第 三百一十五 章 · HOW FROM A BROTHER ONE BECOMES A FATHER

At that same moment, in the garden of the Luxembourg,—for the gaze of

the drama must be everywhere present,—two children were holding each

other by the hand. One might have been seven years old, the other five.

The rain having soaked them, they were walking along the paths on the

sunny side; the elder was leading the younger; they were pale and

ragged; they had the air of wild birds. The smaller of them said: “I am

very hungry.”

The elder, who was already somewhat of a protector, was leading his

brother with his left hand and in his right he carried a small stick.

They were alone in the garden. The garden was deserted, the gates had

been closed by order of the police, on account of the insurrection. The

troops who had been bivouacking there had departed for the exigencies

of combat.

How did those children come there? Perhaps they had escaped from some

guard-house which stood ajar; perhaps there was in the vicinity, at the

Barrière d’Enfer; or on the Esplanade de l’Observatoire, or in the

neighboring carrefour, dominated by the pediment on which could be

read: _Invenerunt parvulum pannis involutum_, some mountebank’s booth

from which they had fled; perhaps they had, on the preceding evening,

escaped the eye of the inspectors of the garden at the hour of closing,

and had passed the night in some one of those sentry-boxes where people

read the papers? The fact is, they were stray lambs and they seemed

free. To be astray and to seem free is to be lost. These poor little

creatures were, in fact, lost.

These two children were the same over whom Gavroche had been put to

some trouble, as the reader will recollect. Children of the

Thénardiers, leased out to Magnon, attributed to M. Gillenormand, and

now leaves fallen from all these rootless branches, and swept over the

ground by the wind. Their clothing, which had been clean in Magnon’s

day, and which had served her as a prospectus with M. Gillenormand, had

been converted into rags.

Henceforth these beings belonged to the statistics as “Abandoned

children,” whom the police take note of, collect, mislay and find again

on the pavements of Paris.

It required the disturbance of a day like that to account for these

miserable little creatures being in that garden. If the superintendents

had caught sight of them, they would have driven such rags forth. Poor

little things do not enter public gardens; still, people should reflect

that, as children, they have a right to flowers.

These children were there, thanks to the locked gates. They were there

contrary to the regulations. They had slipped into the garden and there

they remained. Closed gates do not dismiss the inspectors, oversight is

supposed to continue, but it grows slack and reposes; and the

inspectors, moved by the public anxiety and more occupied with the

outside than the inside, no longer glanced into the garden, and had not

seen the two delinquents.

It had rained the night before, and even a little in the morning. But

in June, showers do not count for much. An hour after a storm, it can

hardly be seen that the beautiful blonde day has wept. The earth, in

summer, is as quickly dried as the cheek of a child. At that period of

the solstice, the light of full noonday is, so to speak, poignant. It

takes everything. It applies itself to the earth, and superposes itself

with a sort of suction. One would say that the sun was thirsty. A

shower is but a glass of water; a rainstorm is instantly drunk up. In

the morning everything was dripping, in the afternoon everything is

powdered over.

Nothing is so worthy of admiration as foliage washed by the rain and

wiped by the rays of sunlight; it is warm freshness. The gardens and

meadows, having water at their roots, and sun in their flowers, become

perfuming-pans of incense, and smoke with all their odors at once.

Everything smiles, sings and offers itself. One feels gently

intoxicated. The springtime is a provisional paradise, the sun helps

man to have patience.

There are beings who demand nothing further; mortals, who, having the

azure of heaven, say: “It is enough!” dreamers absorbed in the

wonderful, dipping into the idolatry of nature, indifferent to good and

evil, contemplators of cosmos and radiantly forgetful of man, who do

not understand how people can occupy themselves with the hunger of

these, and the thirst of those, with the nudity of the poor in winter,

with the lymphatic curvature of the little spinal column, with the

pallet, the attic, the dungeon, and the rags of shivering young girls,

when they can dream beneath the trees; peaceful and terrible spirits

they, and pitilessly satisfied. Strange to say, the infinite suffices

them. That great need of man, the finite, which admits of embrace, they

ignore. The finite which admits of progress and sublime toil, they do

not think about. The indefinite, which is born from the human and

divine combination of the infinite and the finite, escapes them.

