Les Misérables, v. 5

Their clothes, clean in the time of Magnon, and which served her as a prospectus to M. Gillenormand, had become rags; and these beings henceforth belonged to the statistics of "deserted children," whom the police pick up, lose, and find again on the pavement of Paris. It needed the confusion of such a day as this for these two poor little wretches to be in this garden. If the inspectors had noticed these rags they would have expelled them, for poor little lads do not enter public gardens, and yet it ought to be remembered that as children they have a right to flowers. They were here, thanks to the locked gates, and were committing an offence; they had stepped into the garden and remained there. Though locked gates do not give a holiday to the keepers, and their surveillance is supposed to continue, it grows weaker and rests; and the inspectors, also affected by the public affairs, and more busied about the outside than the inside, did not look at the garden, and had not seen the two delinquents. It had rained on the previous evening, and even slightly on this morning, but in June, showers are of no great consequence. People hardly perceive, an hour after a storm, that this fair beauteous day has wept, for the earth dries up as rapidly as a child's cheek. At this moment of the solstice the midday light is, so to speak, poignant, and it seizes everything. It clings to and spreads itself over the earth with a sort of suction, and we might say that the sun is thirsty. A shower is a glass of water, and rain is at once drunk up. In the morning everything glistens, in the afternoon everything is dusty. Nothing is so admirable as verdure cleansed by the rain and dried by the sun; it is warm freshness. Gardens and fields, having water in their roots and sunshine in their flowers, become censers of incense, and smoke with all their perfumes at once. Everything laughs, sings, and offers itself, and we feel softly intoxicated: summer is a temporary Paradise, and the sun helps man to be patient.

There are beings who ask no more, – living creatures who, having the azure of heaven, say it is enough; dreamers absorbed in the prodigy, drawing from the idolatry of nature indifference to good and evil; contemplators of the Cosmos, radiantly distracted from man, who do not understand how people can trouble themselves about the hunger of one person, the thirst of another, the nudity of the poor man in winter, the lymphatic curvature of a small backbone, the truck-bed, the garret, the cell, and the rags of young shivering girls, when they can dream under the trees: they are peaceful and terrible minds, pitilessly satisfied, and, strange to say, infinitude suffices them. They ignore that great want of man, the finite which admits of an embrace, and do not dream of the finite which admits of progress, that sublime toil. The indefinite, which springs from the divine and human combination of the infinite and the finite, escapes them, and provided that they can be face to face with immensity, they smile. They never feel joy, but always ecstasy, and their life is one of abstraction. The history of humanity is to them but a grand detail: the All is not in it, the All remains outside of it. Of what use is it to trouble one's self about that item, man? Man suffers, it is possible, but just look at Aldebaran rising! The mother has no milk left, the new-born babe is dying. I know nothing of all that, but just look at the marvellous rose made by a sprig of hawthorn when looked at through a microscope; just compare the finest Mechlin lace with that! These thinkers forget to love, and the zodiac has such an attraction over them that it prevents them seeing the weeping child. God eclipses their soul, and they are a family of minds at once great and little. Homer belonged to it; so did Goethe, and possibly Lafontaine, magnificent egotists of the infinite, calm spectators of sorrow, who do not see Nero if the weather be fine; from whom the sun hides the pyre; who would look at a guillotining to seek a light effect in it; who hear neither cries nor sobs, nor the death-rattle nor the tocsin; for whom everything is good, since there is the month of May; who so long as they have clouds of purple and gold above their heads declare themselves satisfied; and who are determined to be happy until the radiance of the stars and the song of birds are exhausted.

These are darkly radiant, and they do not suspect that they are to be pitied. But they are certainly so, for the man who does not weep does not see. We must admire and pity them, as we would pity and admire a being at once night and day, who had no eyes under his brows, but a star in the centre of his forehead. The indifference of these thinkers is, according to some, a grand philosophy. Be it so; but in this superiority there is infirmity. A man may be immortal and limp, as witness Vulcan, and he may be more than man and less than man; there is immense incompleteness in nature, and who knows whether the sun be not blind? But in that case, whom to trust? Solem quis dicere falsum audeat? Hence, certain geniuses, certain human deities, star-men, might be mistaken? What is above at the summit, at the zenith, which pours so much light on the earth, might see little, see badly, not see at all? Is not that desperate? No: but what is there above the sun? God.

