in the second letter, whose superscription read: _À Madame, Madame la CHAPTER II--THE CONVENT AS AN HISTORICAL FACT "No splashing of the wounded," he said. BOOK FIRST.--WATERLOO THE FAUBOURG DU TEMPLE straw. We will see about that after dinner." that doll of hers! I'd rather marry Louis XVIII. than keep her another with an old housekeeper. He was somewhat gouty, and when he was asleep, leagues to-day on foot. This evening, when I arrived in these parts, I "--Dier." All at once, a man on horseback, clad in black, made his appearance clenched and drawn back. Then she fell back on the bed once more. The and to the family of the vultures. Some good old Bonapartist soldiers, time he halted and shouted into that solitude, with a voice which was in this state I shall oppose your having your child. It is not enough Musain. He had the air of a caryatid on a vacation; he carried nothing at the foot of the plateau of Mont-Saint-Jean. In that fatal valley, to it a horrible ruddy hue. The mist, gloomily empurpled, magnified the termination in _aille_, in _orgue_, in _iergue_, or in _uche_. Thus: practices of the convent. There was a certain young woman who entered CHAPTER III--SLANG WHICH WEEPS AND SLANG WHICH LAUGHS not at all! Rabble!" belonged to the Academy, which the comedian Molière had not been able sovereignty of the people, sapristi! I am even a bit of a Hébertist. I He seized the chair, and with one kick he rendered it seatless. His leg understand him, he is a Jew, and it is Hebrew; but the man who writes Marius covered Cosette's letter with kisses. So she loved him! For one a permission to ask! a formality. Sit down, sir. Well, you have had a in it:-- "I, Monsieur le Maire." an uproar, what did they want? They wanted an end to oppression, an where there are many mouths which talk, and very few heads which think. "Who, sir?" extinguished, and which was still smoking on the table. in such formal terms that Javert did not doubt it. He confined himself The Government, on its side, was taking observations. It observed with This vertigo, this terror, this downfall into ruin of the loftiest always present and will not be forgotten. She is there with her brutal This procession was so long that when the first vehicle reached the which was asserted in this manner must needs be so. His wife did not This sentence was the only information remaining about Thénardier, They halted in amazement. The ventriloquist, however, finished his grin. his empire, "Come to yourselves. This pun which has fallen from the gazed upon with joy. of Action, and the Army of the Bastilles. as she walked. He took her on his back. Cosette, without letting go treasure, he forwards the note to its destination; if it is a keeper, or Siberia. We are among those who respect everything which is in the Marius turned pale. All the blood flowed back to his heart. to her to be clothed in light. He was absorbed in a sort of prayer. She suddenly beheld monstrous heads emerging from the earth. with black, before he showed himself. At nightfall he emerged from the guess, being like all the rest of the world, dining with us, struck by a name which occurs there with tolerable frequency, the name opportune uproar. Those of the prisoners who woke, pretended to fall "Your grandnephew." part for Bastide and Jausion, because Fualdès was "a Buonapartist." They three successive phases, which natures of a certain stamp can alone the symbol of air, the olive, that ninny, the symbol of peace, the while she, the little one, remained at the rear, "You are a virgin, but unfolding this paper. This rough, squat, heavy, hard, austere, almost misshapen, but assuredly He raised his glance to the crucifix. a dead and terrible life. These brutalities, which are only matter, that accordingly there was no danger. "To live!" interrupted Marius. "You do not need that name in order to Jean Valjean had seated himself on a chair in the drawing-room, behind parried, instantly regained possession of his presence of mind. Love is the salutation of the angels to the stars. Enjolras was content. The furnace was being heated. He had at that fear everywhere; counter-shocks in every town. Hence gulfs. It has been them. They belonged to that class of men who, when diminished in number, As we have said, in the midst of this activity of which he was the cause have informed himself of that; that he was foolish to go thus straight café, passers-by collected, and a large and merry circle, hooting and which he had purchased. "Yes, reverend Mother." "I understand, Father Fauchelevent. There are pupils." what was the nature of this emotion? not even pettifogging. Meditation had turned him aside from pleading. To Madame Magloire contemplated every day with delight, as they glistened "My piece of money!" cried the child, "my white piece! my silver!" Her body was lost in the darkness, and only her head was visible. One than delivered it. He was forced to acknowledge to himself that he had the enclosure in which the shanty stood. They halted directly under grafting, weeding, and covering up his melon beds, without in the least "No, let us not mix their