Provided that they are face to face with immensity, they smile. Joy

never, ecstasy forever. Their life lies in surrendering their

personality in contemplation. The history of humanity is for them only

a detailed plan. All is not there; the true All remains without; what

is the use of busying oneself over that detail, man? Man suffers, that

is quite possible; but look at Aldebaran rising! The mother has no more

milk, the new-born babe is dying. I know nothing about that, but just

look at this wonderful rosette which a slice of wood-cells of the pine

presents under the microscope! Compare the most beautiful Mechlin lace

to that if you can! These thinkers forget to love. The zodiac thrives

with them to such a point that it prevents their seeing the weeping

child. God eclipses their souls. This is a family of minds which are,

at once, great and petty. Horace was one of them; so was Goethe. La

Fontaine perhaps; magnificent egoists of the infinite, tranquil

spectators of sorrow, who do not behold Nero if the weather be fair,

for whom the sun conceals the funeral pile, who would look on at an

execution by the guillotine in the search for an effect of light, who

hear neither the cry nor the sob, nor the death rattle, nor the alarm

peal, for whom everything is well, since there is a month of May, who,

so long as there are clouds of purple and gold above their heads,

declare themselves content, and who are determined to be happy until

the radiance of the stars and the songs of the birds are exhausted.

These are dark radiances. They have no suspicion that they are to be

pitied. Certainly they are so. He who does not weep does not see. They

are to be admired and pitied, as one would both pity and admire a being

at once night and day, without eyes beneath his lashes but with a star

on his brow.

The indifference of these thinkers, is, according to some, a superior

philosophy. That may be; but in this superiority there is some

infirmity. One may be immortal and yet limp: witness Vulcan. One may be

more than man and less than man. There is incomplete immensity in

nature. Who knows whether the sun is not a blind man?

But then, what? In whom can we trust? _Solem quis dicere falsum

audeat?_ Who shall dare to say that the sun is false? Thus certain

geniuses, themselves, certain Very-Lofty mortals, man-stars, may be

mistaken? That which is on high at the summit, at the crest, at the

zenith, that which sends down so much light on the earth, sees but

little, sees badly, sees not at all? Is not this a desperate state of

things? No. But what is there, then, above the sun? The god.

On the 6th of June, 1832, about eleven o’clock in the morning, the

Luxembourg, solitary and depopulated, was charming. The quincunxes and

flower-beds shed forth balm and dazzling beauty into the sunlight. The

branches, wild with the brilliant glow of midday, seemed endeavoring to

embrace. In the sycamores there was an uproar of linnets, sparrows

triumphed, woodpeckers climbed along the chestnut trees, administering

little pecks on the bark. The flower-beds accepted the legitimate

royalty of the lilies; the most august of perfumes is that which

emanates from whiteness. The peppery odor of the carnations was

perceptible. The old crows of Marie de Medici were amorous in the tall

trees. The sun gilded, empurpled, set fire to and lighted up the

tulips, which are nothing but all the varieties of flame made into

flowers. All around the banks of tulips the bees, the sparks of these

flame-flowers, hummed. All was grace and gayety, even the impending

rain; this relapse, by which the lilies of the valley and the

honeysuckles were destined to profit, had nothing disturbing about it;

the swallows indulged in the charming threat of flying low. He who was

there aspired to happiness; life smelled good; all nature exhaled

candor, help, assistance, paternity, caress, dawn. The thoughts which

fell from heaven were as sweet as the tiny hand of a baby when one

kisses it.

The statues under the trees, white and nude, had robes of shadow

pierced with light; these goddesses were all tattered with sunlight;

rays hung from them on all sides. Around the great fountain, the earth

was already dried up to the point of being burnt. There was sufficient

breeze to raise little insurrections of dust here and there. A few

yellow leaves, left over from the autumn, chased each other merrily,

and seemed to be playing tricks on each other.

