Notre-Dame de Paris Victor Hugo (mobile ebook reader .txt) 📖

Byzantine. There are four sister and parallel architectures, each having its special character, but derived from the same origin, the round arch.

Facies non omnibus una,
Non diversa tamen, qualem, etc.

Their faces not all alike, nor yet different, but such as the faces of sisters ought to be. ↩

This portion of the spire, which was of woodwork, is precisely that which was consumed by lightning, in 1823. ↩

The wall walling Paris makes Paris murmur. ↩

We have seen with sorrow mingled with indignation, that it is the intention to increase, to recast, to make over, that is to say, to destroy this admirable palace. The architects of our day have too heavy a hand to touch these delicate works of the Renaissance. We still cherish a hope that they will not dare. Moreover, this demolition of the Tuileries now, would be not only a brutal deed of violence, which would make a drunken vandal blush⁠—it would be an act of treason. The Tuileries is not simply a masterpiece of the art of the sixteenth century, it is a page of the history of the nineteenth. This palace no longer belongs to the king, but to the people. Let us leave it as it is. Our revolution has twice set its seal upon its front. On one of its two façades, there are the cannonballs of the 10th of August; on the other, the balls of the 29th of July. It is sacred. Paris, April 7, 1831. (Note to the fifth edition.) ↩

The tenth month of the French republican calendar, from the 19th of June to the 18th of July. ↩

An official of Notre-Dame, lower than a beneficed clergyman, higher than simple paid chanters. ↩

Hugo II de Bisuncio, 1326⁠–⁠1332. ↩

This comet against which Pope Calixtus, uncle of Borgia, ordered public prayers, is the same which reappeared in 1835. ↩

Comptes du domaine, 1383. ↩

A “queue” was a cask which held a hogshead and a half. ↩

A captain of fifty men. ↩

Ox-eye daisy. ↩

Easter daisy. ↩

A rope for the gallows bird! A fagot for the ape. ↩

An ancient Burgundian coin. ↩

An ancient French coin. ↩

Truly, these roastings are a stupendous thing! ↩

Peter the Slaughterer; and Baptist Crack-Gosling. ↩

An ancient copper coin, the forty-fourth part of a sou or the twelfth part of a farthing. ↩

Une vielle qui scie une anse ↩

Cut-Weazand Street. ↩

Cutthroat Street. ↩

The children of the Petits Carreaux let themselves be hung like calves. ↩

When the rats eat the cats, the king will be lord of Arras; when the sea which is great and wide, is frozen over at St. John’s tide, men will see across the ice, those who dwell in Arras quit their place. ↩

Varieties of the crossbow. ↩

The substance of this exordium is contained in the president’s sentence. ↩

“He that heareth my word and believeth on Him that sent me, hath eternal life, and hath not come into condemnation; but is passed from death to life.” ↩

“Out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice. For thou hadst cast me into the deep in the midst of the seas, and the floods compassed me about.” ↩

“Go now, soul, trembling in the balance, and God have mercy upon thee.” ↩

“Lord have mercy upon us.” ↩

“All thy waves and thy billows have gone over me.” ↩

Bark, Grève, grumble, Grève! Spin, spin, my distaff, spin her rope for the hangman, who is whistling in the meadow. What a beautiful hempen rope! Sow hemp, not wheat, from Issy to Vanvre. The thief hath not stolen the beautiful hempen rope. Grumble, Grève, bark, Grève! To see the dissolute wench hang on the blear-eyed gibbet, windows are eyes. ↩

Look not at the face, young girl, look at the heart. The heart of a handsome young man is often deformed. There are hearts in which love does not keep. Young girl, the pine is not beautiful; it is not beautiful like the poplar, but it keeps its foliage in winter. Alas! What is the use of saying that? That which is not beautiful has no right to exist; beauty loves only beauty; April turns her back on January. Beauty is perfect, beauty can do all things, beauty is the only thing which does not exist by halves. The raven flies only by day, the owl flies only by night, the swan flies by day and by night. ↩

Sols neufs: poulets tués. ↩

An arrow with a pyramidal head of iron and copper spiral wings, by which a rotatory motion was communicated. ↩

A game played on a checkerboard containing three concentric sets of squares, with small stones. The game consisted in getting three stones in a row. ↩

Good night, father and mother, the last cover up the fire. ↩

That I will drink no spiced and honeyed wine for a year, if I am lying now. ↩

And by the blood of God, I have neither faith nor law, nor fire nor dwelling-place, nor king nor God. ↩

Men of the brotherhood of slang: thieves. ↩

Cutthroat. Coupe-gueule being the vulgar word for cut-weazand.