On June 6, 1832, at about eleven in the forenoon, the Luxembourg, solitary and depopulated, was delicious. The quincunxes and flower-beds sent balm and dazzlement into the light, and the branches, wild in the brilliancy of midday, seemed trying to embrace one another. There was in the sycamores a twittering of linnets, the sparrows were triumphal, and the woodpeckers crept along the chestnut, gently tapping holes in the bark. The beds accepted the legitimate royalty of the lilies, for the most august of perfumes is that which issues from whiteness. The sharp odor of the carnations was inhaled, and the old rooks of Marie de Medicis made love on the lofty trees. The sun gilded, purpled, and illumined the tulips, which are nothing but all the varieties of flame made into flowers. All around the tulip-beds hummed the bees, the flashes of these fire-flowers. All was grace and gayety, even the coming shower, for that relapse by which the lilies of the valley and honeysuckles would profit had nothing alarming about it, and the swallows made the delicious menace of flying low. What was there inhaled happiness: life smelt pleasantly, and all this nature exhaled candor, help, assistance, paternity, caresses, and dawn. The thoughts that fell from heaven were as soft as a babe's little hand that we kiss. The statues under the trees, nude and white, were robed in dresses of shadow shot with light; these goddesses were all ragged with sunshine, and beams hung from them on all sides. Around the great basin the earth was already so dry as to be parched, and there was a breeze sufficiently strong to create here and there small riots of dust. A few yellow leaves remaining from the last autumn joyously pursued one another, and seemed to be sporting.

The abundance of light had something strangely reassuring about it; life, sap, heat, and exhalations overflowed, and the greatness of the source could be felt beneath creation. In all these blasts penetrated with love, in this movement of reflections and gleams, in this prodigious expenditure of beams, and in this indefinite outpouring of fluid gold, the prodigality of the inexhaustible could be felt; and behind this splendor, as behind a curtain of flames, glimpses of God, that millionnaire of the stars, could be caught. Thanks to the sand, there was not a speck of mud; and, thanks to the rain, there was not a grain of dust The bouquets had just performed their ablutions, and all the velvets, all the satins, all the varnish, and all the gold which issue from the earth in the shape of flowers, were irreproachable. This magnificence was clean, and the grand silence of happy nature filled the garden, – a heavenly silence, compatible with a thousand strains of music, the fondling tones from the nests, the buzzing of the swarms, and the palpitations of the wind. All the harmony of the season was blended into a graceful whole, the entrances and exits of spring took place in the desired order, the lilacs were finishing, and the jessamine beginning, a few flowers were behindhand, a few insects before their time, and the vanguard of the red butterflies of June fraternized with the rearguard of the white butterflies of May. The plane-trees were putting on a fresh skin, and the breeze formed undulations in the magnificent enormity of the chest-nut-trees. It was splendid. A veteran from the adjoining barracks who was looking through the railings said, "Spring presents arms in full dress."

All nature was breakfasting; the creation was at table; it was the hour: the great blue cloth was laid in heaven, and the great green one on earth, while the sun gave an à giorno illumination. God was serving His universal meal, and each being had its pasture or its pasty. The wood-pigeon found hempseed, the chaffinch found millet, the goldfinch found chickweed, the redbreast found worms, the bee found flowers, the fly found infusoria, and the greenfinch found flies. They certainly devoured one another to some extent, which is the mystery of evil mingled with good, but not a single animal had an empty stomach. The two poor abandoned boys had got near the great basin, and somewhat confused by all this light, tried to hide themselves, which is the instinct of the poor and the weak in the presence of magnificence, even when it is impersonal, and they kept behind the swan's house. Now and then, at intervals when the wind blew, confused shouts, a rumbling, a sort of tumultuous death-rattle which was musketry, and dull blows which were cannon-shots, could be heard. There was smoke above the roofs in the direction of the markets, and a bell which seemed to be summoning sounded in the distance. The children did not seem to notice the noises, and the younger lad repeated every now and then in a low voice, "I am hungry."