This abundance of light had something indescribably reassuring about

it. Life, sap, heat, odors overflowed; one was conscious, beneath

creation, of the enormous size of the source; in all these breaths

permeated with love, in this interchange of reverberations and

reflections, in this marvellous expenditure of rays, in this infinite

outpouring of liquid gold, one felt the prodigality of the

inexhaustible; and, behind this splendor as behind a curtain of flame,

one caught a glimpse of God, that millionaire of stars.

Thanks to the sand, there was not a speck of mud; thanks to the rain,

there was not a grain of ashes. The clumps of blossoms had just been

bathed; every sort of velvet, satin, gold and varnish, which springs

from the earth in the form of flowers, was irreproachable. This

magnificence was cleanly. The grand silence of happy nature filled the

garden. A celestial silence that is compatible with a thousand sorts of

music, the cooing of nests, the buzzing of swarms, the flutterings of

the breeze. All the harmony of the season was complete in one gracious

whole; the entrances and exits of spring took place in proper order;

the lilacs ended; the jasmines began; some flowers were tardy, some

insects in advance of their time; the van-guard of the red June

butterflies fraternized with the rear-guard of the white butterflies of

May. The plantain trees were getting their new skins. The breeze

hollowed out undulations in the magnificent enormity of the

chestnut-trees. It was splendid. A veteran from the neighboring

barracks, who was gazing through the fence, said: “Here is the Spring

presenting arms and in full uniform.”

All nature was breakfasting; creation was at table; this was its hour;

the great blue cloth was spread in the sky, and the great green cloth

on earth; the sun lighted it all up brilliantly. God was serving the

universal repast. Each creature had his pasture or his mess. The

ring-dove found his hemp-seed, the chaffinch found his millet, the

goldfinch found chickweed, the red-breast found worms, the green finch

found flies, the fly found infusoriæ, the bee found flowers. They ate

each other somewhat, it is true, which is the misery of evil mixed with

good; but not a beast of them all had an empty stomach.

The two little abandoned creatures had arrived in the vicinity of the

grand fountain, and, rather bewildered by all this light, they tried to

hide themselves, the instinct of the poor and the weak in the presence

of even impersonal magnificence; and they kept behind the swans’ hutch.

Here and there, at intervals, when the wind blew, shouts, clamor, a

sort of tumultuous death rattle, which was the firing, and dull blows,

which were discharges of cannon, struck the ear confusedly. Smoke hung

over the roofs in the direction of the Halles. A bell, which had the

air of an appeal, was ringing in the distance.

These children did not appear to notice these noises. The little one

repeated from time to time: “I am hungry.”

Almost at the same instant with the children, another couple approached

the great basin. They consisted of a goodman, about fifty years of age,

who was leading by the hand a little fellow of six. No doubt, a father

and his son. The little man of six had a big brioche.

At that epoch, certain houses abutting on the river, in the Rues Madame

and d’Enfer, had keys to the Luxembourg garden, of which the lodgers

enjoyed the use when the gates were shut, a privilege which was

suppressed later on. This father and son came from one of these houses,

no doubt.

The two poor little creatures watched “that gentleman” approaching, and

hid themselves a little more thoroughly.

He was a bourgeois. The same person, perhaps, whom Marius had one day

heard, through his love fever, near the same grand basin, counselling

his son “to avoid excesses.” He had an affable and haughty air, and a

mouth which was always smiling, since it did not shut. This mechanical

smile, produced by too much jaw and too little skin, shows the teeth

rather than the soul. The child, with his brioche, which he had bitten

into but had not finished eating, seemed satiated. The child was

dressed as a National Guardsman, owing to the insurrection, and the

father had remained clad as a bourgeois out of prudence.

Father and son halted near the fountain where two swans were sporting.

This bourgeois appeared to cherish a special admiration for the swans.

He resembled them in this sense, that he walked like them.

For the moment, the swans were swimming, which is their principal

talent, and they were superb.

