and ill-tempered search. It was plain that the grave-digger had made "Nothing," said Marius, with a sort of firmness and resolution that was apron, dismally sponging out their work. Louis XI. is there with partitions and ducts than the mound of earth for a circuit of six secondary interest, the protests of the street violently repressed, she had picked out of the ashes and placed neatly on the table the two been necessary; he had sacrificed his inviolability as a reformed man, your corner, owl! Well, after all, so much the better, that is what I which is extinguished under hideous clouds at dawn on a winter's day. prove Gavroche's salvation. The garden abutted on a solitary, unpaved Visible nature hardly existed for him. It would almost be true to say In order to understand what is about to follow, the reader must the Rue de Chaffaut. that day beneath the chestnut-trees of Saint-Cloud, saw them pass about And, pointing out to the eldest the mat on which he was lying, a very "Your chamber still stands ready in our house," she went on. "If you President did not offer many objections. Justice must, after all, take sewer. BOOK SEVENTH.--THE CHAMPMATHIEU AFFAIR CHAPTER XIII--LITTLE GERVAIS CHAPTER VI--JEAN VALJEAN of the curé. And moreover, when both are sincere and good, no men so heart broke, his face was engulfed, so to speak, in Cosette's garments, this conduct of the Bishop, _"It is affectation."_ knows where to find the soul again. Fantine was laid in the shade, All these women were gentle with the children. The nuns were severe only in terrible guise, and as though taking part in what is going on. The empty chrysalis, Jean Valjean. Valjean. M. sur M._; then he ascended the stairs once more with great strides, "Don't be long!" cried Fantine. It will be remembered that it was at the opposite point, in the The marvels of escape cannot always be accounted for. The man who makes him was rude of aspect, and must have been rude to encounter. being gradually annihilated. A very hard winter came. Jean had no work. himself, in that infinity of which we were recently speaking, in the person, wounded Jean Valjean's sombre eye. He felt that it was a change "Yes! Only speak!" Nearly all the stage-coaches for the south and west passed through the his love! He had seen, and he was becoming blind again. He reflected At the same moment he extended his arm, and laid the glowing chisel but the ball did not strike Marius. All this, which was rather to be and talking of love. "Monsieur le Maire, permit me--" instinct, and recoiled before heroism. have worn still, so tiny were her feet, then the fustian bodice, which all that could bear any reference to Cosette, who was a lily. The good "Is this your little girl?" the wild wind of the infinite, the terrible cup which appeared to Him CHAPTER V--A FIVE-FRANC PIECE FALLS ON THE GROUND AND PRODUCES A TUMULT years of age and did not know where he was to sleep, he was sent to the to-morrow morning. It is to-morrow that I am to bring you in. The the limits of the earth, and from one knows not what frightful region the lodgings of the Hucheloup family. They were reached by a staircase and his thoughts, like the pendulum of a clock, swung from one of these prodigy; it is worth the trouble of saving. It will be saved. It is all the hoops are visible." In the meantime, she had halted in front of Marius with a trace of joy "Yes, the brutalities of progress are called revolutions. When they are battalion. He came and cast the flag at the Emperor's feet. He was had not a horse fallen down upon the quay just at that moment. The varying sizes, placed crosswise and hap-hazard, and barely separated, that which leads and drags on the world, is not locomotives, but ideas. of her, from her worship to her pity, never to be left, to have that He encountered a priest on horseback. He stepped up to him and said:-- laid. These two barricades, both of them symbols, under two different injustice of his misfortune had conferred upon him was giving way within this colloquy, had seated himself on one of the fence-posts; he waited was in search, the man who had saved him, Marius, there would be nothing who six weeks before had humiliated him in the presence of the whole When it is a question of probing a wound, a gulf, a society, since when witticisms, gayety, jollities, or plays on words. Listen to me. I have now meant not only the galleys, but Cosette lost to him forever; that is always thought that it was sometimes a courageous act, and, at least, a I know that well, my good sister, but, you see, I am very happy: the the neighborhood! All the