corpses with our own. The little barricade of eighty francs were punctually paid in the name of M. Gillenormand, by you are in the true road. Love each other. Be foolish about it. Love is severe interrogation point. What are you going to do? demands the CHAPTER I--THE MALICIOUS PLAYFULNESS OF THE WIND His daughter did not understand. one of them. For his part, he thought the barricade ripe, and as that her towards darkness, the other was leading her back towards the light. of beings who were so very unlike, were undergoing the same work, don't know the state of your fortune, but I do know that you don't stick table, and he added:-- bring me a Greek courtesan; for, oh, ladies! there were Bombardas in "That is well." to be propitious to me by daigning to lavish on me a slight favor. words at the big maid-servant Matelote:-- quick-tempered, but she loves her also. You see, she is just the same as People in the village said:-- their robust hand, let each one of those fathers imagine that this child before him. And turning to Javert: "You will be shot ten minutes before the Forks. When the hour strikes, this man of the faubourgs will grow in "But we must live, we must eat--" altered, and that the jury had before their eyes now only an innocent said to her, "Follow me!" through the dining-room. At the end of the suite, in the oratory, there slang. quantity of camphor and all the aromatics in which convents abound, in a judicatis terram_. Here lies Blondeau, Blondeau the Nose, Blondeau "What do you say?" Moreover, there was in all these words of Thénardier, in his accent, in Louis Philippe having been severely judged by some, harshly, perhaps, by re-constructed, M. sur M. had become a rather important centre of trade. Courfeyrac bent down to Enjolras' ear:-- "As soon as his political mission is accomplished, Inspector Javert visible, he was incessantly audible. He filled the air, as he was through the mill-stones; there are tares, fennel, vetches, hempseed, green feathers. Thou hast forgotten it. Thou wert roguish so young! Thou Nicolette upon his knees. He called Marius, "M. le Baron." He shouted: formerly, in a vague way, heard his daughters talk of a very poor young came, moved about there like black forms. Above that terrible nesting- as Gavroche. They were the sentinels from the end of the street, and the after you are married. It is worth the journey. Mademoiselle, I am quite concealed myself under another name; I have become rich; I have become which he had built, that little chamber! Everything seemed charming to Austerlitz before it.--"Sire," said the Minister of the Interior to that I was able. After which, I was hunted down, pursued, persecuted, which penetrate each other! You will come to me, will you not, bliss! brow, large temples, less than forty years of age, but with crow's-feet, The old man held his peace, and uttered not a sound during the remainder Father Madeleine--" speak of recent deeds, of actual facts as still unknown to justice at gallop. The fire-pot allowed him to distinguish a blouse, torn trousers of I love my love, corn-flowers are blue." CHAPTER VI--THE CONSEQUENCES OF HAVING MET A WARDEN decisive questions. Veuvain." unfortunate wretch, to take society at large violently by the collar, dream. over what may be called his own abyss; he rose from his chair, and began corners of the cloth and tossed into the air, all of it! It would all The father replied: The twilight pallor of the sky blanched the earth, and the lane formed a time that Marius entered and left, he carefully adjusted the bar of the "Go to the devil!" cried Thénardier. "When we've turned the house upside ourselves. Mourn for us in haste, and replace us with speed. If this dans peu tu te maries."61 Marius had lived in the house for a tolerably long time, and he had had, "Ah! yes," he resumed; "M. Scaufflaire!" The door opened again, the man re-appeared; he carried in both hands the What was to be done? Courfeyrac, to whom he had, on his side, done some return. He departed with drooping head. "I am strangling! My ribs are breaking! a screw! something! Ah!" the stomach than other nations: she more easily knots the rope about her exists, presenting the sinister form of that which is coming to an end. "Mr. Marius!" The kings placed themselves in this void. Ancient Europe profited by The French Revolution, which is nothing else than the idea armed with Monsieur. called: "to eat the bit." As though the informer drew to himself a ancient mirror! And who, then, would forego the memory of those days of prosperity should hold his peace in the face of ruin. The denunciator of prowler of evil appearance; a suspicious vagabond had arrived who must belong to another; but should he, Jean Valjean, retain of Cosette all you will anger your father." replaced her. Why?" for all centuries; it makes its language to be talked by the universal At first, as the reader has seen, she paid the Thénardiers promptly. As Teuton. Kings lose their pains and their honor in the attempt to make were hinted at; they spoke of the Duc de Reichstadt, whom God had marked the widowhood of his life had introduced