LES MISÉRABLES
BY VICTOR HUGO
PART PREMIER
FANTINE
AUTHORIZED TRANSLATION BY SIR LASCELLES WRAXALL.
_BOSTON:_
LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY.
1887
[Illustration: VICTOR HUGO (1828)]
PUBLISHERS' PREFACE.
The present edition of "LES MISÉRABLES," in five volumes, has been made
with the special object of supplying the work in a proper form for
library use, embodying the two great requisites, clear type and handy
size. It is in the main a reprint of the English translation, in three
volumes, by Sir Lascelles Wraxall, which was made with the sanction
and advice of the author. Chapters and passages omitted in the English
edition have been specially translated for the present issue; numerous
errors of the press, etc., have been corrected; and the author's own
arrangement of the work in five parts, and his subdivisions into books
and chapters, have been restored.
BOSTON, _Sept_. 1, 1887.
PREFACE
So long as, by the effect of laws and of customs, social degradation
shall continue in the midst of civilization, making artificial hells,
and subjecting to the complications of chance the divine destiny of
man; so long as the three problems of the age,--the debasement of
man by the proletariat, the ruin of woman by the force of hunger, the
destruction of children in the darkness,--shall not be solved; so long
as anywhere social syncope shall be possible: in other words, and from
a still broader point of view, so long as ignorance and misery shall
remain on earth, books like this cannot fail to be useful.
HAUTEVILLE-HOUSE, 1862.
TABLE OF CONTENTS.
FANTINE.
BOOK I.
A JUST MAN.
I. M. MYRIEL
II. M. MYRIEL BECOMES MONSEIGNEUR WELCOME
III. A GOOD BISHOP AND A HARD BISHOPRIC
IV. WORKS RESEMBLING WORDS
V. MONSEIGNEUR'S CASSOCKS LAST TOO LONG
VI. BY WHOM THE HOUSE WAS GUARDED
VII. CRAVATTE
VIII. PHILOSOPHY AFTER DRINKING
IX. THE BROTHER DESCRIBED BY THE SISTER
X. THE BISHOP FACES A NEW LIGHT
XI. A RESTRICTION
XII. MONSEIGNEUR'S SOLITUDE
XIII. WHAT HE BELIEVED
XIV. WHAT HE THOUGHT
BOOK II
THE FALL.
I. THE CLOSE OF A DAY'S MARCH
II. PRUDENCE RECOMMENDED TO WISDOM
III. THE HEROISM OF PASSIVE OBEDIENCE
IV. CHEESEMAKING AT PONTARLIER
V. TRANQUILLITY
VI. JEAN VALJEAN
VII. A DESPERATE MAN'S HEART
VIII. THE WAVE AND THE DARKNESS
IX. NEW WRONGS
X. THE MAN AWAKE
XI. WHAT HE DID
XII. THE BISHOP AT WORK
XIII. LITTLE GERVAIS
BOOK III.
IN THE YEAR 1817.
I. THE YEAR 1817
II. A DOUBLE QUARTETTE
III. FOUR TO FOUR
IV. THOLOMYÈS SINGS A SPANISH SONG
V. AT BOMBARDA'S
VI. IN WHICH PEOPLE ADORE EACH OTHER
VII. THE WISDOM OF THOLOMYÈS
VIII. THE DEATH OF A HORSE
IX. THE JOYOUS END OF JOY
BOOK IV.
TO CONFIDE IS SOMETIMES TO ABANDON.
I. TWO MOTHERS MEET
II. A SKETCH OF TWO UGLY FACES
III. THE LARK
BOOK V.
THE DESCENT.
I. PROGRESS IN BLACK-BEAD MAKING
II. MADELEINE
III. SUMS LODGED AT LAFITTE'S
IV. M. MADELEINE GOES INTO MOURNING
V. VAGUE FLASHES ON THE HORIZON
VI. FATHER FAUCHELEVENT
VII. FAUCHELEVENT BECOMES A GARDENER AT PARIS
VIII. MADAME VICTURNIEN SPENDS THIRTY FRANCS ON MORALITY
IX. SUCCESS OF MADAME VICTURNIEN
X. RESULT OF HER SUCCESS
XI. CHRISTUS NOS LIBERA VIT
XII. M. BAMATABOIS' IDLENESS
XIII. THE POLICE OFFICE
BOOK VI.
JAVERT.
I. THE COMMENCEMENT OF REPOSE
II. How "JEAN" MAY BECOME "CHAMP"
BOOK VII
THE CHAMPMATHIEU AFFAIR.
CHAPTER
I. SISTER SIMPLICE
II. SCAUFFLAIRE'S PERSPICACITY
III. A TEMPEST IN A BRAIN
IV. SUFFERINGS IN SLEEP
V. OBSTACLES
VI. SISTER SIMPLICE IS SORELY TRIED
VII. THE TRAVELLER TAKES PRECAUTIONS FOR RETURNING
VIII. INSIDE THE COURT
IX. THE TRIAL
X. THE SYSTEM OF DENIAL
XI. CHAMPMATHIEU IS ASTOUNDED
BOOK VIII.
THE COUNTERSTROKE.
I. M. MADELEINE LOOKS AT HIS HAIR
II. FANTINE IS HAPPY
III. JAVERT IS SATISFIED
IV. AUTHORITY RESUMES ITS RIGHTS
V. A VERY PROPER TOMB
ILLUSTRATIONS
VICTOR HUGO (1828) Vol. I. Frontispiece.
"'YOUR BLESSING,' SAID THE BISHOP, AND KNELT DOWN"
Drawn by G. Jeanniot.
