by Victor Hugo
There was a burst of laughter and applause. A pun is always instantly appreciated in Paris, and consequently always applauded.
Let us add that Coppenole was a man of the people, and that the audience about him consisted of the people only; thus the sympathy between them was prompt, electric, and they were at once on an equal footing. The proud exclamation of the Flemish hosier, while it mortified the courtiers, stirred in every humble soul a certain sense of dignity still vague and indistinct, in the fifteenth century . This hosier, who had just held his own before the Cardinal himself, was their equal! A very pleasant thought for poor devils who were wont to respect and obey the servants of the officers of the bailiff of the Abbot of St. Geneviève, train-bearer to the Cardinal.
Coppenole bowed haughtily to his Eminence, who returned the salutation of the all-powerful citizen dreaded by Louis XI. Then, while Guillaume Rym, “a wise and wily man,” as Philippe de Comines has it, watched them both with a smile full of mocking and superiority, they took each his place,—the Cardinal troubled and disconcerted, Coppenole calm and erect, doubtless thinking that after all his title of hosier was quite as good as any other, and that Mary of Burgundy, mother of that Margaret whose marriage he was now negotiating, would have feared him less as cardinal than as hosier; for no cardinal would have led on the men of Ghent against the favorites of the daughter of Charles the Bold; no cardinal could have hardened the hearts of the masses against her tears and her prayers, by a single word, when the heiress of Flanders besought her people to grant their pardon, at the very foot of their scaffold; while the hosier had but to lift his leathern elbow to cause both your heads to fall, O ye illustrious lords, Guy d‘Hymbercourt and Chancellor Guillaume Hugonet!
But all was not over yet for the poor Cardinal, who was to drink the dregs of the bitter cup of association with such low company.
The reader may perhaps recall the impudent beggar who clung to the fringes of the Cardinal’s dais at the opening of the prologue. The arrival of the distinguished guests did not cause him to relax his hold; and while prelates and ambassadors were packed as close as Dutch herrings in the seats upon the platform, he made himself quite comfortable, and coolly crossed his legs upon the architrave. Such insolence was unusual, and no one noted it at the moment, attention being fixed elsewhere. He for his part saw nothing in the hall; he swayed his head to and fro with the careless ease of a Neapolitan, repeating ever and anon amid the din, as if mechanically, “Charity, kind people!” and certainly he was the only one in the entire audience who did not deign to turn his head to listen to the altercation between Coppenole and the usher. Now, as chance would have it, the master hosier of Ghent, with whom the people already sympathized strongly, and upon whom all eyes were fixed, seated himself in the front row upon the platform, just above the beggar; and they were not a little amazed to see the Flemish ambassador, after glancing at the rascal beneath him, give him a friendly slap upon his tattered shoulder. The beggar turned; surprise, recognition, delight, were visible in both faces, then, without paying the slightest heed to the throng of spectators, the hosier and the scurvy knave fell to talking in low tones, clasping each other’s hands; while the rags of Clopin Trouillefou, displayed against the cloth of gold of the dais, produced the effect of a caterpillar upon an orange.
The novelty of this strange scene excited such an outburst of mirth in the hall that the Cardinal quickly perceived it; he bent forward, and, unable from his position to catch more than a glimpse of Trouillefou’s disgraceful garments, he quite naturally supposed that the beggar was asking alms, and, indignant at his audacity, he exclaimed, “Sir Bailiff of the Palace, throw that rascal into the river!”
“By God’s cross! Sir Cardinal,” said Coppenole, without releasing Clopin’s hand, “he is my friend.”
“Noël! Noël” cried the mob. From that instant Master Coppenole was “in high favor with the people,” in Paris as in Ghent; “for men of his cut always are,” says Philippe de Comines, “when they are thus disorderly.”
The Cardinal bit his lip. He bent towards his neighbor, the Abbot of St. Geneviève, and said in an undertone:—
“Pleasant ambassadors are these sent us by the arch-duke to announce the coming of Lady Margaret!”