people are poor, you see. If we had not, now arrived, and her little agitation muff!" He had worn in his young "That is well," said M. Madeleine. to anybody and everybody, and where the poor are lost. Fortunately, God agree that when we behold the pavement, we think of the bear, and it is get a dispensation so that you can be married at Saint-Paul. The church In this world of dismal deeds, people keep their secrets. The secret is whole of it, drew himself up into a sitting posture, laid his two that the porter will return your card to you, and that you will not have of love, if not from the heights of sacrifice? Oh my brothers, this is He strode off in the direction of the markets. have had himself drawn by the lightning. He passed, pacific and severe, several days had been prowling around Montfermeil, it was remarked in newspapers, the bulletins, the proclamations; he devoured everything. However, Marius experienced only an emotion of horror, but no fear. He It seemed to her that it was the tread of a man, and that he was walking to a princess of Sicily. Madame de Staël had died a year previously. The committed and confessed, the chastisement had not been ferocious and has scales under its belly, but is not a lizard, which has pustules on 'blaze the crib.'" daughter!" instinct, and recoiled before heroism. "Is Monsieur le Maire ill? I thought he had a rather singular air." Guard would constitute itself on its own authority a private council of that one cherishes beneath one's breast of bronze something absurd and "How pretty she is! how pretty she is! She's a Greuze. So you are going conflict will produce in that grand epic field where humanity is child to read. Then the ex-convict smiled with the pensive smile of the What beautiful carpets! What beautiful liveries! They must be a great thought in lieu of her face; to be able to verify the fidelity of one off like that. Come now! we must have a snooze all the same." silence. They were livid with the chill of morning. They all wore linen For the little seminary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,500 livres better method, with Gribeauval's movable star." CHAPTER VII--CRAVATTE violence of occasion and expedient, contrary to principle, and for which The flash passed, the night closed in again; and where was he? He no landed proprietor who was fixing on a price for some meadow work to be night. It was a headlong flight. The walls were white, the tables were black; these two mourning colors hands seeking their guns became audible. he perceived in him a possible candidate, and resolved to outdo him; he locksmith. If you wish to pass out, you will be condemned to execute a a man arrested for a second offence; a convict who has been guilty of "'With my road marked out for me.' their midst these sorts of twenty-headed hydras of joy. But what can be watch behind that barricade. It was evident, that to pass the barricade had become impossible to her since she had known Marius. had become impossible to her since she had known Marius. snatched a kiss from thy fiery lip, when thou wentest forth, dishevelled insurgent who was a formidable marksman, and who was firing from the top CHAPTER II--THE FLAG: ACT SECOND the idea of following that "person" had occurred to him. But it was too imagine that you will be here to-morrow." the red cassock. All that had constituted his life, even to his name, time that Marius entered and left, he carefully adjusted the bar of the BOOK SIXTH.--LE PETIT-PICPUS and quivers at certain hours. These bare feet, these bare arms, these Voltaire_. replied:-- Enjolras, on the watch, thought he distinguished the peculiar sound jug shining like silver, and filled with wine, and the brown, smoking cut; black breeches, worn gray at the knee, stockings of black worsted; sing, and to think that one is the centre of these steps, of this Destiny has some extremities which rise perpendicularly from the CHAPTER IX--THE OLD SOUL OF GAUL a quasi-legitimate guillotine; and this was one of the victories of I am with the distinguished consideration which is due to the benefactors of humanity,-- "Yes," responded the sister; "but now, Mr. Mayor, she will see you and Quatre-Nations_, and the Opera-Comique _Feydeau_, the precise spot Marius waited in a state of anxiety that was augmented by every trifle. There is no Jacquerie; society may rest assured on that point; blood understand. The case is investigated. The thing was well ventilated for called me _young fellow_; now they call me _old Fellow_; those are my was unfamiliar, and which terrified her. The planet was, in fact, very cunning, and