Almost simultaneously with the two boys another couple approached the basin, consisting of a man of about fifty, leading by the hand a boy of six years of age. It was doubtless a father with his son. The younger of the two had a cake in his hand. At this period certain contiguous houses in the Rue Madame and the Rue d'Enfer had keys to the Luxembourg, by which the lodgers could let themselves in when the gates were locked; but this permission has since been withdrawn. This father and son evidently came from one of these houses. The two poor little creatures saw "this gentleman" coming, and hid themselves a little more. He was a citizen, and perhaps the same whom Marius during his love-fever had one day heard near the same great basin counselling his son "to avoid excesses." He had an affable and haughty look, and a mouth which, as it did not close, always smiled. This mechanical smile, produced by too much jaw and too little skin, shows the teeth rather than the soul. The boy with the bitten cake which he had not finished, seemed glutted; the boy was dressed in a National Guard's uniform, on account of the riots, and the father remained in civilian garb for the sake of prudence. Father and son had halted near the great basin, in which the two swans were disporting. This bourgeois appeared to have a special admiration for the swans, and resembled them in the sense that he walked like them. At this moment the swans were swimming, which is their principal talent, and were superb. Had the two little fellows listened, and been of an age to comprehend, they might have overheard the remarks of a serious man; the father was saying to his son, —

"The sage lives contented with little; look at me, my son, I do not care for luxury. You never see me in a coat glistening with gold and precious stones; I leave that false lustre to badly-organized minds."

Here the deep shouts which came from the direction of the Halles broke out, with a redoublement of hells and noise.

"What is that?" the lad asked.

The father replied, —

"That is the saturnalia."

All at once he perceived the two little ragged boys standing motionless behind the swan's green house.

"Here is the beginning," he said.

And after a silence he added, —

"Anarchy enters this garden."

In the mean while the boy bit the cake, spat it out again, and suddenly began crying.

"Why are you crying?" the father asked.

"I am no longer hungry," said the boy.

The father's smile became more marked than ever.

"You need not be hungry to eat a cake."

"I am tired of cake; it is so filling."

"Don't you want any more?"

"No."

The father showed him the swans.

"Throw it to those palmipeds."

The boy hesitated, for if he did not want any more cake that was no reason to give it away.

The father continued, —

"Be humane: you ought to have pity on animals."

And, taking the cake from his son, he threw it into the basin, where it fell rather near the bank. The swans were some distance off, near the centre of the basin, and engaged with some prey: they had seen neither the citizen nor the cake. The citizen, feeling that the cake ran a risk of being lost, and affected by this useless shipwreck, began a telegraphic agitation which eventually attracted the attention of the swans. They noticed something floating on the surface, tacked, like the vessels they are, and came towards the cake slowly, with the majesty that befits white beasts.

"Swans understand signs," said the bourgeois, pleased at his own cleverness.

At this moment the distant tumult of the city was suddenly swollen. This time it was sinister, and there are some puffs of wind which speak more distinctly than others. The one which blew at this moment distinctly brought up the rolling of drums, shouts, platoon fires, and the mournful replies of the tocsin, and the cannon. This coincided with a black cloud which suddenly veiled the sky. The swans had not yet reached the cake.

"Let us go home," the father said; "they are attacking the Tuileries,"

He seized his son's hand again, and then continued, —

"From the Tuileries to the Luxembourg there is only the distance which separates the royalty from the peerage; and that is not far. It is going to rain musketry."

He looked at the cloud, —

"And perhaps we shall have rain of the other sort too; heaven is interfering: the younger branch is condemned. Let us make haste home."

"I should like to see the swans eat the cake," said the boy.

"It would be imprudent," the father answered; and he led away his little bourgeois. The son, regretting the swans, turned his head toward the basin, until a bend in the quincunxes concealed it from him. The two little vagabonds had in the mean while approached the cake simultaneously with the swans. It was floating on the water; the smaller boy looked at the cake; the other looked at the citizen, who was going off. Father and son entered the labyrinth of trees that runs to the grand staircase of the clump of trees in the direction of the Rue Madame. When they were no longer in sight, the elder hurriedly lay down full length on the rounded bank of the basin, and holding by his left hand, while bending over the water, till he all but fell in, he stretched out his switch toward the cake with the other. The swans, seeing the enemy, hastened up, and in hastening their breasts produced an effect useful to the little fisher: the water flowed back in front of the swans, and one of the gentle, concentric undulations slightly impelled the cake toward the boy's switch. When the swans came up, the stick was touching the cake; the lad gave a quick blow, startled the swans, seized the cake, and arose. The cake was soaking, but they were hungry and thirsty. The elder boy divided the cake into two parts, a large one and a small one, kept the small one for himself, and gave the larger piece to his brother, saying, —

"Shove that into your gun."