 Book Seven, Chapter One, of the Hunchback of Notre-Dame by Victor Hugo. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Book Seven, Chapter One. The Danger of Confiding One Secret to a Goat. Many weeks had elapsed. The first of March had arrived. The son, which Dubarte, that classic ancestor of paraphrase, had not yet dubbed the Grand Duke of Candles, was nonetheless radiant and joyous on that account. It was one of those spring days which possesses so much sweetness and beauty that all Paris turns out into the squares and promenades and celebrates them as though they were Sundays. In those days of brilliancy, warmth, and serenity there is a certain hour above all others, when the façade of Notre-Dame should be admired. It is the moment when the sun, already declining towards the west, looks the cathedral almost full in the face. Its rays, growing more and more horizontal, withdraw slowly from the pavement of the square and mount up the perpendicular façade, whose thousand bosses in high relief they caused to start out from the shadows, while the great central rose window flames like the eye of a cyclops, inflamed with the reflections of the forge. This was the hour. Opposite the lofty cathedral, reddened by the setting sun, on the stone balcony built above the porch of a rich gothic house, which formed the angle of the square and the rue de Parvis, several young girls were laughing and chatting with every sort of grace and mirth. From the length of the veil which fell from their pointed quaff, twined with pearls to their heels, from the fineness of the embroidered chemisette which covered their shoulders and allowed a glimpse, according to the pleasing custom of the time, of the swell of their fair virgin bosoms, from the opulence of their under-petticoats still more precious than their overdress, marvellous refinement, from the gauze, the silk, the velvet, with which all this was composed, and above all from the whiteness of their hands which certified to their leisure and idleness, it was easy to divine they were noble and wealthy heiresses. They were, in fact, Damoiselle Fleur-de-Lis de Gondalaurier, and her companions, Diane de Christouille, Amalotte de Montmichel, Colombe de Gaifontaine, and the little Deschamps Chavrier maiden. All damsels of good berth, assembled at that moment at the house of the dame widow de Gondalaurier, on account of Monsignor de Beaujeu and Madame his wife, who were come to Paris in the month of April, there to choose maids of honour for the Dolphinès Magarite, who was to be received in Picardie from the hands of the Flemmings. Now all the squires for twenty leagues around were intriguing for this favour for their daughters, and a goodly number of the latter had been already brought or sent to Paris. These four maidens had been confided to the discreet and venerable charge of Madame-Alois de Gondalaurier, widow of a former commander of the King's cross-bowmen, who had retired with her only daughter to her house in the Place du Parvis Notre-Dame in Paris. The balcony on which these young girls stood opened from a chamber richly tapestry'd in fawn-coloured Flanders' Leather, stamped with golden foliage. The beams, which cut the ceiling in parallel lines, diverted the eye with a thousand eccentric-painted and gilded carvings. Splendid enamels gleamed here and there on carved chests. A boar's head in faience crowned a magnificent dresser, whose two shelves announced that the mistress of the house was the wife or widow of a knight-banerée. At the end of the room, by the side of a lofty chimney, blazoned with arms from top to bottom in a rich red velvet arm-chair, sat Dame de Gondalaurier, whose five and fifty years were written upon her garments no less distinctly than upon her face. Beside her stood a young man of imposing mean, although partaking somewhat of vanity and bravado. One of those handsome fellows whom all women agreed to admire, although grave men learned in physiognomy shrugged their shoulders at them. This young man wore the garb of a captain of the king's unattached archers, which bears far too much resemblance to the costume of Jupiter, which the reader has already been unable to admire in the first book of this history, for us to inflict upon him a second description. The damoiselles receded, apart in the chamber, apart in the balcony, some on square cushions of Utrecht velvet with golden corners, others on stools of oak carved in flowers and figures. Each of them held on her knee a section of a great needlework tapestry, on which they were working in company, while one end of it lay upon the rush mat which covered the floor. They were chatting together in that whispering tone with the half stifled laughs peculiar to an assembly of young girls in whose midst there is a young man. The young man whose presence served to set in play all those feminine self-conceits appeared to pay very little heed to the matter, and, while these pretty damoiselles were vying with one another to attract his attention, he seemed to be chiefly absorbed in polishing the buckle of his sword-belt with his dough-skin glove. From time to time the old lady addressed him in a very low tone, and he replied as well as he was able, with a sort of awkward and constrained politeness. From the smiles and significant gestures of des malois, from the glances which she threw towards her daughter Fleur-de-lis as she spoke low to the captain, it was easy to see that there was here a question of some betrothal concluded, some marriage near at hand, no doubt, between the young man and Fleur-de-lis. From the embarrassed coldness of the officer it was easy to see that on his side, at least, love had no longer any part in the matter. His whole air was expressive of constraint and weariness, which our lieutenants of the garrison would today translate admirably as, What a beastly bore! The poor dame, very much infatuated with her daughter, like any other silly mother, did not perceive the officer's lack of enthusiasm, and strove in low tones to call his attention to the infinite grace with which Fleur-de-lis used her needle or wound her scheme. Come, little cousin, she said to him, plucking him by the sleeve in order to speak in his ear, look at her, do, see her stoop! Yes, truly, replied the young man, and fell back into his glacial and absent-minded silence. A moment later he was obliged to bend down again, and Dey-malois said to him, Have you ever beheld a more gay and charming face than that of your betrothed? Can one be more white and blonde, or not her hands perfect? And that neck, does it not assume all the curves of the swan in ravishing fashion? How I envy you at times, and how happy you are to be a man, not a libertine that you are! Is not my Fleur-de-lis adorably beautiful, and are you not desperately in love with her? Of course, he replied, still thinking of something else. But do say something, said Madame Malois, suddenly giving his shoulder a push. You have grown very timid. We can assure our readers that timidity was neither the captain's virtue nor his defect, but he made an effort to do what was demanded of him. Fair cousin, he said, approaching Fleur-de-lis, what is the subject of this tapestry work which you are fashioning? Fair cousin, responded Fleur-de-lis in an offended tone, I have already told you three times, tis the grotto of Neptune. It was evident that Fleur-de-lis saw much more clearly than her mother through the captain's cold and absent-minded manner. He felt the necessity of making some conversation. And for whom is this Neptune-arie destined? For the abbey of Saint-Antoine de Chap, answered Fleur-de-lis without raising her eyes. The captain took up a corner of the tapestry. Who, my fair cousin, is this big gendarm who is puffing out his cheeks to their full extent and blowing a trumpet? Tis Triton, she replied. There was a rather pettish intonation in Fleur-de-lis's laconic words. The young man understood that it was indispensable that he should whisper something in her ear, a common place, a gallant compliment, no matter what. Suddenly he bent down, but he could find nothing in his imagination more tender and personal than this. Why does your mother always wear that circuit with our memorial designs like our grandmothers of the time of Charles VII? Tell her, fair cousin, that tis no longer the fashion, and that the hinge and the laurel embroidered on her robe give her the air of a walking mental piece. In truth, people no longer sit thus on their banners, I assure you. Fleur-de-lis raised her beautiful eyes, full of reproach. Is that all of which you can assure me? She said in a low voice. In the meantime, Des-Malois, delighted to see them thus bending towards each other and whispering, said, as she toyed with the clasps of her prayer-book, Touching Picture of Love. The captain, more and more embarrassed, fell back upon the subject of the tapestry. Tis in sooth, a charming work, he exclaimed. Whereupon, Colom de Gaifontaine, another beautiful blonde, with a white skin dressed to the neck in blue damask, ventured a timid remark which he addressed to Fleur-de-lis in the hope that the handsome captain would reply to it. My dear Gondolier, have you seen the tapestries of the Hotel de La Roche-Gaillon? Is not that the hotel in which is enclosed the garden of the lingerie du Louvre, asked Diane de Christouille with a laugh, for she had handsome teeth and consequently laughed on every occasion. And where there is that big old tower of the ancient wall of Paris, added Amalot de Mont-Michel, a pretty fresh and curly-headed brunette, who had a habit of sighing just as the other laughed, without knowing why. My dear Colom, interpolated de Malois, do you not mean the hotel which belonged to Monsieur de Bakvy in the reign of King Charles VI? There are indeed many superb high-warped tapestries there. Charles VI, Charles VI, muttered the young captain, twirling his moustache. Good heavens, what old things the good dame does remember! Madame de Gondolier continued, fine tapestries in truth, a work so esteemed that it passes as unrivaled. At that moment, Barranger de Champs-Chevrier, a slender little maid of seven years, who was peering into the square through the tree foils of the balcony, exclaimed, Oh, look, fair godmother Fleur-de-Lis, at that pretty dancer who is dancing on the pavement and playing the tambourine in the midst of the laudage bourgeois! The sonorous vibration of a tambourine was in fact audible. Some gypsy from Bohemia, said Fleur-de-Lis, turning carelessly toward the square. Look, look! exclaimed her lively companions, and they all ran to the edge of the balcony, while Fleur-de-Lis, rendered thoughtful by the coldness of her betrothed, followed them slowly, and the latter, relieved by this incident, which put an end to an embarrassing conversation, retreated to the farther end of the room, with the satisfied air of a soldier released from duty. Nevertheless the fair Fleur-de-Lis's was a charming and noble service, and such it had formerly appeared to him. But the captain had gradually become blasé, the prospect of a speedy marriage cooled him more every day. Moreover he was of a fickle disposition, and, must we say it, rather vulgar in taste. Although a very noble birth, he had contracted in his official harness more than one habit of the common trooper. The tavern and its accompaniments pleased him. He was only at his ease amid gross language, military gallantries, facile beauties, and successes yet more easy. He had, nevertheless, received from his family