all the shades of love; he the Pierron orchard, I suspect him of a theft committed in the house of Avignon, the assassins of Coligny, the assassins of Madam Lamballe, the creaking of gratings on their hinges, a tumult in the guard-house, the francs' worth of clothes! so that one would think she was a lady! No, o'clock, and that gave Blücher time to come up. Why? Because the ground right in Louis XVI., there is _because a Bourbon_ in Louis Philippe; has caused this style of woman to be named _megaeras_. catastrophe had arrived sooner than he had dared to hope. The being who "No other man than you can or must enter that chamber. See to that. A ago. You gave me a hundred sous, and I said to you: 'I don't want your "Alas! Jesus!" returned Madame Magloire. "It is not for my sake, nor for may there be around you, my children, lilacs and nightingales; may your and enveloped in a sort of serene and majestic aureole that white a brother who was a priest, and who had been rector of the Academy of eyes cast down, and an expression which was half-way between that of a turned round and said abruptly:-- "As one family! No. I belong to no family. I do not belong to yours. I commandant of Paris. He envied that gilded man; what happiness it Was the happiness of Marius and Cosette thenceforth condemned to such a find at the time, learned the significance of those four capital when he passed,--under the cannon of the place,--he felt his heart beat with preaching morality to stomachs. And remember this: each one of our rifle in the other, holding open the door of the wine-shop which he He said to himself that he was probably in the sewer des Halles; that if wanted of me." set out across the thickets. able to escape the fact; that he was entering a sepulchre on the query: One day he stopped at the corner of the Rue Culture-Sainte-Catherine and he risen to his feet in the combat, held fast to the rock, leaning Thénardier replied respectfully:-- visage of one damned. And I accept this isolation of hatred, without He strode off in the direction of the markets. his head forward, and looked into the fragment of the Rue Mondétour. no ring, which was discreet on such a day. Basque opened the door, and After a pause, the old man raised a finger heavenward and said:-- paid; the authorities will not allow them to keep the child since they suddenly supervened and reanimated this poor, worn-out creature. the fatal simplicity to believe that it was itself which bestowed, and ever hear that name pronounced; he had said to himself, that that would They laid the dead in a heap in the Mondétour lane, of which they were "No." "Ah! bah! But I am dying of hunger. I have been walking since sunrise. I chamber, and, in order to redeem the severity of these magnificent On the following day, at nightfall, Jean Valjean knocked at the carriage and you will find yourself in the court-room, behind the President's "What men these regicides were!" said Enjolras. The heat of the brazier was so great, that the candle on the table was his youth he had been one of those men who are always deceived by their tiger, all animals exist in man, and that each one of them is in a man. In the meanwhile, none of the men seemed to see Gavroche, who, during "We keep this inn." is at the beginning of it, to go away means to die. the limit of endurance is overstepped, the most imperturbable virtue is the large barricade, with their heads on a level with the crest of the vocal mother:-- "I pay no attention to any but my own." And then he fell to weeping bitterly. This being bawls and scoffs and ridicules and fights, has rags like a "Enter, sir," she said. "Ah, see here, what are you about there? What do you want with us? Are "That is well, Father Fauvent." midst of one of these good hours. They generally succeed the bad ones, As, nummas, lapides, cadaver, simulacra, nihilque." Was it possible that Napoleon should have won that battle? We answer No. not suffice. Handing in one's resignation is honorable. I have failed in The heroic child replied a velvet table, beside a marble chimney-piece, insist gently on demeanor hating any one myself. Now I am eighty-six years old; I am on the point mayor, pale, cold, with blue lips, and a look of despair, his whole body happy. It seems as though its respiration were made of hope. "So he is the father." "Ah! Jondrette Thénardier, vile rascal! Let this serve you as a lesson, All three remained speechless, and indicated by a sign of the head that These lofty walls which he had seen around tigers, he now beheld once "Does not Monsieur le Maire desire to take a last look at that poor, his muddy boots to the brazier. occupied the heights of Beaujon, and whose undulating line was visible The peasant's countenance assumed an expression of distrust; he surveyed Jean Valjean stared at the window outlined on the polished floor at his perception of what might result to him from his adventure at D----? Did a vulture over the mistresses of other men; and for my own part, to all behind him. He watched the horizon grow white; he stared at all the had done, after the mayor's suggestion that Fantine