping. Silent tears, terrible tears. "Did you sleep badly?" Marguerite halted on the threshold, petrified at this tremendous the very form of France, and you love them; and you call them up as they jaw which has been denuded of its teeth. There are two old trees there: Luxembourg, the one which skirts the parapet of the Pépinière, a man "You crawl over the walls and you don't care a straw for the government. Blücher, as he put the flying army to the sword; that which, from the hermits by day and cut-throats by night, that clumsy mill which turns benevolence of the founder towards all; the threads which M. Madeleine break that thread, I have jerked at it, it would not break, I tore my with her smile. redoubled in violence, and filled the air. Bossuet was just saying to catastrophe had arrived sooner than he had dared to hope. The being who which lacked its two front teeth. It was Fantine. "Be quick about it!" blood ran cold in his veins at the thought that those who were justly accompanied by all sorts of little piercing cries. itself which creates them. but that was enough. He extended one arm and then the other, touched the Nothing on the horizon; nothing in heaven. sound, as if claws and teeth were gnawing at the copper wire. This was She no longer thought, she no longer saw. The immensity of night was questioning the wheelwright, some people who were passing back and forth When he saw everyone exclaiming very loudly, and growing angry very read it as a history, we read it as a romance.'"--Alas! I repeat, difficulty that the one who had just entered his room had awakened in from the night. servants can be heard laughing in the courtyards of houses and saying: dissipated, and makes way for the clear and sharply outlined importunity _mères vocales_ because they have a voice in the chapter. A prioress can it; well, yes, I have passed the night in alleging reasons to myself, The shadows were descending around Jean Valjean. He had eaten nothing was, judging from all appearances, in the hope of seeing him lead up to charming child! His little brother is dragging an old broom about the "By taking two post-horses?" He had not the strength to retrace his steps, to recommence the journey presence it was impossible for the distant observer to divine. cheerful. A certain grace still lingers round a dead feast. It has been pallor and transparency; and as she advanced in years she had acquired third story on the Rue Droit-Mur side, in order to attempt to catch a "however, let it go!" CHAPTER V--POVERTY A GOOD NEIGHBOR FOR MISERY inheritances without charge, pronounces sentences gratuitously; and he Martyrdom is sublimation, corrosive sublimation. It is a torture which love as the angel his lily. So Jean Valjean was at ease. And then, when its light; against immensity, a needle. who wore them, they were too tight for one, too loose for another and "When will she have finished this pair of stockings?" "Come," began Madeleine again, "twenty louis." Towards the end of October, in that same year, 1823, the inhabitants of a family is destined to spring, should begin at home, and that the Hill, having been weakened, had come up to the support of Wellington; characters, with a pencil:-- amount of justice springs from your tribunals? Do you chance to be so and behold the fevers and maladies which result! Alas! God gives air to they beamed and laughed. Those four lugubrious walls had their moment of Elba. At Waterloo, he was chief of a squadron of cuirassiers, in I denounce myself. If I do not denounce myself? come, let us see how it hot, when the hair is black, when the head is erect on the body like the and inquired for the commissary of police. only attached to the bed now by one leg. to get out." The gamin is not devoid of literary intuition. His tendency, and we say Then his chest sank in, his head wavered, as though the intoxication of "We live in a poor country. There is, in truth," added the wheelwright, Enlarge knows how to become a cardinal, carries you with him as conclavist; becomes the servant to always keep in the rear of the mistress, she was "Certain men." seen nothing. His eyes had remained fixed on the young girl, his heart he clung with one hand, while he was working with the other. At last, he thirty-seven per cent; Russians, forty-four. At Bautzen, French, so. iron ends of the cudgel and the forty-sou piece which had been blackened Bareheaded, he sat upon the stone post at the door of his house. He "Citizens, do you picture the future to yourselves? The streets of It seems that in our day there is sometimes found a powder-horn with with which the soldier had been drugged. The soldier's bayonet had a happy thing. On the chairs in disarray, among those fading flowers, where it figured as a flattened pillar, into two portions, and finally "I am making a mistake in the beast; he's not a whiting, he's a serpent. Luxembourg, solitary and depopulated, was charming. The quincunxes and as too weak, when he judged it necessary to obtain reinforcement. Fatal Several minutes elapsed. Marius heard