some education and some politeness of manner. But he had been thrown on the world too young. He had been in garrison at too early an age, and every day the polish of a gentleman became more and more effaced by the rough friction of his John-Darm's cross-belt. While still continuing to visit her from time to time, from a remnant of a common respect, he felt doubly embarrassed with Fleur-de-Lis. In the first place, because, in consequence of having scattered his love in all sorts of places, he had reserved very little for her. In the next place, because amid so many stiff, formal and decent ladies, he was in constant fear lest his mouth habituated to oaths, should suddenly take the bid in its teeth and break out into the language of the tavern. The effect can be imagined. Moreover, all this was mingled in him with great pretensions to elegance, toilet, and a fine appearance. Should the reader reconcile these things as best he can, I am simply the historian. He had remained, therefore, for several minutes, leaning in silence against the carved jam of the chimney, and thinking, or not thinking, when Fleur-de-Lis suddenly turned and addressed him. After all, the poor young girl was pouting against the dictates of her heart. Fair cousin, did you not speak to us of a little bohemian whom you saved a couple of months ago, while making the patrol with the watch at night from the hands of a dozen robbers? I believe so, fair cousin, said the captain. Well, she resumed, perchance, tis that same gypsy girl who is dancing yonder on the church square. Come and see if you recognize her, fair cousin Phoebus. A secret desire for reconciliation was apparent in this gentle invitation which she gave him to approach her, and in the care which she took to call him by name. Captain Phoebus de Chateau-Pay, for it is he whom the reader has had before his eyes since the beginning of this chapter, slowly approached the balcony. Stay, said Fleur-de-Lis, laying her hand tenderly on Phoebus' arm. Look at that little girl yonder, dancing in that circle. Is she your bohemian? Phoebus looked and said, Yes, I recognize her by her goat. Oh, in fact, what a pretty little goat, said Amolette, clasping her hands in admiration. Are his horns of real gold, inquired Béranger? Without moving from her arm-chair, de Mellois interposed. Is she not one of those gypsy girls who arrived last year by the gibard gate? Madame, my mother, said Fleur-de-Lis gently. That gate is now called the Port d'Enferre. Mademoiselle de Gondolarié knew how her mother's antiquated mode of speech shocked the captain. In fact, he began to sneer and muttered between his teeth. Port-je-barred, Port-je-barred, it is enough to make King Charles the Six-Pass by. Mademoiselle exclaimed Béranger, whose eyes, incessantly in motion, had suddenly been raised to the summit of the towers of Notre-Dame. Who is that black man up yonder? All the young girls raised their eyes. A man was, in truth, leaning on the balustrade which surmounted the northern tower, looking on the grave. He was a priest. His costume could be plainly discerned, and his face resting on both his hands, but he stirred no more than if he had been a statue. His eyes, intently fixed, gazed into the plaza. It was something like the immobility of a bird of prey, who has just discovered a nest of sparrows, and is gazing at it. Tismont-sur, the Archdeacon of José, said Fleur-de-Lis. You have good eyes if you can recognize him from here, said the guy Fontaine. How he is staring at the little dancer, went on Dianne de Christouille. Let the gypsy beware, said Fleur-de-Lis, for he loves not Egypt. Tis a great shame for that man to look upon her thus, added Amalot de Montmachel, for she dances delightfully. Fair cousin Phoebus, said Fleur-de-Lis suddenly, since you know this little gypsy, make her a sign to come up here. It will amuse us. Oh, yes! exclaimed all the young girls, clapping their hands. Why, it is not worth while, replied Phoebus. She has forgotten me, no doubt, and I know not so much as her name. Nevertheless, as you wish it, young ladies, I will make the trial. And leaning over the balustrade of the balcony, he began to shout, Little One! The dancer was not beating her tambourine at the moment. She turned her head towards the point whence this call proceeded. Her brilliant eyes rested on Phoebus, and she stopped short. Little One! repeated the captain, and he beckoned her to approach. The young girl looked at him again. Then she blushed as though a flame had mounted into her cheeks, and taking her tambourine under her arm she made her way through the astonished spectators towards the door of the house where Phoebus was calling her, with slow, tottering steps, and with the troubled look of a bird which is yielding to the fascination of a serpent. A moment later the tapestry portiere was raised and the gypsy appeared on the threshold of the chamber, blushing, confused, breathless, her large eyes drooping, and not daring to advance another step. Berangère clapped her hands. Meanwhile, the dancer remained motionless upon the threshold. Her appearance had produced a singular effect upon these young girls. It is certain that a vague and indistinct desire to please the handsome officer animated them all, that his splendid uniform was the target of all their coca-trees, and that from the moment he presented himself there existed among them a secret, suppressed rivalry which they hardly acknowledged even to themselves, but which broke forth nonetheless every instant in their gestures and remarks. Nevertheless as they were all very nearly equal in beauty they contended with equal arms, and each could hope for the victory. The arrival of the gypsy suddenly destroyed this equilibrium. Her beauty was so rare that, at the moment when she appeared at the entrance of the apartment, it seemed as though she diffused a sort of light which was peculiar to herself. In that narrow chamber, surrounded by that somber frame of hangings and woodwork, she was incomparably more beautiful and more radiant than on the public square. She was like a torch which has suddenly been brought from broad daylight into the dark. The noble damsels were dazzled by her in spite of themselves. Each one felt herself in some sort wounded in her beauty. Hence, their battle front, may we be allowed the expression, was immediately altered, although they exchanged not a single word. But they understood each other perfectly. Women's instincts comprehend and respond to each other more quickly than the intelligences of men. An enemy had just arrived. All felt it, all rallied together. One drop of wine is sufficient to tinge a glass of water red. To diffuse a certain degree of ill temper throughout a whole assembly of pretty women, the arrival of a prettier woman suffices, especially when there is but one man present. Hence, the welcome, according to the gypsy, was marvelously glacial. They surveyed her from head to foot, then exchanged glances, and all was said. They understood each other. Meanwhile, the young girl was waiting to be spoken to, in such emotion that she dared not raise her eyelids. The captain was the first to break the silence. Upon my word, said he, in his tone of intrepid fatuity, here is a charming creature. What think you of her, fair cousin? This remark, which a more delicate admirer would have uttered in a lower tone, at least was not of a nature to dissipate the feminine jealousies which were on the alert before the gypsy. Fleur-de-lis replied to the captain with a bland affectation of disdain. Not bad, the others whispered. At length Madame Allois, who was not the less jealous because she was so for her daughter, addressed the dancer. Approach, little one! Approach, little one! Repeated with comical dignity, little barangère, who would have reached about as high as her hips. The gypsy advanced towards the noble dame. Fair child, said Phoebus, with emphasis, taking several steps towards her. I do not know whether I have the supreme honour of being recognised by you. She interrupted him with a smile and a look full of infinite sweetness. Oh, yes, said she. She has a good memory, remarked Fleur-de-lis. Come now, resumed Phoebus. You escaped nimbly the other evening. Did I frighten you? Oh, no, said the gypsy. There was in the intonation of that, oh, no, uttered after that, oh, yes, an ineffable something which wounded Fleur-de-lis. You left me in your stead, my beauty, pursued the captain, whose tongue was unloosed when speaking to a girl out of the street. A crabbed nave, one eyed and hunch-backed, the bishop's bell-ringer, I believe. I have been told that, by birth, he is the bastard of an arch-deacon and a devil. He has a pleasant name. He is called Quantret Tom, Pecket Fleury, Mardi Gras, I know not what, the name of some festival when the bells are peeled. So he took the liberty of carrying you off, as though you were made for beetles. Tis too much. What the devil did that screech I'll want with you, hey, tell me. I do not know, she replied. The inconceivable impudence. A bell-ringer carrying off a winch like a vicompt. A lout poaching on the game of gentlemen. That is a rare piece of assurance. However, he paid dearly for it. Sir Perrier Torcherou is the harshest groom that ever curried a nave, and I can tell you, if it will be agreeable to you, that your bell-ringer's height got a thorough dressing at his hands. "'Poor man,' said the gypsy, in whom these words revived the memory of the pillory. The captain burst out laughing. "'God debuff! Here's pity as well placed as a feather in a pig's tail. May I have as big a belly as a pope if,' he stopped short. Pardon me, ladies, I believe that I was on the point of saying something foolish.' "'Fie, sir,' said La Guy Fontaine. He talks to that creature in her own tongue,' added Fleur-de-Lis, in a low tone, her irritation increasing every moment. This irritation was not diminished when she beheld the captain, chanted with the gypsy, and most of all with himself, execute a pirouette on his heel, repeating with course, naïve, and soldierly gallantry. A handsome winch upon my soul. "'Rather savagely dressed,' said Dianda, Christouille, laughing to show her fine teeth. This remark was a flash of light to the others. Not being able to impugn her beauty, they attacked her costume. That is true,' said La Montmichel. What makes you run about the streets thus, without wimpe, or rough? That petticoat is so short that it makes one tremble,' added La Guy Fontaine. "'My dear,' continued Fleur-de-Lis, with decided sharpness, you will get yourself taken up by the sumptuary police for your gilded girdle.' "'Little one, little one,' resumed La Christouille, with an implacable smile. If you were to put respectable sleeves upon your arms, they would get less unburned.' It was, in truth, a spectacle worthy of a more intelligent spectator than Phoebus to see how these beautiful maidens, with their inventum'd and angry tongues, wound serpent-like, and glided and writhed around the street dancer. They were cruel and graceful. They searched and rummaged maliciously in her poor and silly toilet of spangles and tinsel. There was no end to their laughter, irony, and humiliation. Sarcasms rained down upon the gypsy, and haughty condescension and malevolent looks. One would have thought they were young Roman dames thrusting golden pins into the breast of a beautiful slave. One would have pronounced them elegant greyhounds, circling with inflated nostrils round a poor woodland fawn whom the glance of their master forbade