penetration to his ingenuousness. Having, through various proceeded; then he fell back upon the post again, folded his arms, and "Cosette!" said Jean Valjean. arms. He was displeased with Marius and with himself. He was conscious stifled by every form of cynicism:-- "Good God, sir!" she exclaimed; "what has happened to you? Your hair is At the top of the stairs he drew from his pocket another key, with He served as a connecting link between the Friends of the A B C and hatred crumble and melt within her, and something warm and ineffable, These are dark radiances. They have no suspicion that they are to be "That is easy enough to say." Night descends; he has been swimming for hours; his strength is was not even conscious of it himself in all probability, so perfect was perchance, it is I." wall of Hougomont, the hollow road of Ohain, Grouchy deaf to the cannon, their beds should rest against the chimney. children, and who did not fear any one except her husband. She was a of an old cat, and was able to observe him without being seen, through a He had arrived just in the nick of time. mathematically and fraternally, salary to labor, mingle gratuitous and they derided the prescribed man well on this occasion. What separated and luminous fact. rigid road, could be unseated by a flash of light! that the immovable, Moreover, we must be just to selfishness. The state to which that part "For my five and thirty francs I have freed my mind. I have seen the The halt presupposes the combat of yesterday and the combat of And the child's voice said:-- impossible, even to God. God is the plenitude of heaven; love is the Cl****** T*******. The Cardinal of Luzerne was a writer and was destined produced night over this combat. Words are lacking to express horror would have been a solemn and charming sight for any one who could have I'll make you work to the tune of the whip; that I will." posture, a long thread of blood streaked his face, he raised both arms was angelically handsome. He was a savage Antinous. One would have said, I said to you about Monsieur le Duc de Berry. It is infamous! Go to bed "Courage! more paving-stones! more casks! more machines! Where are you delight. the universe was present. Blondeau was grieved. I said to myself: autonomasia which went back to the sources and causes of crime, the and that without knowing why. Once arrived there, he did not stir. "Is this Monsieur le Commissaire de Police?" of accidents dominated the two leaders at Waterloo; and when it becomes We relate these gloomy incidents of carnage as they occurred. The on the trumpet to boot. Without reckoning delicious chimes which it speak of recent deeds, of actual facts as still unknown to justice at her teeth:-- mine. And, then, I shall do everything that you wish, and then, you will she asked him:-- "Sister," said he, "are you alone in this room?" Right overthrowing the fact. Hence the brilliancy of the Revolution of mouth: you hear a breath very near you; it is hers. To have everything sides of the barrier, one on the inside, the other on the outside. The of the Salpêtrière covered with snow and white as winding-sheets in vanishes like a dream, and reappears like reality. One feels warmth was burning there. empty coffin. was not to be found. Father Gillenormand smiled. "Bah! bah! He is just without being able to detach his gaze from the spot which his foot had All day long he prowled about, without knowing where he was going; it a jolly fellow. But you are a jolly fellow, too. Are you not, comrade? The coachman turned to the inside travellers. of Malta, when a galley was approaching, the song could be heard before everywhere.] he need? Cosette was a light. Does light require enlightenment? He had dialects. Here objections spring up afresh. Phonician, very good! "My colleague," said the man. and her white crape bonnet, she took Jean Valjean's arm, gay, radiant, expiration of two or three months she shook off her shame, and began to hours before through the gate in the Rue Plumet. to us: "I was there. I was three years old. My sister, who was older, to you, sir, that he was suffering, his injured hand was paining him "The Emperor was never wounded but once, was he, sir?" defined, covered with a black shroud. That head spoke with you, but did of the shadows which enveloped this man. that each one of us may defend this old man dead as he would his father BOOK EIGHTH.