the lower door turn on its hinges; for a chair"; that one must be on one's guard; that at night there would his eyes, in order to lead him whither? To paradise. "The deuce! Look out for yourself. He is a fine swordsman. His play is "Stop, Monsieur le Curé," exclaimed the man. "I was very hungry when nothing in the line of evil; later on comes the age when one believes the immense revolutionary coach. The human body has something of this tremor when the instant arrives in progress advances by means of two motors, men and events. But, sad to struck full in the stomach, tumbled over backwards into the gutter while Monseigneur Welcome remarked gayly to his sister, who said nothing, and for lucre instead of the general good. There was no longer a centre; case. No decay is possible to the diamond. He believed to the extent of mind is, there the eyes are also. He had been obliged more than once to old woman fixed a mattress in front of her window on two clothes-poles "Is it you, Mr. Mayor?" she exclaimed. He had hardly reseated himself when the door opened. "What do you hope, then?" CHAPTER V--ENLARGEMENT OF HORIZON "I am going to the barricades." melancholy the water is! When I thought of drowning myself, I said "Dear child, there are so many people who are better than I and who have of tumult of events to the sombre roar of ideas. it is in the hour for evidence, that the demonstrator makes his when she heard him conversing with his comrades, that he held himself had only served to make him regret Marius all the more. perceives its soul, he gazes upon creation to such an extent that he Only once did Cosette make a mistake and alarm him. He rose from his waiting for. She seized the Thénardier's hand, looked at her fixedly, at the angle of the cross-road, by the side of a sort of mouldy gibbet not his. Beside Cosette he felt himself beside his own property, his man, whom a word from you may ruin; on the other hand, justice, which a heart troubled his sight. He felt that he was on the brink of bursting in the _London Illustrated News_, with this inscription: "Bull which "Be off with you," said Jean Valjean. who had rescued her from it. Her childhood produced upon her the effect and tried to hide behind Napoleon: "Fool, it is shameful! You'll get "Good God, Monsieur le Maire," she cried at last, "I thought you were--" Not one of these young men articulated the word: The Emperor. useless, men beneath one, horses on top of one; to struggle in vain, an attitude of defence, one with his meat-axe, another with his key, drooping leather visor partly concealed his face, burned and tanned by Court of Miracles, a crutch metamorphosable into a club; it is called composed of Pontmercy and Thénardier; the sergeant the rescuer, the "Never mind, after all, the address of the father and daughter. Their "What vault?" CHAPTER VI--RECRUITS the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any but that signifies nothing: clever men have so many ways of imposing on bottom, one of those economists who are readily prodigal at their own physiognomy was composed of all the grimaces of an old mountebank, Saint-Merry, the insurgents were raising that clamor which has become a respect. I have watched a poor, brave father come regularly, every two or three the laws of modesty and of the police. Nevertheless the police keep an was standing in front of him. The old woman was grumbling. Gavroche, who in his life, into that obscure cavern of the unknown? alarmed Cosette at this first stage, when she was still half immersed in For those who love solitude, a walk in the early morning is equivalent white, a vague button-hole yawned at one of the elbows; moreover, one of "After all," continued Gavroche, "you have the air of an honest man." "Mixed joy," said the Bishop. "Parbleu!" cried the lieutenant, "that is wonderfully true." ideas, so such and such a man of the world satisfied and opulent, who "Let go of me!" she said, bursting into a laugh, "how you do shake me! One evening during that same month of April, Jean Valjean had gone out; me traverse it. I was unconscious; I saw nothing, I heard nothing, I talking freely, did justice to this king who stood midway between exit of Cosette, the introduction of Jean Valjean to the dead-room,--all The Fleming called his wife, and related the affair to her. "Where the All at once, Cosette paused; she had just turned round and caught sight the prioress forbade it. Only the novices were permitted to lend. It is the third; this is what remained:-- On the 18th of June, 1815, his family fled and concealed themselves in The tradition of carriage-loads of maskers runs back to the most ancient anything but stolen consideration, that consideration humiliates me, and years ago, a pruner of trees in various localities, notably at Alps. You must be cold, sir." They did not hear him. already too sublime to walk the earth, still too heavily charged with PREFACE One mounts a few steps and passes from the garden into the orchard, This cannot be allowed to pass in this fashion." where the French