them to devour. After all, what was a miserable dancer on the public squares in the presence of these high-born maidens? They seemed to take no heed of her presence, and talked of her aloud to her face as of something unclean, abject, and yet at the same time passively pretty. The gypsy was not insensible to these pinpricks. From time to time a flush of shame, a flash of anger inflamed her eyes or her cheeks. With disdain she made that little grimace with which the reader is already familiar, but she remained motionless. She fixed on Phoebus a sad, sweet, resigned look. There was also happiness and tenderness in that gaze. One would have said that she endured for fear of being expelled. Phoebus laughed, and took the gypsy's part with a mixture of impertinence and pity. "'Let them talk, little one,' he repeated, jingling his golden spurs. No doubt your toilet is a little extravagant and wild, but what difference does that make with such a charming damsel as yourself?' "'Good gracious!' exclaimed the blonde guy Fontaine, drawing up her swan-like throat with a bitter smile. I see that Miss Yeh's, the archers of the King's police, easily take fire at the handsome eyes of gypsies.' "'Why not?' said Phoebus. At this reply, uttered carelessly by the captain, like a stray stone, whose fall one does not even watch, Colombe began to laugh as well as Diane, Amalot, and Fleur-de-Lis into whose eyes at the same time a tear started. The gypsy, who had dropped her eyes on the floor at the words of Colombe de Guy Fontaine, raised them beaming with joy and pride and fixed them once more on Phoebus. She was very beautiful at that moment. The old dame, who was watching this scene, felt offended, without understanding why. "'Holy Virgin!' she suddenly exclaimed. "'What is it moving about my legs? Ah, the villainous beast!' It was the goat, who had just arrived, in search of his mistress, and who, in dashing towards the latter, had begun by entangling his horns in the pile of stuffs which the noble dame's garments heaped upon her feet when she was seated. This created a diversion. The gypsy disentangled his horns without uttering a word. "'Oh, here's the little goat with golden hooves!' exclaimed Berangère, dancing with joy. The gypsy crouched down on her knees and leaned her cheek against the fondling head of the goat. One would have said that she was asking pardon for having quittered it thus. Meanwhile, Dion had bent down to Colombe's ear. "'Ah, good heavens! Why did not I think of that sooner? Tiss the gypsy with the goat! They say she is a sorceress, and that her goat executes very miraculous tricks!' "'Well,' said Colom, the goat must now amuse us in its turn and perform a miracle for us.' Dion and Colombe eagerly addressed the gypsy. "'Little one, make your goat perform a miracle!' "'I do not know what you mean,' replied the dancer. "'A miracle! A piece of magic! A bit of sorcery in short!' "'I do not understand!' And she fell to caressing the pretty animal, repeating, "'Jolly! Jolly!'' At that moment Fleur-de-Lis noticed a little bag of embroidered leather suspended from the neck of the goat. "'What is that?' she asked of the gypsy. The gypsy raised her large eyes upon her and replied gravely. "'That is my secret.' "'I should really like to know what your secret is,' thought Fleur-de-Lis. Meanwhile the good dame had risen angrily. "'Come now, gypsy, if neither you nor your goat can dance for us, what are you doing here?' The gypsy walked slowly towards the door without making any reply. But the nearer she approached it the more her pace slackened. An irresistible magnet seemed to hold her. Suddenly she turned her eyes, wet with tears, towards Phoebus and halted. "'True! God!' exclaimed the captain. "'That's no way to depart. Come back and dance something for us. By the way, my sweet love, what is your name?' "'La Esmeralda,' said the dancer, never taking her eyes from him. At this strange name a burst of wild laughter broke from the young girls. "'Here's a terrible name for a young lady,' said Deanne. "'You see well enough,' retorted Amalot, that she is an enchantress. "'My dear!' exclaimed De Malois solemnly. Her parents did not commit the sin of giving you that name at the baptismal font. In the meantime, several minutes previously, Beryl Gère had coaxed the goat into a corner of the room with a marsh-pan cake, without anyone having noticed her. In an instant they had become good friends. The curious child had detached the bag from the goat's neck, had opened it, and had emptied out its contents on the rush matting. It was an alphabet. First letter of which was separately inscribed on a tiny block of boxwood. Hardly had these playthings been spread out on the matting when the child, with surprise, beheld the goat, one of whose miracles this was, no doubt, draw out certain letters with its golden hoof, and arrange them with the gentle pushes in a certain order. In a moment they constituted a word, which the goat seemed to have been trained to write. So little hesitation did it show in forming it, and Beryl Gère suddenly exclaimed, clasping her hands in admiration, "'Godmother Fleur-de-lis, see what the goat has just done!' Fleur-de-lis ran up and trembled. The letters arranged upon the floor formed this word. Phoebus. "'Was it the goat who wrote that?' she inquired in a changed voice. "'Yes, Godmother,' replied Beryl Gère. It was impossible to doubt it. The child did not know how to write. "'This is the secret,' thought Fleur-de-lis. Meanwhile, at the child's exclamation, all had hastened up, the mother, the young girls, the gypsy, and the officer. The gypsy beheld the piece of folly which the goat had committed. She turned red, then pale, and began to tremble, like a culprit before the captain, who gazed at her with a smile of satisfaction and amazement. "'Phebus,' whispered the young girls, stupefied, "'tis the captain's name!' "'You have a marvellous memory,' said Fleur-de-lis to the petrified gypsy, then bursting into sobs. "'Oh!' she stammered mournfully, hiding her face in both her beautiful hands. "'She is a magician!' and she heard another, and a still more bitter voice at the bottom of her heart, saying, "'She is a rival!' she fell, fainting. "'My daughter, my daughter!' cried the terrified mother. "'Begone, you gypsy of hell!' The twinkling, La Esmeralda gathered up the unlucky letters, made a sign to Jolly, and went out through one door, while Fleur-de-lis was being carried out through the other. Captain Phoebus, on being left alone, hesitated for a moment between the two doors, then he followed the gypsy. End of Book 7, Chapter 1 Book 7, Chapter 2 of The Hunchback of Notre-Dame by Victor Hugo. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Book 7, Chapter 2. A Priest and a Philosopher Are Two Different Things. The priest whom the young girls had observed at the top of the North Tower, leaning over the plos and so attentive to the dance of the gypsy, was, in fact, Archdeacon Claude Frollo. Our readers have not forgotten the mysterious cell which the Archdeacon had reserved for himself in that tower. I do not know, by the way be it said, whether it be not the same, the interior of which can be seen today through a little square window, opening to the east at the height of a man above the platform from which the towers spring, a bare and dilapidated den whose badly plastered walls are ornamented here and there at the present day with some wretched yellow engravings representing the facades of cathedrals. I presume that this hole is jointly inhabited by bats and spiders, and that, consequently, it wages a double war of extermination on the flies. Every day, an hour before sunset, the Archdeacon ascended the staircase to the tower and shut himself up in this cell, where he sometimes passed whole nights. That day, at the moment when, standing before the low door of his retreat, he was fitting into the lock the complicated little key which he always carried about him in the purse suspended to his side, a sound of tambourine and castanets had reached his ear. These sounds came from the Place du Parvis. The cell, as we have already said, had only one window opening upon the rear of the church. Claude Frollo had hastily withdrawn the key, and instant later he was on the top of the tower in the gloomy and pensive attitude in which the maidens had seen him. There he stood, grave, motionless, absorbed in one look and one thought. All Paris lay at his feet, with the thousand spires of its edifices and its circuit or horizon of gentle hills, with its river winding under its bridges and its people moving to and fro through its streets, with the clouds of its smoke, with the mountainous chain of its roofs which presses Notre-Dame in its doubled folds, but out of all the city the Archdeacon gazed at only one corner of the pavement, the Place du Parvis. In all that throng at but one figure, the gypsy. It would have been difficult to say what was the nature of this look, and whence preceded the flame that flashed from it. It was a fixid gaze, which was nevertheless full of trouble and tumult. And from the profound immobility of his whole body, barely agitated at intervals by an involuntary shiver as a tree is moved by the wind, from the stiffness of his elbows more marble than the balustrade in which they leaned, or the sight of the petrified smile which contracted his face, one who would have said that nothing living was left about Claude Frollo except his eyes. The gypsy was dancing. She was twirling her tambourine on the tip of her finger and tossing it into the air as she danced Provençal Sarabans. Agile, light, joyous, and unconscious of the formidable gaze which descended perpendicularly upon her head. The crowd was swarming around her. From time to time a man accoutred in red and yellow made them form into a circle, and then returned, seated himself on a chair a few paces from the dancer, and took the goat's head on his knees. The man seemed to be the gypsy's companion. Claude Frollo could not distinguish his features from his elevated post. From the moment when the archdeacon caught sight of this stranger his attention seemed divided between him and the dancer, and his face became more and more gloomy. All at once he rose upright and a quiver ran through his whole body. Who is that man, he muttered between his teeth. I have always seen her alone before. Then he plunged down beneath the tortuous vault of the spiral staircase and once more descended. As he passed the door of the bell-chamber, which was ajar, he saw something which struck him. He beheld Quasimodo, who, leaning through an opening of one of those slayed penthouses which resemble enormous blinds, appeared also to be gazing at the plaza. He was engaged in so profound a contemplation that he did not notice the passage of his adopted father. His savage eye had a singular expression. It was a charmed, tender look. This is strange, murmured Claude. Is it the gypsy at whom he is thus gazing? He continued his descent. At the end of a few minutes the anxious archdeacon entered upon the plaza from the door at the base of the tower. What has become of the gypsy girl, he said, mingling with the group of spectators which the sound of the tambourine had collected? I know not, replied one of his neighbours. I think that she has gone to make some of her fundangos in the house opposite, whither they have called her. In the place of the gypsy on the carpet, whose arabesques had seemed to vanish but a moment previously by the capricious figures of her dance, the