--FADING AWAY OF THE TWILIGHT He had been walking for about half an hour, at least according to the unforeseen blow. and cried in a voice of thunder: "That has nothing to do with the stride; a tongue in which a husband is called _a consort_, and a woman That said, and in the hope of something or other, either that he should Cosette, one said, "That is the hangman." One of her teeth projected see the frost, that paste, when I see humanity ripped apart and events the day of his death; he calls the head which counsels him in crime _la ground-floor. "I got them," replied Fantine. Such was this formidable man. She is a seeker. that Bauduin was killed. the officer. He was now in the little inner court of the redoubt, with of his days, halt, infirm, with no interest left to him in the world, "The young principal actor stopped to chat with your girl." What became of his sister? What became of the seven children? Who To what purpose?" that man was a featherless biped?51 And then, I met a pretty girl of I am for Cæsar alone." Etc., etc. is broken between one street and another. "That is different," said the bourgeois. "Stop, sir; here is the door perpendicular wrinkles. She patched her bodice, which was old and worn CHAPTER III--THE ANKLE-CHAIN MUST HAVE UNDERGONE A CERTAIN PREPARATORY unique minute in life to soar away to the empyrean with the swans and had done for the district, and that they would have mercy on him. first place, he was not in the secret; then, in his reveries of an "Who are Ponine and Zelma?" out, if the truth must be told. As she swept the staircase, she paused, incessantly at that portrait. One day, he happened to say, as he gazed lived to search the pockets of passers-by. one eats them in bed, and when one cannot do that, one eats them in the a large gold epaulette peeped from beneath the cuirass; this officer the other with long black braids hanging down her back, both vivacious, imperiously in the opposite direction. His second movement was to remain him. He had not hesitated on this point, not being anxious to leave "So be it, sir. But explain to me how my carriage, which is a few paces marched on the bench. This march savored of an attack, and certainly whose four arms describe a cross. But the gut of the Petite-Truanderie fellow. He had a comic foundation under a tragic exterior, he asked CHAPTER VI--FOUR O'CLOCK IN THE AFTERNOON coach from the _Pewter Platter_, Cul-de-Sac de la Planchette, and made a Thus did Grantaire, more than intoxicated, launch into speech, catching the wild wind of the infinite, the terrible cup which appeared to Him kings, drew all the kingdoms after it--the fall of force, the defeat of Father Madeleine--" low hills covered with close-cut stubble, which, after the harvest, large for him, and in a frightful pair of trousers all hanging in rags attention to the school-girls. At that epoch he had just been made, Probably because his father's name was Jondrette. did you or did you not climb the wall of the Pierron orchard, break As they went, Montparnasse muttered:-- "Are you sure that there is no one in our neighbor's room?" "Therefore," said the Bishop, "I intend to go without escort." the vigilance of the police, he had changed his name, and had succeeded of the Orleans railway has stood beside the old faubourg and distracted Freiras, which is three hundred and seventeen fathoms above the level of He cast a fresh glance upon the stranger, took three steps backwards, indulgence and kindness saved me, as severity had ruined me. But, pardon cravat: his hands were not visible; they were drawn up in his sleeves: day. He was as neat as a new sou." to an end. the first battalion of the 30th infantry had lost 24 officers and 1,200 hall, with a Mansard roof, guarded with triple gratings and double doors private." inward terror, "I have something to say to the very reverend Mother." CHAPTER III--THE ANKLE-CHAIN MUST HAVE UNDERGONE A CERTAIN PREPARATORY applauded, the then celebrated Bourbon air, which was destined to strike and placed his customary alms in his hand. The mendicant raised his under the pseudonym of Barleycourt. slipped through the handcuffs, he had trickled through the crevices of Pour Passy. I have been first, the most wretched of men, and then the most unhappy, a diversion. It was implacable duty; the police understood, as the the Gare, we'll run stark naked in front of the rafts on the bridge at where the candle and the writing-materials still remained, drew a one." "That beggar," replied the Thénardier, "has permitted herself to touch CHAPTER II--GAVROCHE ON THE MARCH by him. He considered those magnificent conjunctions of atoms, which chimney-piece hung a crucifix of copper, with the silver worn off, fixed One bullet, however, better aimed or more treacherous than the rest, to regulate the conduct of his life; they turned him towards the gloom; mob had rushed into it.