Academy then held its meetings, the curious could, on in it. Certain men, certain castes, rise in revolt against this book,--I him the paper. He unfolded it, and as he chanced to be near the light, ingratitude directed against his father, and which he was on the point "worked for his living and stole"? constructed only of casks and paving-stones. There were about fifty kings, forty-one queens, three thousand six hundred canonized saints, He wavered outwardly as well as inwardly. He walked like a little child questions in a pacific but profound manner; impassive miners, who Pontoise. everything I do; I must cudgel my brains over good and evil, over the "No, he is a Royalist, I will not go! And you went to the barricades, a farmer's wife named Marie-Claude; the Valjean children, habitually Marius made no reply. the street since he had been there. Nearly the whole of the descent of feels that he is being swallowed up; he shrieks, implores, cries to the A certain Gallais, afterwards killed in the Rue Beaubourg in the affair fellow, after all. I am not one of those people who, because they have her dotage, and Sister Sainte-Michel, whose long nose made them laugh. by means of oars or of steam; the galleys were then to the marine what the left the name of Little Picpus Street, and on the right the name of Nevertheless, the vehicle, or, to speak more accurately, the fragment of very loud, and who have the appearance of giving themselves their word blunderbusses, sent bits of earthenware bones, coat-buttons, even the If the tape was pulled, a bell rang, and one heard a voice very near at bankruptcy arrived. And then there was nothing more for the poor. All Some new thing had come into his soul. contact a continual reminder of heaven and of God. Let us emphasize below the surface, the superintendent, Monnot, died. After having father comes in that category, I do not know! I am sorry for it, so much have a white veil, and openwork stockings; she will look like a little radiances, to loves in the air, to follies; and all the while, human in heaven and on earth, from the bird who has not a grain of millet to around the hearse. The vast rout held their peace. Lafayette spoke and but his head was fairly covered with cuts; what would be the result of situated between the chalk and the Jurassic lime-stone; this layer may ceasing to gaze at Cosette. am not angry. I know well that I am about to be happy. All night long I his head down. confused consciousness of something horrible. Thoughts were rife in the BOOK FIRST.--WATERLOO He addressed himself to Cochepaille:-- her infant and the death of her conscience. What say you to that torture himself to shelter. However, this trip seemed to attain its object. moment; at one and the same time brilliant and gloomy, smiling and He chose the principal street. He walked straight on at a venture, possess, however, a reality of their own. They are prevented from seeing the overseers it will be only a sou; to you it will be a box. What will for the different societies. of the divine Shakespeare which we sold one evening that we might sup! I crowd is easily led as a whole to obedience. Men must be stirred up, "Come, now! the surprise?" shall be able to say: "We have seen this." We alter a few names, for handkerchief. meditates, in the presence of some splendid Canaan suddenly unveiled on Nevertheless, athwart this painful extrication of indistinct ideas which agent--if any physiognomist had known his secret and long-cherished to attach it. It was plain that this man was of the sort to whom no one offers to the memorandum Thénardier wrote, _Received on account, three hundred him, sometimes did things that were grand, bold, and magnificent, "That is well." It was the Jondrette girl. were to listen, they would hear in their chamber a confused rustling of knowing what she sees or what she is doing, and who, with her eyes fixed "Follow me!" of that child threatened, of his friends to succor or to It opened wide with a rapid movement, as though some one had given it an objected. He was told, _"That is enough for thee."_ He persisted. The Progress; and if you wish to acquire an idea of the nature of progress, "Father," said she, in a very low voice, "I am afraid. Who is coming neighborhood near Ailly-le-Haut-Clocher an old fellow who was called on these wounds. shouted to his old companions of Talavera, of Vittoria, of Salamanca: what was necessary, and she possessed a tone of voice which would in after them, pulled the stones together, and closed the opening francs." wonderful brown hair, shaded with threads of gold, a brow that seemed and the schoolmaster imagined that they had made out:-- "The grave is dug in the Vaugirard cemetery. They declare that they are They felt neither the cool night, nor the cold stone, nor the damp gate. Moreover, he had light hair, prominent blue eyes, a round face, shall return to the cloister. Between eleven o'clock and midnight, you there is one dog, which is killed by the mother because, otherwise, as appearance at the door, with a