archdeacon no longer beheld anyone but the red and yellow man, who, in order to earn a few testers in his turn, was walking round the circle with his elbows on his hips, his head thrown back, his face red, his neck outstretched with a chair between his teeth. To the chair he had fastened a cat, which a neighbour had lent, and which was spitting in great affright. No tra-dom, exclaimed the archdeacon at the moment when the juggler, perspiring heavily, passed in front of him with his pyramid of chair and his cat. What is Master Pierre Gringois doing here? The harsh voice of the archdeacon threw the poor fellow into such a commotion that he lost his equilibrium, together with his whole edifice, and the chair and the cat tumbled pel mel upon the heads of the spectators in the midst of inextinguishable hootings. It is probable that Master Pierre Gringois, for it was indeed he, would have had a sorry account to settle with the neighbour who owned the cat, and all the bruised and scratched faces which surrounded him, if he had not hastened to profit by the tumult to take refuge in the church, wither Claude Frollo had made him a sign to follow him. The cathedral was already dark and deserted, the side aisles were full of shadows and the lamps of the chapels began to shine out like stars, so black had the vaulted ceiling become. Only the great rose window of the façade, whose thousand colours were steeped in a ray of horizontal sunlight, glittered in the gloom like a mass of diamonds, and threw its dazzling reflection to the other end of the nave. When they had advanced a few paces, Dom Claude placed his back against a pillar and gazed intently at Gringois. The gaze was not the one which Gringois feared, ashamed as he was of having been caught by a grave and learned person in the costume of a buffoon. There was nothing mocking or ironical in the priest's glance. It was serious, tranquil, piercing. The Archdeacon was the first to break the silence. Come now, Master Pierre, you are to explain many things to me. And first of all, how comes it that you have not been seen for two months and that now one finds you in the public squares in a fine equipment in truth? Motley red and yellow, like a Côte-de-Bec apple? Monsieur, said Gringois piteously, it is, in fact, an amazing accoutrement. You see me no more comfortable in it than a cat coiffed with a calabash. It is very ill-done, I am conscious, to expose messieurs the sergeants of the watch to the liability of a cuddling beneath this cassock the humerus of a Pythagorean philosopher. But what would you have, my Reverend Master? Tis the fault of my ancient jerkin which abandoned me and cowardly wise at the beginning of the winter under the pretext that it was falling into tatters and that it required repose in the basket of a rag-picker. What is one to do? Civilization has not yet arrived at the point where one can go stark naked, as agent Diogenes wished. Add that a very cold wind was blowing and tis not in the month of January that one can successfully attempt to make humanity take this new step. This garment presented itself, I took it, and I left my ancient black smock, which, for a hermetic like myself, was far from being hermetically closed. Behold me, then, in the garments of a stage-player, like Saint Genest. What would you have? Tis an eclipse. Apollo himself tended the flocks of Atmidus. Tis a fine profession that you are engaged in, replied the Archdeacon. I agree, my Master, that Tis better to philosophize and poetize to blow the flame in the furnace or to receive it from carry-cats on a shield. When you addressed me, I was as foolish as an ass before a turn-spit. But what would you have, Monsieur? One must eat every day, and the finest Alexandrine verses are not worth a bit of brie cheese. Now, I made for Madame Marguerite of Flanders that famous epithelium, as you know, and the city will not pay me, under the pretext that it was not excellent, as though one could give a tragedy of Sophocles for four crowns. Hence, I was on the point of dying with hunger. Happily, I found that I was rather strong in the jaw, so I said to this jaw, perform some feats of strength and of equilibrium, nourish thyself. Allez, ti ipsam! A pack of beggars, who have become my good friends, have taught me twenty sorts of Herculian feats, and now I give my teeth every evening the bread which they have earned during the day by the sweat of my brow. After all, concede, I grant that it is a sad employment for my intellectual faculties, and that man is not made to pass his life in beating the tambourine and biting chairs. But Reverend Master, it is not sufficient to pass one's life. One must earn the means for life. Some Claude listened in silence. All at once, his deep-set eye assumed so sagacious and penetrating an expression that Gringoire felt himself, so to speak, searched to the bottom of the soul by that glance. Very good, Master Pierre, but how comes it that you are now in company with that gypsy dancer? In faith, said Gringoire, tis because she is my wife and I am her husband. The priest's gloomy eyes flashed into flame. Have you done that, you wretch! He cried, seizing Gringoire's arm with fury. Have you been so abandoned by God as to raise your hand against that girl? On my chance of paradise, Monseigneur, replied Gringoire, trembling in every limb, I swear to you that I have never touched her, if that is what disturbs you. Then why do you talk of husband and wife, said the priest? Gringoire made haste to relate to him as succinctly as possible all that the reader already knows, his adventure in the court of miracles and the broken crock marriage. It appeared, moreover, that this marriage had led to no results whatever and that each evening the gypsy girl cheated him of his nuptial right as on the first day. Tis, a mortification, he said in conclusion, but that is because I have had them as fortune to wed a virgin. What do you mean, demanded the archdeacon, who had been gradually appeased by this recital? Tis, very difficult to explain, replied the poet. It is a superstition. My wife is, according to an old thief who has called among us the Duke of Egypt has told me, a foundling or a lost child, which is the same thing. She wears on her neck an amulet, which, it is affirmed, will cause her to meet her parent some day, but which will lose its virtue if the young girl loses hers. Hence it follows that both of us remain very virtuous. So, resumed Claude, whose brow cleared more and more, you believe, master Pierre, that this creature has not been approached by any man? What would you have a man do, Dom Claude, as against a superstition? She has got that in her head. I assuredly esteem as a rarity this none-like prudery which is preserved untamed amid those bohemian girls who are so easily brought into subjection. But she has three things to protect her. The Duke of Egypt, who has taken her under his safeguard, reckoning perchance on selling her to some gay abbey, all his tribe, who hold her in singular veneration, like a Notre-Dame, and a certain tiny poignard which the buxom-dame always wears about her in some nook, in spite of the ordinances of the provost, and which one causes to fly out into her hands by squeezing her waist, till a proud wasp I can tell you. The Archdeacon pressed Gringoire with questions. La Esmeralda, in the judgment of Gringoire, was an inoffensive and charming creature, pretty, with the exception of a pout which was peculiar to her. A naive and passionate damsel, ignorant of everything and enthusiastic about everything. Not yet aware of the difference between a man and a woman, even in her dreams. Made like that. Child, especially over-dancing, noise, the open air. A sort of woman bee, with invisible wings on her feet, and living in a whirlwind. She owed this nature to the wandering life which she had always led. Gringoire had succeeded in learning that, while a mere child, she had traversed Spain and Catalonia, even to Sicily. He believed that she had even been taken by the caravan of Zingari, of which she formed a part, to the Kingdom of Algiers, a country situated in Aquia, which country adjoins on one side Albania and Greece, on the other the Sicilian Sea, which is the road to Constantinople. The Bohemians, said Gringoire, were vassals of the King of Algiers, in his quality of Chief of the White Moors. One thing is certain, that La Esmeralda had come to France while still very young by way of Hungary. From all these countries the young girl had brought back fragments of queer jargons, songs, and strange ideas, which made her language as motley as her costume, half Parisian, half African. However, the people of the quarters which she frequented loved her for her gaiety, her daintiness, her lively manners, her dances, and her songs. She believed herself to be hated in all the city by but two persons of whom she often spoke in terror, the sacked nun of the Toul-Roland, a villainous recluse who cherished some secret grudge against these gypsies and who cursed the poor dancer every time that the latter passed before her window, and a priest who never met her without casting at her looks and words which frightened her. The mention of this last circumstance disturbed the Archdeacon greatly, though Gringoire paid no attention to his perturbation. To such an extent had the two months suffice to cause the heedless poet to forget the singular details of the evening on which he had met the gypsy and the presence of the Archdeacon in it all. Otherwise the little dancer feared nothing. She did not tell fortunes, which protected her against those trials for magic which were so frequently instituted against gypsy women. And then Gringoire held the position of her brother, if not of her husband. After all, the philosopher endured this sort of platonic marriage very patiently. It meant a shelter and bread at least. Every morning he set out from the lair of the thieves, generally with the gypsy. He helped her make her collection of targes and little blanks in the squares. Each evening he returned to the same roof with her, allowed her to bolt herself into her little chamber, and slept the sleep of the just. A very sweet existence, taking it all in all, he said, and well adapted to reverie. And then, on his soul and conscience, the philosopher was not very sure that he was madly in love with the gypsy. He loved her goat almost as dearly. It was a charming animal, gentle, intelligent, clever, a learned goat. Nothing was more common in the Middle Ages than these learned animals, which amazed people greatly and often led their instructors to the stake. But the witchcraft of the goat with the golden hoofs was a very innocent species of magic. Gringoire explained them to the Archdeacon whom these details seemed to interest deeply. In the majority of cases it was sufficient to present the tambourine to the goat in such or such a manner in order to obtain from him the trick desired. He had been trained to this by the gypsy, who possessed in these delicate arts so rare a talent that two months had suffice to teach the goat to write, with movable letters the word Phoebus. Phoebus, said the priest, why Phoebus? I know not, replied Gringoire. Perhaps it is a word which she believes to be endowed with some magic and secret virtue. She often repeated in a low tone when she thinks that she is alone. Are you sure, persisted Claude, with his penetrating glance, that it is only a word and not a name? The name of whom? said the poet. How should I know? said the priest. That is what