“Your Eminence,” replied the abbot, “wastes his courtesies upon these Flemish grunters,—Margaritas ante porcos.”u
“Say rather,” replied the Cardinal with a smile, “Porcos ante Margaritam.”v
All the little court in priestly robes went into ecstasies over the joke. The Cardinal felt slightly comforted: he was quits with Coppenole; his pun also had been applauded.
Now, let those of our readers who have the power of generalizing an image and an idea, as it is the pleasant fashion to express it, allow us to ask them if they have a distinct conception of the spectacle afforded, at the moment that we claim their attention, by the vast parallelogram of the great hall of the Palace: In the center of the hall, against the western wall, a broad and magnificent platform covered with gold brocade, upon which stepped in procession, through a small arched doorway, a number of grave and reverend personages successively announced by the nasal voice of an usher; on the foremost benches, already seated, various venerable figures wrapped in ermine, velvet, and scarlet; around the dais, where all was dignity and silence, below, in front, everywhere, a great crowd and a great uproar; a thousand eyes from the crowd fixed upon every face on the platform, a thousand murmurs upon the announcement of every name. Certainly the sight is a strange one, and well worthy the attention of the spectators. But below there, at the extreme end, what is that kind of trestle-work with four motley puppets above and four more below? Who is that pale-faced man in a black coat beside the boards? Alas! dear reader, that is Pierre Gringoire and his prologue.
We had all entirely forgotten him.
This was precisely what he feared.
From the instant that the Cardinal entered, Gringoire had never ceased working for the salvation of his prologue. He at first en-joined the actors, who remained in suspense, to go on, and to raise their voices; then, seeing that no one was listening, he stopped them; and then, after the interruption had lasted nearly fifteen minutes, he began to stamp, to struggle, to question Gisquette and Lie narde, and to encourage his neighbors to call for the prologue. All in vain; not an eye would move from the Cardinal, the ambassadors, and the dais,—the sole center of that vast circle of visual rays. We must therefore believe, and we say it with regret, that the prologue was beginning to be somewhat tedious to the audience at the moment that his Eminence caused so terrible a diversion. After all, the spectacle was the same upon the dais as upon the marble table,—the conflict between Labor and Religion, Nobility and Commerce; and many people preferred to see them simply, in living, breathing reality, elbowing and pushing, in flesh and blood, in this Flemish embassy, in this Episcopal court, beneath the Cardinal’s robe, beneath the jacket of Coppenole, rather than painted and decked out, speaking in artificial verse, and as it were stuffed with straw beneath the white and yellow tunics in which Gringoire had arrayed them.
However, when our poet saw that peace was beginning to reign once more, he hit upon a stratagem which might have saved all.
“Sir,” said he, turning towards one of his neighbors, a good fat fellow with a patient face, “suppose they begin again?”
“Begin what?” said the neighbor.
“Why, the mystery!” said Gringoire.
“If you like,” responded his neighbor.
This lukewarm approval was enough for Gringoire, and acting for himself he began to shout, mixing with the crowd as much as he could, “Go on with the miracle-play! Go on!”
“The devil!” said Joannes de Molendino, “what are they bawling about over there?” (For Gringoire made noise enough for four.) “Say, boys, isn’t the play done? They want to have it all over again; it’s not fair.”
“No, no!” cried the students. “Down with the mystery! down with it!”
; But Gringoire seemed ubiquitous, and shouted louder than before, “Go on! go on!”
These outcries attracted the attention of the Cardinal.
“Bailiff,” he said to a tall dark man seated near him, “are those devils caught in a font of holy water, that they make such an infernal noise?”
The Bailiff of the Palace was a species of amphibious magistrate, a sort of bat of the judicial order, partaking at once of the nature of the rat and the bird, the judge and the soldier.
He approached his Eminence, and, not without serious fears of his displeasure, stammered out an explanation of the popular misconduct, —that noon had come before his Eminence, and that the actors were obliged to begin without awaiting his Eminence.
The Cardinal burst out laughing.
“Upon my word, the Rector of the University had better have done as much. What say you, Master Guillaume Rym?”
“My lord,” replied Guillaume Rym, “let us be content that we have escaped half the play. It is just so much gained.”
“May those rascals go on with their performance?” asked the bailiff.