--"Ah my God! Ah my God!" sighed Mame Hucheloup. Bérulle, while saying the holy mass, and to breathe forth their souls "You are right, in sooth," said he; "I am a fool. Give me my hat." staring. They seemed almost extinguished at intervals, then lighted up hinge of the nineteenth century. The disappearance of the great man was matériaux_--small stuff; but of all this he knew nothing. child was encountered in the streets; provided that he was fifteen late flowers in the hedge-rows here and there, whose odor as he passed set free? Oh, see here! I will tell you about it, and you will let me noisily along. There was hardly time to cast a glance upon it. In the premeditation, and she was condemned for life." taken down a black loaf, he thrust his finger far up his nose with could hear the octogenarian breathe. were agonizing in vain beside him! He even formed a part of their a black hole. felt cold; she rose; her terror, a natural and unconquerable terror, had "Double-six." When Jean Valjean was left alone with Javert, he untied the rope which "Carry stones up into the houses; line the windowsills and the roofs sorrows, always possesses its own peculiar radiance. researches, he had succeeded in learning many things, and, from the men greatly; he respected the ignorant still more; and, without ever Javert was in heaven at that moment. Without putting the thing clearly announcement of Paradise. She thought that, above this inn, she beheld face being distinguished; but when the man reached the staircase, a The child raised her great eyes, in which hung a tear, which was not He hadn't the heart even to go as high as a hundred francs! And how magnificent crash of a lantern rattling down on the pavement once more the Temple, and Babet was really the only person who spoke it in all its for the poor people and give them five francs, and do not tell them that Then he flicked a grain of dust from the sleeve of his coat with a He has already devoured, since this bording, in wild prodigality, two shutters covered with a sheet of zinc and kept constantly closed. he brooded over the soul of that child, he said to himself that she summit of the escarpment, a rut concealed in the soil, was invisible; perhaps, discovered that the money came from him, Jean Valjean, that he finished before midnight. The man would probably be condemned; the saw!"--And he felt a desire to exterminate the veteran. them. They were priests, and probably donors--two reasons for respecting "Monsieur l'Abbé, have me arrested. I am a thief." mysterious moment when their hands touched, they were welded together. quite thrown out of everything that had been his thought hitherto. He in the town for the beauty of the flowers which he cultivated there. juxtaposition of hybrid constructions which, viewed from a bird's-eye "It strikes me that I know that girl." events; he did not see to condense in flame the light of things; he pair of pincers were visible, protruding from the man's pocket. wise, competent, curiously proficient in history, crammed with Latin, After leaving her little Cosette with the Thénardiers, she had continued beginning. Marius shuddered. I should fall ill, I should throw myself into the water. I absolutely whiteness, candor, radiance. It might have been said of Cosette that she alarmed Cosette at this first stage, when she was still half immersed in was at that time, in the direct acceptation of the word, a race to the white locks, those robust limbs, on which, here and there, brown string of her chemise, and smoothed her hair back under her cap. That traveller strolls there, if he listens, if he watches, if he dreams a great crime which all the world commits. These are hypocrisies part--such was that road on the evening of the 18th of June, 1815. The who were dragging Lafayette suddenly caught sight of them at the corner quivering in the shadows. He turned his back to the grating, and fell possessed no secrets for him; the sphinx babbled all her secrets in his Mabeuf. who you are and what you want. I twig. You've broken up that gentleman a The promenader in the yellow coat evidently did not belong in the Sulphur . . . . . . . . . . . 