I imagine, monsieur. These Bohemians are something like Gerbers and adore the sun, hence Phoebus. That does not seem so clear to me as to you, Master Pierre. After all, that does not concern me. Let her mumble her Phoebus at her pleasure. One thing is certain that Jolly loves me almost as much as he does her. Who is Jolly? The goat! The archdeacon dropped his chin into his hand and appeared to reflect for a moment. All at once he turned abruptly to Gringoire once more. And do you swear to me that you have not touched her? Whom, said Gringoire, the goat? No, that woman! My wife, I swear to you that I have not! You are often alone with her? A good hour every evening! Poor Claude frowned. Oh! Oh! Solus cum sola non cogita buntur orare paternaster! Upon my soul I could say the pater and the ave Maria and the credo indium patrim omnipotentum without her paying any more attention to me than a chicken to a church. Swear to me, by the body of your mother, repeated the archdeacon violently, that you have not touched that creature with even the tip of your finger. I will also swear by the head of my father for the two things have more affinity between them. But my reverend master permit me a question in my turn. Speak, sir. What concern is it of yours? The archdeacon's pale face became as crimson as the cheek of a young girl. He remained for a moment without answering. Then with visible embarrassment. Listen, Master Pierre Gringoire, you are not yet damned so far as I know. I take an interest in you and wish you well. Now the least contact with that Egyptian of the demon would make you the vassal of Satan. You know that Tiss always the body which ruins the soul. Woe to you if you approach that woman! That is all. I tried once, said Gringoire, scratching his ear. It was on the first day, but I got stung. You were so audacious, Master Pierre! And the priest's brow clouded over again. On another occasion, continued the poet with a smile, I peeped through the keyhole before going to bed, and I beheld the most delicious dame in her shift that ever made a bed-creak under her bare foot. Go to the devil! cried the priest with a terrible look, and giving the amazed Gringoire a push on the shoulders he plunged with long strides under the gloomiest arcades of the cathedral. End of Book 7, Chapter 2 Book 7, Chapter 3 of The Hunchback of Notre-Dame by Victor Hugo. After the morning in the pillory the neighbors of Notre-Dame thought they noticed that Quasimodo's ardor for ringing had grown cool. Formerly there had been peels for every occasion, long-morning serenades which lasted from prime to compline, peels from the belfry for a high mass, rich scales drawn over the smaller bells for a wedding, or a christening, and a mingling in the air like a rich embroidery of all sorts of charming sounds. The old church, all vibrating and sonorous, was in a perpetual joy of bells. One was constantly conscious of the presence of a spirit of noise and caprice who sang through all those mouths of brass. Now that spirit seemed to have departed. The cathedral seemed gloomy and gladly remained silent. Festivals and funerals had the simple peel, dry and bare, demanded by the ritual nothing more. Of the double noise which constitutes a church, the organ within, the bell without, the organ alone remained. One would have said that there was no longer a musician in the belfry. Quasimodo was always there nevertheless. What then had happened to him? Was it that the shame and despair of the pillory still lingered in the bottom of his heart, that the lashes of his tormentor's whip reverberated unendingly in his soul, and that the sadness of such treatment had wholly extinguished in him even his passion for the bells, or was it that Marie had a rival in the heart of the bell-ringer of Notre-Dame, and that the great bell and her fourteen sisters were neglected for something more amiable and more beautiful? It chanced that, in the year of Grace 1482, Annunciation Day fell on Tuesday, the twenty-fifth of March. That day the air was so pure and light that Quasimodo felt some returning affection for his bells. He therefore ascended the northern tower while the beetle below was opening wide the doors of the church, which were then enormous panels of stout wood covered with leather, bordered with nails of gilded iron and framed in carvings very artistically elaborated. On arriving in the lofty bell-chamber, Quasimodo gazed for some time at the six bells and shook his head sadly, as though groaning over some foreign element which had interposed itself in his heart between them and him. And when he had set them to swinging, when he felt that cluster of bells moving under his hand, when he saw, for he did not hear it, the palpitating octave ascend and descend that sonorous scale, like a bird hopping from branch to branch, when the demon music, that demon who shakes a sparkling bundle of strate, trills, and arpeggios, had taken possession of the poor deaf man, he became happy once more, he forgot everything, and his heart expanding made his face beam. He went and came, he beat his hands together, he ran from rope to rope, he animated the six singers with voice and gesture like the leader of an orchestra who is urging on intelligent musicians. Go on, said he, go on, go on, Gabriel, pour out all thy noise into the plass, tis a festival today, no laziness, Thibault, though what relaxing, go on, go on, then, art thou rusted, thou sluggard, that is well, quick, quick, let not thy clapper be seen, make them all deaf like me, that's it, Thibault, bravely done, galloom, galloom, thou art the largest, and pasquier is the smallest, and pasquier does best, let us wager that those who hear him will understand him better than they understand thee, good, good, my Gabriel, stoutly, most stoutly, Eli, what are you doing up all off there, you two mano, I do not see you making the least shred of noise, what is the meaning of those beaks of copper which seem to be gaping when they should sing, come, work now, tis the feast of the annunciation, the sun is fine, the chime must be fine also, poor galloom, thou art all out of breath, my big fellow. He was wholly absorbed in spurring on his bells, all six of which vied with each other, in leaping and shaking their shiny haunches, like a noisy team of Spanish mules, pricked on here and there by the apostrophes of the mulleteer. All at once, on letting his glance fall between the large slate scales which covered the perpendicular wall of the bell tower at a certain height, he beheld on the square a young girl, fantastically dressed, stop, spread out on the ground a carpet, on which a small goat took up its post, and a group of spectators collect around her. This sight suddenly changed the course of his ideas, and congealed his enthusiasm as a breath of air congeals melted rosin. He halted, turned his back to the bells, and crouched down behind the projecting roof of slate, fixing upon the dancer that dreamy, sweet, and tender look which had already astonished the archdeacon on one occasion. Meanwhile, the forgotten bells died away abruptly and altogether to the great disappointment of the lovers of bell-ringing, who were listening in good faith to the peal from above the Pantuchange, and who went away dumbfounded, like a dog who had been offered a bone and given a stone. CHAPTER IV A NARC It chanced that upon a fine morning in this same month of March, I think it was on Saturday the 29th, St. Eustache's Day, our young friend the student, Jehan Frollo Dumoulin, perceived, as he was dressing himself, that his breeches, which contained his purse, gave out no metallic ring. Poor purse, he said, drawing it from his fob. What, not the smallest pericy? How cruelly the dice, beer-pots, and venus have depleted thee! How empty, wrinkled, limp thou art! Thou resemblest the throat of a fury! I ask you, M. Cicero and M. Seneca, copies of whom, all dogs eared, I behold, scattered on the floor. What profits it me to know, better than any governor of the Mint, or any Jew on the Pantuchange, that a golden crown stamped with a crown is worth thirty-five onzeins of twenty-five souses, and eight deniers pericy apiece, and that a crown stamped with a crescent is worth thirty-six onzeins of twenty-six souses, six deniers to nois apiece, if I have not a single wretched black liard to risk on the double-six. Oh, consul Cicero, this is no calamity from which one extricates oneself with paraphrases, quema d'modum and verum enim vero. He dresses himself sadly. An idea had occurred to him as he laced his boots, but he rejected it at first. Nevertheless it returned, and he put on his waistcoat wrong side out, an evident sign of violent internal combat. At last he dashed his cap roughly on the floor and exclaimed, So much the worse! Let come of it what may! I am going to my brother! I shall catch a sermon, but I shall catch a crown! Then he hastily donned his long jacket with furred half-sleeves, picked up his cap, and went out like a man driven to desperation. He descended the Rue de la Arpée toward the city. As he passed the Rue de la Ucchette, the odor of those admirable spits which were incessantly turning tickled his olfactory apparatus, and he bestowed a loving glance toward the cyclopean roast which one day drew from the Franciscan friar, Calatigaroni, this pathetic exclamation. Veramente, queste rotisserie sono cosa stupenda. Truly these roastings are a stupendous thing. But Jehan had not the wherewithal to buy a breakfast, and he plunged with a profound sigh under the gateway of the Petit Châtelet, that enormous double-treefoil of massive towers which guarded the entrance to the city. He did not even take the trouble to cast a stone in passing, as was the usage, at the miserable statue of that Perennée Leclerc, who had delivered up the Paris of Charles VI to the English, a crime which his effigy, its face battered with stones and soiled with mud, expiated for three centuries at the corner of the Rue de la Arpée and the Rue de Boucher as an eternal pillory. The Petit Pont traversed, the Rue Nouve Saint-Jean-Vierve crossed, Jehan de Melandineau found himself in front of Notre-Dame. Then, indecision seized upon him once more, and he paced for several minutes round the statue of Monsieur Legré, repeating to himself with anguish, the sermon is sure the crown is doubtful. He stopped a beetle who emerged from the cloister. Where is Monsieur the Archdeacon of José? I believe that he is in his secret cell in the tower," said the beetle. I shall advise you not to disturb him there, unless you come from someone like the Pope or Monsieur the King. Jehan clapped his hands. Becliable! Here's a magnificent chance to see the famous sorcery cell! This reflection having brought him to a decision, he plunged resolutely into the small black doorway and began the ascent of the spiral of Saint-Jean's which leads to the upper stories of the tower. I am going to see, he said to himself on the way. By the ravens of the Holy Virgin it must needs be a curious thing, that cell which my reverend brother hides so secretly. Tis said that he lights up the kitchens of hell there, and that he cooks the philosopher's stone there over a hot fire. Bidieu! I care no more for the philosopher's stone than for a pebble, and I would rather find over his furnace an omelet of Easter eggs and bacon than the biggest philosopher's stone in the world. On arriving at the gallery of slender columns he took a breath for a moment and swore against the interminable staircase by I know not how many million