“Go on, go on,” said the Cardinal; “it’s all the same to me. I will read my breviary in the meantime.”
The Provost advanced to the edge of the platform and cried aloud, after imposing silence by a wave of his hand: “Citizens, commoners, and residents: to satisfy those who wish the play to begin again and those who wish it to end, his Eminence orders that it be continued.”
Both parties were forced to submit. However, the author and the audience long cherished a grudge against the Cardinal.
The characters on the stage accordingly resumed their recital, and Gringoire hoped that the rest of his work at least would be heard. This hope soon proved as illusory as all the rest. Silence was indeed restored to a certain extent among the audience; but Gringoire had not remarked that, at the moment when the Cardinal gave the order to go on, the dais was far from being filled, and that in the train of the Flemish embassy came other personages forming part of the procession, whose names and titles, shouted out in the midst of his prologue by the intermittent cry of the usher, made many ravages in it. Imagine the effect, in the midst of a play, of the shrill voice of an usher uttering between two rhymes, and often between two hemistichs, such parentheses as these:—
“Master Jacques Charmolue, king’s attorney in the Ecclesiastical Court!”
“Jehan de Harlay, esquire, keeper of the office of captain of the watch of the city of Paris!”
“Master Galiot de Genoilhac, knight, Lord of Brussac, chief of the king’s ordnance!”
“Master Dreux-Raguier, inspector of the woods and waters of our lord the king, in the lands of France, Champagne, and Brie!”
“Master Louis de Graville, knight, councillor, and chamberlain to the king, admiral of France, keeper of the forest of Vincennes!”
“Master Denis le Mercier, guardian of the Home for the Blind of Paris!” etc.
This at last became insufferable.
This strange accompaniment, which made it very hard to follow the play, enraged Gringoire all the more because he could not blind himself to the fact that the interest was constantly increasing, and that all his work needed was to be heard. It was indeed difficult to conceive of a more ingenious and more dramatic context. The four characters of the prologue were lamenting their terrible embarrassment, when Venus in person (vera incessu patuit dea) appeared before them, clad in a fine coat of mail, emblazoned with the ship from the seal of the city of Paris. She came herself to claim the dolphin promised to the fairest of the fair. Jupiter, whose thunder was heard muttering in the dressing-room below, supported her claim, and the goddess was about to triumph,—that is, speaking without metaphor, to marry the Dauphin,—when a young child, habited in white damask and holding a daisy (an obvious allusion to the Lady of Flanders), came to contest the prize with Venus. Theatrical effect and sudden change of affairs! After some controversy, Venus, Margaret, and those behind the scenes agreed to refer the matter to the wise decision of the Holy Virgin. There was also another fine part, that of Don Pedro, King of Mesopotamia; but amid so many interruptions it was difficult to discover the object of his introduction. All these characters came up the ladder.
But it all was in vain; none of these beauties were appreciated or understood. With the Cardinal’s entrance, an invisible and magical cord seemed suddenly to draw all eyes from the marble table to the dais, from the southern to the western portion of the hall. Nothing could free the audience from the spell; every eye was fixed, and the newcomers and their accursed names, and their faces and their dresses, were a perpetual source of distraction. It was heartrending. Save for Gisquette and Liénarde, who occasionally turned away when Gringoire pulled them by the sleeve; save for the patient fat neighbor, no one listened to, no one looked at, the poor forsaken morality. Gringoire saw nothing but profiles.
With what bitterness he saw his whole framework of fame and poetry crumble away bit by bit! And to think that this very mob had been on the point of revolting against the bailiff, from sheer impatience to hear his work! Now that they had it, they cared nothing for it,—this same performance which began amid such universal applause! Eternal ebb and flow of popular favor! To think that they had come so near hanging the bailiff’s men! What would he not have given to recover that golden hour!
The usher’s brutal monologue ceased at last; every one had arrived, and Gringoire breathed again; the actors went bravely on.