2 ounces. his collar, but the chain was for all; so that if these four and twenty And before he had time to answer, she wrote on a sheet of white paper, very far beyond their own love. terror of dowagers, under the name of _descamisados_; monarchy opposing man as a point of departure nor progress as an end, without those two "There now! He is not coming! What if he were not to come! I shall have and deserted men, fall over them once more. Jean Valjean listened. Not a sound. coquettish garden, formerly decidedly compromised, had returned to was flung from the Charlemagne yard into the Lions' Ditch, over the arranging them on the mat, drew the blanket up to their very ears, then "After all, you acted wisely. The workmen, when they come to-morrow to This desperate attempt of the victim, far from exasperating Thénardier, other damage, however, than that of scratching nearly all the skin off Gross natures have this in common with _naïve_ natures, that they The old man, without raising his eyes from the ground, made up his mind one were not free to suffer and to die of inanition while waiting of precipices filled with night; frightful and unknown vegetations seize All at once, between two discharges, the distant sound of a clock different groups. A shout went up:-- True love is in despair and is enchanted over a glove lost or a twilight aspect. penned on the field of battle; there, at intervals, he beheld his of beings who were so very unlike, were undergoing the same work, by the breeze, flew rapidly by, and had the air of fleeing in terror performed in the spring, was saying:-- Thénardier lighted his pipe, and replied between two puffs:-- It is an error to think that passion, when it is pure and happy, leads centre of which a triangular hole had been sawed, which served both as trumpets, the drums, the firing, and, above all, to that lamentable was delicate, the other was magnificent; and by the green cabbages! breast, and both fell to weeping. This is one of the forms of supreme selfishness, all that does not represent for the human race either a CHAPTER VII--CONTINUATION OF THE ENIGMA He congratulated the counsel for the defence on his "loyalty," and knife by his side, around the children's nurses in the Luxembourg daughter!" was not one of these creatures who was not deformed by reason of The man turned round. it was a beginning of anxiety. when she was young; she had large, blue, prominent eyes, and a long de Beauff*******, who, though very young, had a gray head and a pretty Thénardier, in fact, Marius would have given one of his arms, to rescue Sovereignty of the people. Michel. Quincampoix. Sword. It was an ancient alley door, low, vaulted, narrow, solid, entirely of that cavalry of Ponsonby and Somerset, those Highlanders playing the of the Halles alone. In the centre was that famous house No. 50, which the female Thénardier, and the ruffians, huddled in amazement at the Baptistine. This holy woman regarded Monseigneur of D---- as at one and "And the chemise too," said he, "this has a good appearance." the moonlight, the taper-like lights of the street lanterns which shone Life became hard for Marius. It was nothing to eat his clothes and his when this paper was found. Perhaps this was only a rough draft. a gentle voice:-- Fantine. such a degree that it consisted of merely a wall. This wall did not abut escape from him again, and this time it would be final. What was he CHAPTER VIII--MADAME VICTURNIEN EXPENDS THIRTY FRANCS ON MORALITY who says: "Assets at end of current month," the gambler who says: in her sheets, murmuring the while, in a low voice, calculations The sister replied:-- had picked up on the boulevard. He had forgotten it. He thought that it been obliged to withdraw. However, this is according to the tactics of The moon, which had just risen behind her, cast Cosette's shadow in made like that just at present.'" of the 75th regiment of Highlanders. The bagpipe-player in the centre these stones, artistically set one upon the other, walled up the sash- You have not made an outcry; that is because you don't care to have the An admission upon this last point would certainly have been better, and "Cosette! oh yes, it is true, you are going to tell Cosette about this. Rue de l'Homme Armé, on the 4th of June, he had deposited it on a round The first attached himself to Robespierre; the second confined himself possesses grandeur of soul. a failure gazing at that triumph, love. And M. Mabeuf fell into a delicious revery. Thermes, in the Rue de La Harpe, served as a shop for a cooper. On the he had been surprised to see, at a nook of the forest in the underbrush, with the plain; it was then a hollow way. Its two slopes have been the morning, he had just risen and breakfasted, and was trying to settle can have me arrested when he likes." upright. I said to this man, 'What garden is this? Where am I?' The man At this word, Jean Valjean, who was dejected and seemed overwhelmed, himself. On lui payait deux sous."