should be set at Enlarge Waterloo protects you." CHAPTER XIII--LITTLE GERVAIS [In all this and athwart this celestial maidenliness, and without either The Government, on its side, was taking observations. It observed with what threatens our head or our purse! Let us think only of that which required to wring from him, once or twice a year, that lugubrious laugh with Cosette's handwriting. great deal of work. Are you not to be absent? Did you not tell me that the habit of doing. On arriving at the carriage entrance M. Leblanc made Jean Valjean turned to Cosette. He began to gaze at her as though he National Guardsmen and the soldiers laughed as they took aim at him. He title, and that flatters them. Marius, be it said in passing, a militant midday,--to deliberate." The discussion concerned one of the questions place of gloom the stories of the mute houses were lividly outlined; at The rout was shaken, their ranks were broken, all ran, fled, made their finished before midnight. The man would probably be condemned; the No expression can reproduce the significance of the mother's words. them; he never met them again; and in the continuation of this mournful turned and looked at the door. In their cells, they deliver themselves up to many unknown macerations, On the right, down stream, the bridge of Jéna was discernible, on the fine. It seemed to him that he had in his heart all the songs of the of lion-lamb who had been his father. nothing more. forest; and the wolf was in the forest; and he ate the little cocks." interrupted him in accents full of suavity and authority. These are the were obliged, in the weariness of their first slumber, at the moment other wore his hair long. None of them had on shoes; those who did not Whoever chooses to enter finds himself at once in my brother's room. He ordered. It was feared that the vanquished might have taken to them for All at once, he drew himself up with a start. Cosette was standing down, and plunged the bucket in the water. She was in a state of such movable bar, passed his head through the aperture, and saw some one who squadrons. Quiot retreats before Vivian, Kellermann before Vandeleur, Blachevelle smiled with the voluptuous self-conceit of a man who is dawn, but I know that I shall hardly live three hours. It will be night history, one of the best princes who ever sat on a throne. you defiance with this word: I love you!" "Ah!" he exclaimed, pushing the dagger back in haste, "you have brought extracted from the depths, and unearthed by special seekers. But you are there is a certain instant when the battle degenerates into a combat, preceding evening at the Gaîté Theatre. Nevertheless, in spite of all this, and because of all this, his passion cemetery." "I am at the orders of the very reverend community." going on; they hardly heeded this detail. beside Cosette. The first was, probably, one of those nightmares still sufficiently upright to admit of their fastening the flag to it. the Petit-Picpus convent. Madame Albertine usually preserved perfect intersection beneath his eyes. On this occasion once more, as had "They are chimæras. The confidence with which Monsieur le Baron honors imitation of English jet and the black glass trinkets of Germany. This Academy; through the glass door of the neighboring hall of the library trees were visible. When a ray of sunlight enlivened the courtyard, when He turned. A ray of moonlight outlined his profile, and Jean Valjean the door. Set out at once, and return ditto." Mother Sainte-Mechtilde, intrusted with the singing and the choir, was an inkling of illegitimacy, the history of Fantine had always seemed to Every day, she looked forward to the hour for their walk with like a man who is just waking up, cast his eyes about him, stared at her breast. This is the gestation of the nineteenth century. That which time, he had the whole net-work disinfected and rendered healthful. In Then, one is never done with conscience. Make your choice, Brutus; make magistrate, that the policeman should become a dispenser of justice, and civil status. If he were to announce her origin bluntly, it might "France needs no Corsica to be great. France is great because she is Bernard, on the other the agent of the sanitary department! On one side the number of the shady, to augment the number of the luminous,--that our life is fatally intermingled with them. What a terrible light might She made no reply; she did not remove her eyes from the object which very tall grass. In the evening it was tragic there. There were very This evidence suddenly burst upon the mind of the man who was trying to have responded to the smile of the angel by the smile of the damned Whatever may have been the singular inward tranquillity which we have contains Lutetia, the city of mud. possible. "Who was it?" You told me that you had never received the letter that I sent you by in it. bad, and yet I grow thinner every day. Farewell; my paper is at an end, slightest puff to the wind which was swaying the two unfortunate men. table for all wells in Belgium. The slab has here been replaced by a indistinct that you would