Chapter Chapter 19 · DETAILS CONCERNING THE CHEESE-DAIRIES OF PONTARLIER.

Now, in order to convey an idea of what passed at that table, we cannot

do better than to transcribe here a passage from one of Mademoiselle

Baptistine’s letters to Madame Boischevron, wherein the conversation

between the convict and the Bishop is described with ingenious

minuteness.

“. . . This man paid no attention to any one. He ate with the voracity

of a starving man. However, after supper he said:

“‘Monsieur le Curé of the good God, all this is far too good for me;

but I must say that the carters who would not allow me to eat with them

keep a better table than you do.’

“Between ourselves, the remark rather shocked me. My brother replied:—

“‘They are more fatigued than I.’

“‘No,’ returned the man, ‘they have more money. You are poor; I see

that plainly. You cannot be even a curate. Are you really a curé? Ah,

if the good God were but just, you certainly ought to be a curé!’

“‘The good God is more than just,’ said my brother.

“A moment later he added:—

“‘Monsieur Jean Valjean, is it to Pontarlier that you are going?’

“‘With my road marked out for me.’

“I think that is what the man said. Then he went on:—

“‘I must be on my way by daybreak to-morrow. Travelling is hard. If the

nights are cold, the days are hot.’

“‘You are going to a good country,’ said my brother. ‘During the

Revolution my family was ruined. I took refuge in Franche-Comté at

first, and there I lived for some time by the toil of my hands. My will

was good. I found plenty to occupy me. One has only to choose. There

are paper mills, tanneries, distilleries, oil factories, watch

factories on a large scale, steel mills, copper works, twenty iron

foundries at least, four of which, situated at Lods, at Châtillon, at

Audincourt, and at Beure, are tolerably large.’

“I think I am not mistaken in saying that those are the names which my

brother mentioned. Then he interrupted himself and addressed me:—

“‘Have we not some relatives in those parts, my dear sister?’

“I replied,—

“‘We did have some; among others, M. de Lucenet, who was captain of the

gates at Pontarlier under the old régime.’

“‘Yes,’ resumed my brother; ‘but in ’93, one had no longer any

relatives, one had only one’s arms. I worked. They have, in the country

of Pontarlier, whither you are going, Monsieur Valjean, a truly

patriarchal and truly charming industry, my sister. It is their

cheese-dairies, which they call _fruitières_.’

“Then my brother, while urging the man to eat, explained to him, with

great minuteness, what these _fruitières_ of Pontarlier were; that they

were divided into two classes: the _big barns_ which belong to the

rich, and where there are forty or fifty cows which produce from seven

to eight thousand cheeses each summer, and the _associated fruitières_,

which belong to the poor; these are the peasants of mid-mountain, who

hold their cows in common, and share the proceeds. ‘They engage the

services of a cheese-maker, whom they call the _grurin_; the _grurin_

receives the milk of the associates three times a day, and marks the

quantity on a double tally. It is towards the end of April that the

work of the cheese-dairies begins; it is towards the middle of June

that the cheese-makers drive their cows to the mountains.’

“The man recovered his animation as he ate. My brother made him drink

that good Mauves wine, which he does not drink himself, because he says

that wine is expensive. My brother imparted all these details with that

easy gayety of his with which you are acquainted, interspersing his

words with graceful attentions to me. He recurred frequently to that

comfortable trade of _grurin_, as though he wished the man to

understand, without advising him directly and harshly, that this would

afford him a refuge. One thing struck me. This man was what I have told

you. Well, neither during supper, nor during the entire evening, did my

brother utter a single word, with the exception of a few words about

Jesus when he entered, which could remind the man of what he was, nor

of what my brother was. To all appearances, it was an occasion for

preaching him a little sermon, and of impressing the Bishop on the

convict, so that a mark of the passage might remain behind. This might

have appeared to any one else who had this, unfortunate man in his

hands to afford a chance to nourish his soul as well as his body, and

to bestow upon him some reproach, seasoned with moralizing and advice,

or a little commiseration, with an exhortation to conduct himself

better in the future. My brother did not even ask him from what country

he came, nor what was his history. For in his history there is a fault,

and my brother seemed to avoid everything which could remind him of it.

To such a point did he carry it, that at one time, when my brother was

speaking of the mountaineers of Pontarlier, _who exercise a gentle

labor near heaven, and who_, he added, _are happy because they are

innocent_, he stopped short, fearing lest in this remark there might

have escaped him something which might wound the man. By dint of

reflection, I think I have comprehended what was passing in my

brother’s heart. He was thinking, no doubt, that this man, whose name

is Jean Valjean, had his misfortune only too vividly present in his

mind; that the best thing was to divert him from it, and to make him

believe, if only momentarily, that he was a person like any other, by

treating him just in his ordinary way. Is not this indeed, to

understand charity well? Is there not, dear Madame, something truly

evangelical in this delicacy which abstains from sermon, from

moralizing, from allusions? and is not the truest pity, when a man has

a sore point, not to touch it at all? It has seemed to me that this

might have been my brother’s private thought. In any case, what I can

say is that, if he entertained all these ideas, he gave no sign of

them; from beginning to end, even to me he was the same as he is every

evening, and he supped with this Jean Valjean with the same air and in

the same manner in which he would have supped with M. Gédéon le

Prévost, or with the curate of the parish.

“Towards the end, when he had reached the figs, there came a knock at

the door. It was Mother Gerbaud, with her little one in her arms. My

brother kissed the child on the brow, and borrowed fifteen sous which I

had about me to give to Mother Gerbaud. The man was not paying much

heed to anything then. He was no longer talking, and he seemed very

much fatigued. After poor old Gerbaud had taken her departure, my

brother said grace; then he turned to the man and said to him, ‘You

must be in great need of your bed.’ Madame Magloire cleared the table

very promptly. I understood that we must retire, in order to allow this

traveller to go to sleep, and we both went upstairs. Nevertheless, I

sent Madame Magloire down a moment later, to carry to the man’s bed a

goat skin from the Black Forest, which was in my room. The nights are

frigid, and that keeps one warm. It is a pity that this skin is old;

all the hair is falling out. My brother bought it while he was in

Germany, at Tottlingen, near the sources of the Danube, as well as the

little ivory-handled knife which I use at table.

“Madame Magloire returned immediately. We said our prayers in the

drawing-room, where we hang up the linen, and then we each retired to

our own chambers, without saying a word to each other.”