But then what should Master Coppenole, the hosier, do but rise suddenly; and Gringoire heard him utter, amid universal attention, this abominable speech:—
“Citizens and squires of Paris, I know not, by God’s cross! what we are doing here. I do indeed see in yonder corner, upon those boards, people who look as if they were spoiling for a fight. I don’t know whether that is what you call a ‘mystery,’ but it is not at all amusing: they abuse one another, and get no farther. For full fifteen minutes I have been waiting for the first blow; nothing comes; they are cowards, who deal in no other weapons than insults. You ought to fetch a few wrestlers from London or Rotterdam, and then you’d have a treat! You would see blows that could be heard all over the place; but those fellows yonder are a disgrace. They might at least give us a Morris-dance or some other mummery! This is not what I was told I should see; I was promised a Feast of Fools and the election of a Pope. We have our Pope of Fools in Ghent, too; and we’re not behind you in that, by God’s cross! But this is how we do it: we collect a crowd, as you do here; then every man in his turn puts his head through a hole and pulls a face at the rest; he who makes the ugliest is chosen pope by popular acclaim; there! It’s very amusing. Would you like to choose your pope after the fashion of my country? At least it would be better than listening to those chatterboxes. If they will come and make their grimaces through the window, they can join the game. What say you, Sir Citizens? There are quite enough absurd specimens of both sexes here to give us a good Flemish laugh, and we have ugly mugs enough to hope for some fine grimaces.”
Gringoire longed to answer; but amazement, anger, indignation, robbed him of speech. Moreover, the proposal of the popular hosier was greeted with such enthusiasm by those plain citizens who were flattered at being dubbed “Squires,” that all opposition was useless. Nothing remained but to follow the current. Gringoire hid his face in his hands, not being lucky enough to have a cloak to cover his head, like Agamemnon of Timanthes.
CHAPTER V
Quasimodo
In the twinkling of an eye, all was ready for the execution of Coppenole’s idea. Citizens, students, and lawyers’ clerks set briskly to work. The little chapel opposite the marble table was chosen as the stage for the grimaces. A broken pane in the pretty rose-window over the door left free a circle of stone, through which it was agreed that the contestants should thrust their heads. To reach it, all were obliged to climb upon a couple of barrels, which had been discovered somewhere and set one upon the other. It was settled that
all candidates, men or women (for a papess might be chosen), lest the effect of their grimaces should be weakened, should cover their faces and remain hidden in the chapel until the proper moment to appear. In less than an instant the chapel was filled with aspirants, upon whom the door was closed.
Coppenole, from his seat, directed everything, arranged everything. During the confusion, the Cardinal, no less disconcerted than Gringoire, withdrew with all his train, feigning business and vespers; the same crowd which had been so stirred by his coming, showing not the least emotion at his departure. Guillaume Rym was the only one who observed his Eminence’s flight. Popular attention, like the sun, pursued its course; starting from one end of the hall, after pausing for some time in the center, it was now at the other end. The marble table, the brocaded dais, had had their day; it was the turn of Louis XI’s chapel. The field was now clear for every kind of folly. No one remained but the Flemings and the vulgar herd.
The grimaces began. The first to appear at the window, with eyelids inverted until they showed the red, a cavernous mouth, and a forehead wrinkled like the boots of a hussar under the Empire, produced such inextinguishable laughter, that Homer would have taken all these clowns for gods. And yet, the great hall was anything but an Olympus, and Gringoire’s poor Jupiter knew this better than any one. A second, a third wry face fol- 46 lowed, then another, and another; and still the shouts of laughter and stamps of delight increased. There was a certain peculiar intoxication in the spectacle, a certain potent ecstasy and fascination which it would be hard to explain to the reader of our own day and society. Let him imagine a series of faces presenting in turn every geometric form, from the triangle to the trapezium, from the cone to the polyhedron; every human expression, from rage to lust; every age, from the wrinkles of the new-born babe to the furrows of the old and dying; every religious phantasmagoria, from Faunus to Beelzebub; every animal profile, from the jaws of the dog to the beak of the bird, from the boar’s head to the pig’s snout. Let him picture to himself all the grotesque heads carved on the Pont Neuf, those petrified nightmares from the hand of Germain Pilon, taking breath and life, and coming in turn to gaze at you with fiery eyes; all the masks from a Venetian carnival passing before your glass,—in one word, a human kaleidoscope.