FATHER FAUCHELEVENT
Drawn by G. Jeanniot.
FAUCHELEVENT AND THE GRAVE-DIGGER, Vol. II. Frontispiece
Drawn by G. Jeanniot.
"SHE GLIDED ALONG RATHER THAN WALKED"
Drawn by G. Jeanniot.
LE GRAND BOURGEOIS Vol. III. Frontispiece
Drawn by G. Jeanniot.
BEGINNING OF A GREAT MALADY
Drawn by G. Jeanniot.
"ONE MORNING WHEN THE SUN WAS SHINING, AND BOTH
WERE ON THE GARDEN STEPS" Vol. IV. Frontispiece
Drawn by G. Jeanniot.
RECRUITS
Drawn by G. Jeanniot.
"A NIGHT BEHIND WHICH IS A DAY" Vol. V. Frontispiece
Drawn by G. Jeanniot.
THE DEATH OF GAVROCHE
Drawn by G. Jeanniot.
FANTINE.
BOOK I.
A JUST MAN.
CHAPTER I.
M. MYRIEL.
In 1815 M. Charles François Bienvenu Myriel was Bishop of D----. He
was a man of about seventy-five years of age, and had held the see of
D---- since 1806. Although the following details in no way affect our
narrative, it may not be useless to quote the rumors that were current
about him at the moment when he came to the diocese, for what is said
of men, whether it be true or false, often occupies as much space in
their life, and especially in their destiny, as what they do. M. Myriel
was the son of a councillor of the Aix Parliament. It was said that
his father, who intended that he should be his successor, married him
at the age of eighteen or twenty, according to a not uncommon custom
in parliamentary families. Charles Myriel, in spite of this marriage
(so people said), had been the cause of much tattle. He was well
built, though of short stature, elegant, graceful, and witty; and the
earlier part of his life was devoted to the world and to gallantry. The
Revolution came, events hurried on, and the parliamentary families,
decimated and hunted down, became dispersed. M. Charles Myriel
emigrated to Italy in the early part of the Revolution, and his wife,
who had been long suffering from a chest complaint, died there, leaving
no children. What next took place in M. Myriel's destiny? Did the
overthrow of the old French society, the fall of his own family, and
the tragic spectacles of '93, more frightful perhaps to the emigrés who
saw them from a distance with the magnifying power of terror, cause
ideas of renunciation and solitude to germinate in him? Was he, in the
midst of one of the distractions and affections which occupied his
life, suddenly assailed by one of those mysterious and terrible blows
which often prostrate, by striking at his heart, a man whom public
catastrophes could not overthrow by attacking him in his existence and
his fortune? No one could have answered these questions; all that was
known was that when he returned from Italy he was a priest.
In 1804 M. Myriel was Curé of B---- (Brignolles). He was already aged,
and lived in great retirement. Towards the period of the coronation a
small matter connected with his curacy, no one remembers what, took him
to Paris. Among other powerful persons he applied to Cardinal Fesch
on behalf of his parishioners. One day, when the Emperor was paying a
visit to his uncle, the worthy curé, who was waiting in the ante-room,
saw his Majesty pass. Napoleon, noticing this old man regard him with
some degree of curiosity, turned and asked sharply,--
"Who is this good man who is staring at me?"
"Sire," M. Myriel said, "you are looking at a good man and I at a great
man. We may both profit by it."
The Emperor, on the same evening, asked the Cardinal the curé's name,
and some time after M. Myriel, to his great surprise, learned that he
was nominated Bishop of D----. What truth, by the way, was there in the
stories about M. Myriel's early life? No one knew, for few persons had
been acquainted with his family before the Revolution. M. Myriel was
fated to undergo the lot of every new comer to a little town, where
there are many mouths that speak, and but few heads that think. He was
obliged to undergo it, though he was bishop, and because he was bishop.
But, after all, the stories in which his name was mingled were only
stories, rumors, words, remarks, less than words, mere _palabres_, to
use a term borrowed from the energetic language of the South. Whatever
they might be, after ten years of episcopacy and residence at D----,
all this gossip, which at the outset affords matter of conversation for
little towns and little people, had fallen into deep oblivion. No one
would have dared to speak of it, no one have dared to remember it.
M. Myriel had arrived at D----, accompanied by an old maid, Mlle.
Baptistine, who was his sister, and ten years younger than himself.
Their only servant was a female of the same age as Mademoiselle,
of the name of Madame Magloire, who, after having been the servant
of M. le Curé, now assumed the double title of waiting-woman to
Mademoiselle, and house-keeper to Monseigneur. Mlle. Baptistine was
a tall, pale, slim, gentle person; she realized the ideal of what
the word "respectable" expresses, for it seems necessary for a woman
to be a mother in order to be venerable. She had never been pretty,
but her whole life, which had been but a succession of pious works,
had eventually cast over her a species of whiteness and brightness,
and in growing older she had acquired what may be called the beauty
of goodness. What had been thinness in her youth had become in her
maturity transparency, and through this transparency the angel could be
seen. She seemed to be a shadow, there was hardly enough body for a sex
to exist; she was a little quantity of matter containing a light--an
excuse for a soul to remain upon the earth. Madame Magloire was a fair,
plump, busy little body, always short of breath,--in the first place,
through her activity, and, secondly, in consequence of an asthma.
On his arrival M. Myriel was installed in his episcopal palace with all
the honors allotted by the imperial decrees which classify the Bishop
immediately after a Major-General. The Mayor and the President paid him
the first visit, and he on his side paid the first visit to the General
and the Prefect. When the installation was ended the town waited to see
its bishop at work.