cartloads of devils. Then he resumed his ascent through the narrow door of the North Tower, now closed to the public. Several moments after passing the bell-chamber he came upon a little landing-place, built in a lateral niche, and under the vault of a low pointed door, whose enormous lock and strong iron bars he was unable to see through a loophole pierced in the opposite circuit or wall of the staircase. Person's desirous of visiting this door at the present day will recognize it by this inscription engraved in white letters on the black wall. J'adorer Coralie, 1823. Signet Eugénée. Signet stands in the text. Ugg, said the scholar, tis here, no doubt. The key was in the lock, the door was very close to him. He gave it a gentle push and thrust his head through the opening. The reader cannot have failed to turn over the admirable works of Rembrandt, that Shakespeare of painting. Amid so many marvellous engravings, there is one etching in particular, which is supposed to represent Dr. Faust, and which it is impossible to contemplate without being dazzled. It represents a gloomy cell, in the center is a table loaded with hideous objects, skulls, spheres, alembics, compasses, hieroglyphic parchments. The doctor is before this table clad in his large coat and covered to the very eyebrows with his furred cap. He is visible only to his waist. He has half risen from his immense armchair, his clenched fists rest on the table, and he is gazing with curiosity and terror at a large luminous circle formed of magic letters which gleams from the wall beyond, like the solar spectrum in a dark chamber. This cabalistic sun seems to tremble before the eye and fills the wand's cell with its mysterious radiance. It is horrible and it is beautiful. Something very similar to Faust's cell presented itself to Jehan's view when he ventured his head through the half-open door. It also was a gloomy and sparsely lighted retreat. There also stood a large armchair and a large table, compasses, alembics, skeletons of animals suspended from the ceiling, a globe rolling on the floor, hippocephaly mingled promiscuously with drinking cups in which quivered leaves of gold. Skulls placed upon vellum checkered with figures and characters. Huge manuscripts piled up wide open, without mercy on the cracking corners of the parchment. In short, all the rubbish of science, and everywhere, on this confusion, dust, and spider's webs. But there was no circle of luminous letters, no doctor in an ecstasy contemplating the flaming vision as the eagle gazes upon the sun. Nevertheless the cell was not deserted. A man was seated in the armchair and bending over the table. Jehan, to whom his back was turned, could see only his shoulders and the back of his skull. But he had no difficulty in recognizing that bald head which nature had provided with an eternal tonsure, as though desirous of marking, by this external symbol, the archdeacon's irresistible clerical vocation. Jehan accordingly recognized his brother, but the door had been opened so softly that nothing worn dumb-clawed of his presence. The inquisitive scholar took advantage of this circumstance to examine the cell for a few moments at his leisure. A large furnace, which he had not at first observed, stood to the left of the armchair beneath the window. The ray of light which penetrated through this aperture made its way through a spider's circular web, which tastefully inscribed its delicate rows in the arch of the window, and in the center of which the insect architect hung motionless, like the hub of this wheel of lace. From the furnace were accumulated in disorder all sorts of vases, earthenware bottles, glass retorts, and mattresses of charcoal. Jehan observed, with a sigh, that there was no frying-pan. How cold the kitchen utensils are, he said to himself. In fact there was no fire in the furnace, and it seemed as though none had been lighted for a long time. A glass mask which Jehan noticed among the utensils of alchemy, and which served no doubt to protect the arch-deacon's face when he was working over some substance to be dreaded, lay in one corner covered with dust and apparently forgotten. Beside it lay a pair of bellows no less dusty, the upper side of which bore this inscription encrusted in copper letters, spira sparra. Other inscriptions were written in accordance with the fashion of the hermetics, in great numbers on the walls, some traced with ink, others engraved with a metal point. There were, moreover, gothic letters, Hebrew letters, Greek letters, and Roman letters, pel mel. The inscriptions overflowed at haphazard, on top of each other, the more recent effacing the more ancient and all entangled with each other, like the branches in a thicket, like pikes in an affray. It was, in fact, a strangely confused mingling of all human philosophies, all reveries, all human wisdom. Here and there one shone out from the rest like a banner among lance heads. Generally it was a brief Greek or Roman device, such as the Middle Ages knew so well how to formulate. Undi, Indi, homohumini monstern, astra castra nomen numen, maya bibklav uya zazav, superi audae, fiat ubi volt, etc. Sometimes a word devoid of all apparent use. Avet zaxpaia, which possibly contained a bitter illusion to the regime of the cloister, sometimes a simple maxim of clerical discipline formulated in a regular hexameter. Koelistem dominum toristrem dicite dominum. There was also Hebrew jargon, of which Jehan, who has yet knew but little Greek, understood nothing, and all were traversed in every direction by stars, by figures of men or animals, and by intersecting triangles. And this contributed not a little to make the scrawled wall of the cell resemble a sheet of paper over which a monkey had drawn back and forth a pen filled with ink. The whole chamber, moreover, presented a general aspect of abandonment and dilapidation, and the bad state of the utensils induced the supposition that their owner had long been distracted from his labors by other preoccupations. Meanwhile this master bent over a vast manuscript, ornamented with fantastical illustrations, appeared to be tormented by an idea which incessantly mingled with his meditations. That at least was Jehan's idea, when he heard him exclaim with the thoughtful breaks of a dreamer thinking aloud. Yes, Manu said it, and Zoroaster taught it. The sun is born from fire, and the moon from the sun. Fire is the soul of the universe. Its elementary atoms pour forth and flow incessantly upon the world through infinite channels. At the point where these currents intersect each other in the heavens they produce light. At their points of intersection on earth they produce gold. Light, gold, the same thing. From fire to the concrete state. The difference between the visible and the palpable, between the fluid and the solid in the same substance. Between water and ice. Nothing more. These are no dreams. It is the general law of nature. But what is one to do in order to extract from science the secret of this general law? What? This light which inundates my hand is gold. The same atoms, dilated in accordance with a certain law, need only be condensed in accordance with another law. How is it to be done? Some have fancied by burying a ray of sunlight. Avarois, yes, it is Avarois. Avarois buried one under the first pillar on the left of the sanctuary of the Koran, in the great Mohammedan mosque of Kordova. But the vault cannot be opened for the purpose of ascertaining whether the operation has succeeded until after the lapse of eight thousand years. The devil, said Jahan to himself, tis a long while to wait for a crown. Others have thought, continued the dreamy archdeacon, that it would be better worthwhile to operate upon a ray of Sirius. But tis exceeding hard to obtain this ray pure because of the simultaneous presence of other stars whose rays mingle with it. Flamel esteemed it more simple to operate upon terrestrial fire. Flamel, there's predestination in the name. Flama, yes, fire. All lies there. The diamond is contained in the carbon. Gold is in the fire. But how to extract it? Magistri affirms that there are certain feminine names which possess a charm so sweet and mysterious that it suffices to pronounce them during the operation. Let us read what Manon says on the matter. Where women are honored, the divinities are rejoiced. Where they are despised, it is useless to pray to God. The mouth of a woman is constantly pure. It is a running water. It is a ray of sunlight. The name of a woman should be agreeable, sweet, fanciful. It should end in long vowels and resemble words of benediction. Yes, the sage is right. In truth, Maria, Sophia, la es morale, damnation, always that thought. And he closed the book violently. He passed his hand over his brow as though to brush away the idea which assailed him. Then he took from the table a nail and a small hammer, whose handle was curiously painted with cabalistic letters. For some time, he said with a bitter smile, I have failed in all my experiments. One fixed idea possesses me and sears my brain like fire. I have not even been able to discover the secret of Cassiodorus, whose lamp burned without wick and without oil. A simple matter, nevertheless. The deuce, muttered Jehan in his beard. Hence, continued the priest, one wretched thought is sufficient to render a man weak and beside himself. Oh, how Claude Pernell would laugh at me. She, who could not turn Nicholas Flamel aside for one moment from his pursuit of the great work. What! I hold in my hand the magic hammer of Zashiellae, at every blow dealt by the formidable rabbi from the depths of his cell upon this nail, that one of his enemies whom he had condemned, were he a thousand leagues away, was buried a cupid deep in the earth which swallowed him. The King of France himself, in consequence of once having inconsiderately knocked at the door of the Thermaturgist, sank to the knees through the pavement of his own Paris. This took place three centuries ago. Well, I possess the hammer and the nail, and in my hands they are utensils no more formidable than a club in the hands of a maker of edge tools. And yet all that is required is to find the magic word which Zashiellae pronounced when he struck his nail. What nonsense! thought Jehan. Let us see, let us try, resumed the archdeacon briskly. Were I to succeed, I should behold the blue spark flash from ahead of the nail. Amen, etan, amen, etan! That's not it. Segeani, Segeani, may this nail open the tomb to anyone who bears the name of Phoebus. A curse upon it, always and eternally the same idea. And he flung away the hammer in a rage. Then he sank down so deeply on the armchair and the table that Jehan lost him from view behind the great pile of manuscripts. For the space of several minutes all that he saw was his fist convulsively clenched on a book. Suddenly Dom Claude sprang up, seized a compass and engraved in silence upon the wall in capital letters this Greek word—anarch. My brother is mad, said Jehan to himself. It would have been far more simple to write phatum. Every one is not obliged to know Greek. The archdeacon returned and seated himself in his armchair and placed his head on both his hands, as a sick man does, whose head is heavy and burning. The student watched his brother with surprise. He did not know. He who wore his heart on his sleeve. He who observed only the good old law of nature in the world. He who allowed his passions to follow their inclinations, and in whom the lake of great emotions was always dry, so