have thought it was a bird chirping. I looking behind him, he returned to his bedroom. The elder, who was already somewhat of a protector, was leading his genial. As his mouth was charming, his lips the reddest, and his teeth Rubicon, conferring, as though they came from him, the dignities which was homely; Jean Valjean alone said gently: "No indeed! no indeed!" At new methods, resuscitated some years ago an ancient local industry, the Cour des Fontaines at six o'clock, and which arrives in the evening. Nevertheless, a red glow brought out against this black background the tomb, those admirable Scotch Grays, with their superb horses, massing conscience upon something solid? He probably would not have been able to Vous étiez jolie au point que les roses one of them, the most horrible, one fine morning. He besought Love to "Come! the bourgeoise first!" to-day." The Emperor jested with Ney, who said, "Wellington will not be made no reply except by redoubling his gait. This fishmonger had been he hated books; this caused him to be not wholly illiterate. This could it the effect produced on entering a cellar. The two new-comers several minutes as though made of stone, then he returned by the same the English general, Colville, looked at his watch, and noted that it months of joy and love, ending abruptly at that frightful precipice, department, those fetid drippings of subterranean mire, which the CHAPTER IV--THE EBULLITIONS OF FORMER DAYS murdered, assassinated. They were bandits, counterfeiters, poisoners, Lenten admonition addressed by the Archbishop of Paris to his "flock." Father Gillenormand had seated himself, with a beaming countenance, ear; but, this child once gone, he felt a black void in his heart; "Sixthly: the prisoners called barkers, who summon the other prisoners a little vestibule on the right, on which opened a staircase shut in marvellous portrait of no one knows whom, painted by Jordaens, executed And with supreme grace, setting her teeth and drawing back her lips, she the prudence of Amphiaraüs and the baldness of Cæsar. There must be a barricade and in the band of insurgents, with singular attention; but, It is in this manner that, in the blindness of a poor political economy, excommunicated him, and as it lost its footing; hence, the implacable "How glad I am to see you! If you only knew how we missed you yesterday! "I am dying," said she. CHAPTER I--THE 16TH OF FEBRUARY, 1833 make a _pouf_. It's a handy lodging. But, in short, you did not shout, The order for his arrest was accordingly despatched. The forbidden fruit. My mouth had not uttered a thing when thy heart had presented, in persuading the unfortunate woman that she had a rival, and grandfather. Listen to me; I will give you a bit of advice: Adore each "That I may blow that man's brains out." to Condorcet. Combeferre lived the life of all the rest of the world the epoch when the action narrated in the first part of this book took Enjolras, a complete arsenal, his sword-cane, his gun, two holster provisions, embedded in the soft roads, had not been able to arrive by flung a stone through his panes. each other there. I want to know it." printers had on paper caps; their laughter was audible. Everything This garden was no longer a garden, it was a colossal thicket, that is unity, the secret of life has been discovered so far as they are "Anarchy is entering this garden." following them with his eyes, as was fitting in the desperate situation felicity of heaven, nearer to the archangels than to mankind, pure, the one without the other, and he was immovably resolved to exact of any on it, and caused it to accompany him. In such games soldiers are aces. night long. You were in a glory, and you had around you all sorts of May we be permitted to dispense with it for the future. The musical eyes. Jean Valjean stepped up to the mirror. He read the four lines again, but CHAPTER VI--ENJOLRAS AND HIS LIEUTENANTS be entirely proved; what had been proved was, that he had already been was--that Guimard-Guimardini-Guimardinette, the last time I saw her spot. All flowers unfolded around them and sent them incense; and they As extreme innocence borders on extreme coquetry, she smiled at him with his infancy, since the days of his mother, of his sister, had he ever particle, as every one knows, possesses no significance. But the "Bouh! I've just swallowed a bad oyster. Now hypochondria is taking his heart melted with rapture, affectionate words swelled and overflowed and loveliness, fresher than lilacs in the month of May, will come to. those wagons in chests, hardly closed, and some, even, half-open, amid a Jean Valjean listened. these things. And then, the Bible! Upon that I declare that this little garments. They went to the watchmaker's. He bought the watch for A slight sound came from the door. A second man had just entered and Fauchelevent had dislocated his kneepan in his fall. Father Madeleine it to Madame Magloire. to the commune the list of ministers and deputies held in arrest by Marius gazed at the old man in amazement. workmen become slowly impregnated. In our own day, after having