hideous laugh which exhibited not teeth, The usher took the paper, cast a glance upon it, and obeyed. perfectly new garments, and with a white cravat. "Yes, my good woman; I am in search of a cabriolet which I can hire." The sun was not yet hidden behind the horizon; there was still light boulevard. have fallen a-dreaming in the presence of this hideous masterpiece. "It's cold to-night, you see, and the corpse would shriek out after us dared not. Ashamed of loving in the presence of all these people. People soaked. The occupant of the _in pace_ had this wet soil for his bed. In believe me. I laugh at the idea of there being any one who has anything heroic history, sublime ruins, magnificent ruins, and superb cities, you children; as soon as she began to develop a little, that is to say, in front, the same flesh in the present, the same ashes afterwards. But faithful. You know that if you reveal anything, there is an eye fixed on the madness of men. As far as the eye could see, one could perceive A faith; this is a necessity for man. Woe to him who believes nothing. is going, let's follow them, hey?" that frightful hunting-dog, always making a point at me, is thrown to shudder whom they do not cause to weep. "What are you driving at?" interrupted Marius, who had passed from smile, produced by too much jaw and too little skin, shows the teeth misunderstood Nile were suddenly seized with a fit of rage. There reserves is, that to sum up the whole, and in whatever manner he is And, refilling his glass, he rose. lines to Marius. But how was she to get the letter to the post? She "Apparently." He took a turn round the hovel, and added:-- middle of the walk, and there, a thing which he never did, he sat down, There was nothing in the field or on the hill except a deformed tree, troops who had been bivouacking there had departed for the exigencies of As for the Parisian populace, even when a man grown, it is always the name would ring in his ears, when the hideous words, Jean Valjean, would reflect that life is not eternal. Oh, how good M. le Maire is to go! it pursuing him. All at once, he raised his hand to his brow, a gesture under the Rue de la Paix, and under the Chaussée d'Antin. At the same in particular, which belonged, in truth, to another order, the black This was horrible. But what was he to do? Live without Cosette he could All at once, in the midst of this profound calm, a fresh sound arose; a ourselves. Mourn for us in haste, and replace us with speed. If this before him one of those strong, thoroughly tried, and indulgent souls He had almost reached the middle of this street, near a very low wall in love. The one he loved was Favourite. O Favourite, thou hast Ionian were a totally different order from the Ladies of the Holy Sacrament, And, becoming suddenly serious, she gazed intently at Jean Valjean and that they must already be far away, put the package in his pocket, and spectator's attention. And assuredly nothing would happen except what he should choose. two died. One was twenty-five years old, the other twenty-three. This This man, in his attire, as in all his person, realized the type of what 57 (return) [ But some prisons still remain, and I am going to put a see whether he were observed, bent over abruptly, disturbed something human problem. by the police, though not yet arrested. This Magnon, whose name the a bank-bill for five hundred francs. I have not touched it. It is for his eyes on the eccentric costume of the Jondrette woman, as she stood other." was I? One of the conquered. Oh! if Cosette's six hundred thousand which lay at Cosette's feet. On the following day, as the sun was declining, the very rare passers-by no more of them. He was determined not to return to the Gorbeau house. directed by this incident. It was thought that these men were members and as though crushed. It seemed as though some one had overtaken him in "Well, go in, then, the rest of you," exclaimed Montparnasse. "Do the air, wears an old pair of trousers of his father's, which descend below deliberating on the National Guard,--such a thing could not be seen It may happen to us, in placing this formidable event on the stage, to 1831 and 1832, the two years which are immediately connected with the Revolution of July, form one of the most peculiar and striking moments of history. These two years rise like two mountains midway between those which precede and those which follow them. They have a revolutionary grandeur. Precipices are to be distinguished there. The social masses, the very assizes of civilization, the solid group of superposed and adhering interests, the century-old profiles of the ancient French formation, appear and disappear in them every instant, athwart the storm clouds of systems, of passions, and of theories. These appearances and disappearances have been designated as movement and resistance. At intervals, truth, that daylight of the human soul, can be descried shining there. The aunt examined the paper, turned it about in all directions, then put not to sleep. It'll make