freely did he let it off each day by fresh drains. He did not know with what fury the sea of human passions ferments and boils when all egress is denied to it, how it accumulates, how it swells, how it overflows, how it hollows out the heart, how it breaks in inward sobs and dull convulsions until it has rent its dykes and burst its bed. The austere and glacial envelope of Claude Frollo, that cold surface of steep and inaccessible virtue, had always deceived Jehan. The merry scholar had never dreamed that there was boiling lava, furious and profound beneath the snowy brow of Etna. We do not know whether he suddenly became conscious of these things, but giddy as he was, he understood that he had seen what he ought not to have seen, that he had just surprised the soul of his elder brother in one of its most secret altitudes, and that Claude must not be allowed to know it. Seeing that the Archdeacon had fallen back into his former immobility, he withdrew his head very softly and made some noise with his feet outside the door, like a person who has just arrived and is giving warning of his approach. Enter!" cried the Archdeacon from the interior of his cell. I was expecting you. I left the door unlocked expressly. Enter Master Jacques. The scholar entered boldly. The Archdeacon, who was very much embarrassed by such a visit in such a place, trembled in his arm chair. What! Tis you, Johan? Tis a jay all the same, said the scholar, with his ruddy, merry and audacious face. Dom Claude's visage had resumed its severe expression. What are you come for? Brother replied the scholar, making an effort to assume a decent, pitiful and modest mean, and twirling his cappiness hands with an innocent air. I am come to ask of you. What! A little lecture on morality of which I stand greatly in need. Johan did not dare to add aloud, and a little money of which I am in still greater need. This last member of his phrase remained unuttered. Montseur, said the Archdeacon in a cold tone, I am greatly displeased with you. Halas! sighed the scholar. Dom Claude made his arm chair describe a quarter-circle and gazed intently at Johan. I am very glad to see you. This was a formidable exordium. Johan braced himself for a rough encounter. Johan, complaints are brought me about you every day. What a fray was that in which you bruised with a cudgel, a little vicompte, Albert de Romonchamp. Oh! says Johan, a vast thing that. A malicious page amused himself by splashing the scholars, by making his horse gallop through the mire. Who, pursue the Archdeacon, is that mayet fargel whose gown you have torn? Tunicum de cire virunt, saith the complaint. Ah! Bah! A wretched cap of a Montigu, isn't that it? The complaint says Tunicum, not Capetum. Do you know Latin? Johan did not reply. Yes, pursued the priest, shaking his head. That is the state of learning and letters at the present day. The Latin tongue is hardly understood. Syriac is unknown, Greek so odious, that Tissa counted no ignorance in the most learned to skip a Greek word without reading it, and to say groicum est non-legitur. The scholar raised his eyes boldly. Monsieur, my brother, doth it please you that I shall explain in good French vernacular that Greek word which is written yonder on the wall? What word? Anarch. A slight flush spread over the cheeks of the priest with their high bones, like the puff of smoke which announces on the outside the secret commotions of a volcano. The student hardly noticed it. Well, Johan, stammered the elder brother with an effort, what is the meaning of yonder word? Fate. Dom Claude turned pale again, and the scholar pursued carelessly. And that word below it, graved by the same hand, Avivella, signifies impurity. You see that people do know their Greek. And the Archdeacon remained silent. The Greek lesson had rendered him thoughtful. Master Johan, who possessed all the artful ways of a spoiled child, judged that the moment was a favourable one in which to risk his request. Accordingly he assumed an extremely soft tone and began, My good brother, do you hate me to such a degree as to look savagely upon me because of a few mischievous cuffs and blows distributed in a fair way to a pack of lads and brats? Hue bustum marmositas? You see, good brother Claude, that people know their Latin. But all his caressing hypocrisy did not have its usual effect on the severe elder brother. Cerberus did not bite at the honey cake. The Archdeacon's brow did not lose a single wrinkle. What are you driving at? he said, dryly. Well, in point of fact, this, replied Johan bravely. I stand in need of money. At this audacious declaration the Archdeacon's visage assumed a thoroughly pedagogical and paternal expression. You know, Mansil Johan, that our thief of Tirchapet, putting the direct taxes and the rents of the nine and twenty houses in a block, yields only nine and thirty livras, eleven sous, six deniers, Parisian. It is one half more than in the time of the brother's paquet, but it is not much. I need money, said Johan stoically. You know that the official has decided that our twenty-one houses should be moved fold into the thief of the bishopric, and that we could redeem this homage only by paying the Reverend Bishop two marks of silver guilt of the price of six livras peresee. Now, these two marks I have not yet been able to get together. You know it. I know that I stand in need of money, repeated Johan for the third time. And what are you going to do with it? This question caused a flash of hope to gleam before Johan's eyes. He resumed his dainty caressing air. Stay, dear brother Claude. I should not come to you with any evil motive. There is no intention of cutting a dash in the taverns with your own zanes, of strutting about the streets of Paris in a comparison of gold brocade with a lackey, comio loquacio. No, brother, tis for a good work. What good work! demanded Claude, somewhat surprised. Two of my friends wished to purchase an outfit for the infant of a poor Audreyette widow. It is a charity. It will cost three forms, and I should like to contribute to it. What are names of your two friends? Pierre Losaumier and Baptiste Crocoisson. Peter the Slaughterer and Baptist Crac Gosling. Hum! said the Archdeacon. Those are names as fit for a good work as a catapult for the chief alter. It is certain that Johan had made a very bad choice of names for his two friends. He realized it too late. And then pursued the sagacious Claude. What sort of an infant's outfit is it that it is to cost three forms, and that for the child of an Audreyette? Since when have the Audreyette widows taken to having babes in swaddling clothes? Johan broke the ice once more. Ah, well, yes. I need the money in order to go and see Isabelle La Théorie tonight, I'd deval d'amour. Impure wretch! exclaimed the priest. Avivella! said Johan. This quotation, which the scholar borrowed with malice per chance from the wall of the cell, produced a singular effect on the Archdeacon. He bit his lips, and his wrath was drowned in a crimson flush. Begone! he said to Johan. I am expecting someone. The scholar made one more effort. Brother Claude, give me at least one little pericy to buy something to eat. How far have you gone in the decritos of Gratian? demanded Dom Claude. I have lost my copy books. Where are you in your Latin humanities? My copy of Horace has been stolen. Where are you in Aristotle? If faith, brother, what father of the church is it, who says that the errors of heretics have always had for their lurking place the tickets of Aristotle's metaphysics? A plague on Aristotle. I care not to tear my religion on his metaphysics. Young man, resumed the Archdeacon. At the king's last entry there was a young gentleman named Philippe de Cominé, who wore, embroidered on the housings of his horse, this device upon which I counsel you to meditate. Queen non-laborate, non-mendoussette. The scholar remained silent for a moment, with his finger in his ear, his eyes on the ground, and a discomfort at mean. All at once he turned round to Claude with the agile quickness of a wag-tail. So, my good brother, you refuse me a sous-parisie, where with to buy a crust at a baker's shop? Queen non-laborate, non-mendoussette. At this response of the inflexible Archdeacon, Jehan hit his head in his hands like a woman sobbing, and exclaimed with an expression of despair, O-ro-ro-ro-ro-ro-ro-ro-ro-ro-ro-ro-ro! What is the meaning of this, sir? demanded Claude, surprised at this freak. What indeed! said the scholar, and he lifted to Claude his imputed eyes into which he had just thrust his fists in order to communicate to them the redness of tears. Tis Greek! Tis an anapest of Asia-less, which expresses grief perfectly. And here he burst into a laugh so droll and violent that it made the Archdeacon smile. It was Claude's fault, in fact. Why had he spoiled that child? Oh, good brother Claude! resumed Jehan, emboldened by this smile. Look at my worn-out boots! Is there a catherness in the world more tragic than these boots whose souls are hanging out their tongues? The Archdeacon promptly returned to his original severity. I will send you some new boots, but no money. Only a poor little pericy, brother, continue the suppliant, Jehan. I will learn Gratian by heart. I will believe firmly in God. I would be a regular Pythagoras of science and virtue. But one little pericy in mercy. Will you have Thamon bite me with its jaws which are gaping in front of me, blacker, deeper, and more noisome than a tartarous or the nose of a monk? Dom Claude shook his wrinkled head. Queen on laborat? Jehan did not allow him to finish. Well, he exclaimed, to the devil then! Long live joy! I will live in the tavern! I will fight! I will break pots and I will go and see wenches! And thereupon he hurled his cap at the wall and snapped his fingers like castanets. The Archdeacon surveyed him with a gloomy air. Jehan, you have no soul! In that case, according to Epicurious, I like a something made of another something which has no name. Jehan, you must think seriously of amending your ways. Oh, come now! cried the student, gazing in turn at his brother and the alembics on the furnace. Everything is preposterous here, both ideas and bottles. Jehan, you are on a very slippery downward road. Do you know whither you are going? To the wine-shop, said Jehan. The wine-shop leads to the pillory. Tis as good a lantern as any other, and perchance with that one, Diogenes would have found his man. The pillory leads to the gallows. The gallows is a balance which has a man at one end and the whole earth at the other. Tis fine to be the man. The gallows leads to hell. Tis a big fire. Jehan, Jehan, the end will be bad. The beginning will have been good. At that moment the sound of a footstep was heard on the staircase. Silence! said the archdeacon, laying his finger on his mouth. Here is Master Jacques. Listen, Jehan, he added in a low voice. Have a care never to speak of what you shall have seen or heard here. Hide yourself quickly under the furnace, and do not breathe. The scholar concealed himself. Just then a happy idea occurred to him. By the way, Brother Claude, a form for not breathing? Silence! I promise! You must give it to me. Take it, then! said the archdeacon angrily, flinging his purse at him. Jehan darted under the furnace again, and the door opened. End of Book Seven, Chapter Four Book Seven, Chapter Five, of the Hunchback of Notre-Dame by Victor Hugo. This Liberbox recording is in the public domain. Book Seven, Chapter Five The Two Men Clothed in Black The