If the two poor little beings had listened and if they had been of an

age to understand, they might have gathered the words of this grave

man. The father was saying to his son:

“The sage lives content with little. Look at me, my son. I do not love

pomp. I am never seen in clothes decked with gold lace and stones; I

leave that false splendor to badly organized souls.”

Here the deep shouts which proceeded from the direction of the Halles

burst out with fresh force of bell and uproar.

“What is that?” inquired the child.

The father replied:

“It is the Saturnalia.”

All at once, he caught sight of the two little ragged boys behind the

green swan-hutch.

“There is the beginning,” said he.

And, after a pause, he added:

“Anarchy is entering this garden.”

In the meanwhile, his son took a bite of his brioche, spit it out, and,

suddenly burst out crying.

“What are you crying about?” demanded his father.

“I am not hungry any more,” said the child.

The father’s smile became more accentuated.

“One does not need to be hungry in order to eat a cake.”

“My cake tires me. It is stale.”

“Don’t you want any more of it?”

“No.”

The father pointed to the swans.

“Throw it to those palmipeds.”

The child hesitated. A person may not want any more of his cake; but

that is no reason for giving it away.

The father went on:

“Be humane. You must have compassion on animals.”

And, taking the cake from his son, he flung it into the basin.

The cake fell very near the edge.

The swans were far away, in the centre of the basin, and busy with some

prey. They had seen neither the bourgeois nor the brioche.

The bourgeois, feeling that the cake was in danger of being wasted, and

moved by this useless shipwreck, entered upon a telegraphic agitation,

which finally attracted the attention of the swans.

They perceived something floating, steered for the edge like ships, as

they are, and slowly directed their course toward the brioche, with the

stupid majesty which befits white creatures.

“The swans [_cygnes_] understand signs [_signes_],” said the bourgeois,

delighted to make a jest.

At that moment, the distant tumult of the city underwent another sudden

increase. This time it was sinister. There are some gusts of wind which

speak more distinctly than others. The one which was blowing at that

moment brought clearly defined drum-beats, clamors, platoon firing, and

the dismal replies of the tocsin and the cannon. This coincided with a

black cloud which suddenly veiled the sun.

The swans had not yet reached the brioche.

“Let us return home,” said the father, “they are attacking the

Tuileries.”

He grasped his son’s hand again. Then he continued:

“From the Tuileries to the Luxembourg, there is but the distance which

separates Royalty from the peerage; that is not far. Shots will soon

rain down.”

He glanced at the cloud.

“Perhaps it is rain itself that is about to shower down; the sky is

joining in; the younger branch is condemned. Let us return home

quickly.”

“I should like to see the swans eat the brioche,” said the child.

The father replied:

“That would be imprudent.”

And he led his little bourgeois away.

The son, regretting the swans, turned his head back toward the basin

until a corner of the quincunxes concealed it from him.

In the meanwhile, the two little waifs had approached the brioche at

the same time as the swans. It was floating on the water. The smaller

of them stared at the cake, the elder gazed after the retreating

bourgeois.

Father and son entered the labyrinth of walks which leads to the grand

flight of steps near the clump of trees on the side of the Rue Madame.

As soon as they had disappeared from view, the elder child hastily

flung himself flat on his stomach on the rounding curb of the basin,

and clinging to it with his left hand, and leaning over the water, on

the verge of falling in, he stretched out his right hand with his stick

towards the cake. The swans, perceiving the enemy, made haste, and in

so doing, they produced an effect of their breasts which was of service

to the little fisher; the water flowed back before the swans, and one

of these gentle concentric undulations softly floated the brioche

towards the child’s wand. Just as the swans came up, the stick touched

the cake. The child gave it a brisk rap, drew in the brioche,

frightened away the swans, seized the cake, and sprang to his feet. The

cake was wet; but they were hungry and thirsty. The elder broke the

cake into two portions, a large one and a small one, took the small one

for himself, gave the large one to his brother, and said to him:

“Ram that into your muzzle.”