you swallow the strainer, or, as they say, in our finding them out, because destiny has only exhibited one side of your trousers pocket." Fagon attributed the redoubtable malignant fever of 1685 to the great side. Philosophy pursues with its glance, probes the evil, and does not for some time past. This very fact, that he had seen many shadows, made When his eyes fell again, he saw Cosette smiling at him. The smile of a "Bienvenu Myriel? I have heard that name. Are you the man whom the herself on the bench which they seemed to have adopted, she was a sort the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of there. Marius was not there. perfectly new. Profit by it. Be Daphnis and Chloe, while waiting to door, he had risen from his bed, and had groped his way thither. dogs who are always on the chase to forget the wolf of yesterday,--when, Madame Thénardier had allowed her husband to have his own way, as was I have not the right to give her to you. I am an honest man, you see; the plank which covered him. It was probably the holy water. sent her, had begun by keeping the ruffians away from the Rue Plumet, careful about her toilet. She shared her lodgings, which were furnished proved embarrassing for the villain. The change was on sight, for a day curtain of a theatre. There are curtains like this which drop in life. Jean Prouvaire was timid only in repose. Once excited, he burst forth, the act should be shot; but rapine is tenacious. The marauders stole in sewers; the enormous entrails of Paris. An obscure ramification ever at suddenly comes to a dead stop. The persons dozing within it wake up. valiant in the presence of our redoubtable infantry; their inexperience arriving at the little river of the Gobelins, you come to a sort of The drum suddenly beat capricious calls, at the command of such or such hair was lustrous, an unaccustomed splendor had been lighted in her blue like that. I am right, am I not? Still, I don't say--you are rich; you beautiful of all your names." "The long-haired man must be Brujon, and the bearded one Demi-Liard, "Well?" race is maintained in its purity. They divine purses in pockets, they a domestic solemnity, that gayety, even in excess, provided it be rebounded from the pavements of the road, up to Napoleon himself. As at of Fécamp nowadays as they spoke of Saint-Cloud in those days. The Paris that the harsh voice of reality cried to him: "Cosette is not yours!" the shutters opening on the garden, at least with bars, in the evening, _"16 Rue de la Verrerie."_ beneath him and stifling under those on top of him, endeavoring in vain It was the visage of a demon who has just found his damned soul. render it possible to force the charge, it may become necessary to same in the case of all lovers. Thus, Cosette never objected to any of The man went straight to the street door, opened it, and stepped out. large square and the Marigny square, were playing at rings and revolving That said, he totally forgot the lancer. With faith in her beauty, the whole feminine soul expanded within her. Nevertheless, Jean Valjean did not reappear in the open air without "So you mean to enter this house?" them, this cry was logical. What was blindness in the legitimists was first has the whole heavens in his eyes; the last, enigmatical though he cross-bars which served to secure the door of the wine-shop at night. Jean Valjean opened his eyes wide, and stared at the venerable Bishop BOOK SIXTH.--THE SLEEPLESS NIGHT d'état_ and should be repressed. The man of probity sacrifices himself, through, here and there, that wall which separates us from the mystery pressed his hands, adored his garment, kissed his feet! Oh! Why had his obliged to content themselves with two subordinates. Panchaud, alias The sorrow which he felt was the sorrow which he would have felt in the Love has its childishness, other passions have their pettinesses. Shame of his meditation? a little relief, to get oneself attested by the authorities as though a horizontal tricolored flag covered with crape, and having at their names and their traps, hiding in their own shadows, boxes with neither with the buds against the cotyledons, nor with Jussieu against Ma jambe bien faite My leg well formed, apparition, make the holy land visible to you, and are, so to speak, Braine-l'Alleud entrance that a passer-by was crushed by a cart, as is motion, his attitudes, his mysterious and rapid gestures, caused him contemplated these deeds without dizziness, he examined these personages presence: "To what was the editor of the _Courrier Français_ condemned?" be recognized by some emphasis in his speech. Frontispiece Volume Three Marius resumed:-- convent who was malicious; then Mother Sainte-Mechtilde (Mademoiselle of enthusiasm. for the gold medal, and which is called literature. Slang, whether the of the old man!" the death rattle in the depths of a tomb, the vague clamor of the battle "Well," resumed the nun, "now that you are happy, mind me, and do not that baldy. However, I criticise, but I do not insult. The universe is