personage who entered wore a black gown and a gloomy mean. The first point which struck the eye of our Jehan, who, as the reader will readily surmise, had ensconced himself in his nook in such a manner as to enable him to see and hear everything at his good pleasure. Was the perfect sadness of the garments and the visage of this newcomer? There was, nevertheless, some sweetness diffused over that face, but it was the sweetness of a cat or a judge, and affected treacherous sweetness. He was very gray and wrinkled, and not far from his sixtieth year. His eyes blinked, his eyebrows were white, his lips pendulous, and his hands large. When Jehan saw that it was only this, that is to say, no doubt a physician or a magistrate, and that this man had a nose very far from his mouth, a sign of stupidity, he nestled down in his hole, in despair at being obliged to pass an indefinite time in such an uncomfortable attitude and in such bad company. The Archdeacon, in the meantime, had not even risen to receive this personage. He had made the latter a sign to seat himself on a stool near the door, and after several moments of a silence which appeared to be a continuation of a proceeding meditation, he said to him in a rather patronizing way, Good day, Master Jacques! Greeting, Master! replied the man in black. There was in the two ways in which Master Jacques was pronounced on the one hand, and the Master by preeminence on the other, the difference between Monsignor and Monsieur, between Domine and Domnie. It was evidently the meeting of a teacher and a disciple. Well, resumed the Archdeacon, after a fresh silence which Master Jacques took good care not to disturb. How are you succeeding? Alas, Master! said the other with a sad smile! I am still seeking the stone. Plenty of ashes, but not a spark of gold. Dom Claude made a gesture of impatience. I am not talking to you of that, Master Jacques Chameleux, but of the trial of your magician. Is it not Marx and Nan that you call him the butler of the Court of Accounts? Does he confess his witchcraft? Have you been successful with the torture? Alas, no! replied Master Jacques, still with his sad smile. We have not that consolation. That man is a stone. We might have him boiled in the Marsha-Parsaud before he would say anything. Nevertheless, we are sparing nothing for the sake of getting out the truth. He is already thoroughly dislocated. We are applying all the herbs of St. John's Day. As saith the old comedian Plautus, advorsum stimulus laminas cruquesche compadescu, neros cattinas carceris numeles pedicus boyas. Nothing answers. That man is terrible. I am at my wit's end over him. You have found nothing new in his house? If faith, yes, said Master Jacques, fumbling in his pouch. This parchment. There are words in it which we cannot comprehend. The criminal advocate, Montseur-Philippe Lolié, nevertheless, knows a little Hebrew, which he learned in that matter of the Jews of the Rue Caterestan at Brussels. So saying, Master Jacques unrolled a parchment. Give it here, said the Archdeacon, and casting his eyes upon this writing. Pure magic, Master Jacques, he exclaimed. Iman etan. It is the cry of the vampires when they arrive at the witch's sabbath, per ipsum et kum ipso et in ipso. Tis the command which changed the devil in hell. Axe, pax, max. That refers to medicine. A formula against the bite of mad dogs. Master Jacques, you are a procurator to the king in the ecclesiastical courts. This parchment is abominable. We will put the man to the torture once more. Here again, added Master Jacques, fumbling afresh in his pouch, is something that we have found at Max and Anne's house. It was a vessel belonging to the same family as those who covered Dom Claude's furnace. Ah, said the Archdeacon, a crucible for alchemy. I will confess to you, continued Master Jacques with his timid and awkward smile. That I have tried it over the furnace, but I have succeeded no better than with my own. The Archdeacon began an examination of the vessel. What has he engraved on this crucible? Ah, ah, the word which expels fleas. That Max and Anne is an ignoramus. I verily believe that you will never make gold with this. Just good to set in your bedroom in summer, and that is all. Since we are talking about errors, said the king's procurator, I have just been studying the figures on the portal below before ascending hither. Is your reverence quite sure that the opening of the work of physics is there portrayed on the side towards the Hotel d'Hier, and that among the seven nude figures withstand at the feet of Notre-Dame, that which has wings on his heels is mercurious? Yes, replied the priest. Tis Auguste Niffo who writes it. That Italian doctor who had a bearded demon who acquainted him with all things. However, we will descend, and I will explain it to you with the text before us. Thanks, master, said Charméleux, bowing to the earth. By the way, I was on the point of forgetting. When doth it please you that I shall apprehend the little sorceress? What sorceress? That gypsy girl, you know, who comes every day to dance on the church square, in spite of the official's prohibition. She hath a demonic goat with horns of the devil, which reads, which writes, which knows mathematics like Picatrix, and which would suffice to hang all Bohemia. The prosecution is all ready. To as soon be finished, I assure you. A pretty creature on my soul, that dancer. The handsomest black eyes. Two Egyptian carbuncles. When shall we begin? The archdeacon was excessively pale. I will tell you that hereafter, he stammered, in a voice that was barely articulate. Then he resumed with an effort. Busy yourself with Marc Sennayne. Be at ease, said Charméleux, with a smile. I'll buckle him down again for you on the leather bed when I get home. But is a devil of a man. He wearies even Piria Torterou himself, who hath hands larger than my own. As that good plow to Seith, nodus victus sentum pondo es quando pendis perpedis. The torture of the wheel at axle, tis the most effectual. He shall taste it. Dom Claude seemed absorbed in gloomy abstraction. He turned to Charméleux. Master Pirat, Master Jacques Amin, busy yourself with Marc Sennayne. Yes, yes, Dom Claude. Poor man! He will have suffered like mum all. What an idea to go to the witch's sabbath! A butler of the court of accounts, who ought to know Charlemagne's text! Striga Velmasia! In the matter of the little girl, Smillard as they call her, I will await your orders. Ah! As we pass through the portal, you will explain to me also the meaning of the gardener painted in relief, which one sees as one enters the church. Is it not the sower? A master, of what are you thinking, pray? Dom Claude buried in his own thoughts no longer listen to him. Charméleux, following the direction of his glance, perceived that it was fixed mechanically on the great spider's web which draped the window. At that moment a bewildered fly which was seeking the Marc's son flung itself through the net and became entangled there. On the agitation of his web the enormous spider made an abrupt move from his central cell, then with one bound rushed upon the fly which he folded together with his fore antenna, while his hideous probiscous dug into the victim's head. Poor fly, said the king's procurator in the ecclesiastical court, and he raised his hand to save it. The arch-deacon, as though roused with a start, withheld his arm with convulsive violence. Master Jacques, he cried, let fate take its course. The procurator wheeled round in a fright. It seemed to him that pincers of iron had clutched his arm. The priest's eye was staring, wild, flaming, and remained riveted on the horrible little group of the spider and the fly. Oh, yes! continued the priest, in a voice which seemed to proceed from the depths of his being. Behold here, a symbol of all! She flies, she is joyous, she is just born. She seeks the spring, the open air, liberty. Oh, yes! But let her come in contact with the fatal network, and the spider issues from it the hideous spider. Poor dancer, poor predestined fly. Let things take their course, Master Jacques. Tis fate. Alas! Claude, thou art the spider. Claude, thou art the fly also. Thou wert flying towards learning, light, the sun. Thou hast no other care than to reach the open air, the full daylight of eternal truth. But in precipitating thyself towards the dazzling window which opens upon the other world, upon the world of brightness, intelligence, and science. Blind fly, senseless learned man. Thou hast not perceived that subtle spider's web, stretched by destiny, betwixt the light and thee. Thou hast flung thyself headlong into it, and now thou art struggling with headbroken and mangled wings between the iron antennae of fate. Master Jacques, Master Jacques, let the spider work its will. I assure you, said Charmeleux, who was gazing at him without comprehending him, that I will not touch it. But release my arm, Master, for pity's sake. You have a hand like a pair of pincers. The archdeacon did not hear him. Oh, mad man! he went on, without removing his gaze from the window. And even couldst thou have broken through that formidable web, with thy gnats' wings, thou believest that thou couldst have reached the light? Alas! that pain of glass which is further on, that transparent obstacle, that wall of crystal, harder than brass, which separates all philosophies from the truth, how wouldst thou have overcome it? Oh, vanity of science! how many wise men come flying from afar to dash their heads against thee! How many systems vainly fling themselves buzzing against that eternal pain! He became silent. These last ideas, which had gradually led him back from himself to science, appeared to have calmed him. Jacques Charmeleux recalled him wholly to a sense of reality by addressing to him this question. Come now, Master, when will you come to aid me in making gold? I am impatient to succeed. The archdeacon shook his head with a bitter smile. Master Jacques, read Michel Cellus Dioligus di Energia et Appretione di Monum. What we are doing is not wholly innocent. Speak lower, Master. I have my suspicions of it, said Jacques Charmeleux. But one must practice a bit of hermetic science when one is only procurator of the king in the ecclesiastical court at 30 crowns to noir year. Only speak low. At that moment the sound of jaws in the act of mastication which proceeded from beneath the surface struck Charmeleux's uneasy ear. What's that? he inquired. It was the scholar who, ill at ease and greatly bored in his hiding-place, had succeeded in discovering there a stale crust and a triangle of moldy cheese, and had set to devouring the whole without ceremony by way of consolation and breakfast. As he was very hungry he had made a great deal of noise, and he accented each mouthful strongly which startled and alarmed the procurator. "'Tis a cat of mine,' said the archdeacon quickly, who is regaling herself under there with a mouse. This explanation satisfied Charmeleux. "'In fact, Master,' he replied, with a respectful smile, all great philosophers have their familiar animal. You know what Servius saith. Nullus inum locus sine gineo est, for there is no place that hath not its spirit.' But Dom Claude, who stood in terror of some new freak on the part of Jean, reminded his worthy disciple that they had some figures on the façade to study together, and the two quitted the cell, to the accompaniment of a great ouf from the scholar, who began to seriously fear that his knee would acquire the imprint of his chin.