Free Hunchback of Notre Dame (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) by Victor Hugo

characters.”
    “How well I remember it!” exclaimed Gisquette,—“God on the cross, and the two thieves to right and left.”
    Here the young gossips, growing excited at the recollection of the arrival of the legate, both began to talk at once.
    “And farther on, at the Painters’ Gate, there were other persons richly dressed.”
    “And at the Fountain of the Holy Innocents, that hunter chasing a doe, with a great noise of dogs and hunting-horns!”
    “And at the Paris slaughter-house, those scaffolds representing the fortress at Dieppe!”
    “And when the legate passed by, you know, Gisquette, there was an attack, and all the English had their throats cut.”
    “And over against the Châtelet Gate there were very fine persons!”
    “And on the Money-brokers’ Bridge, which was hung all over with tapestries!”
    “And when the legate passed by, they let loose more than two hundred dozen birds of all sorts; it was very fine, Liénarde.”
    “It will be finer today,” replied their listener at last, seeming to hear them with some impatience.
    “Then you promise us that this play will be a fine one?” said Gisquette.
    “To be sure,” he answered. Then he added with a certain emphasis: “Young ladies, I am the author of it!”
    “Really?” said the young girls, much amazed.
    “Really!” replied the poet, drawing himself up; “that is, there are two of us: Jehan Marchand, who sawed the planks and built the frame and did all the carpenter’s work, and I, who wrote the piece. My name is Pierre Gringoire.” 3
    The author of the Cid could not have said “Pierre Corneille” with any greater degree of pride.
    Our readers may have noticed that some time had already passed since Jupiter had gone behind the hangings, and before the author of the new morality revealed himself so abruptly to the simple admiration of Gisquette and Liénarde. Strange to say, all that multitude, which a few instants previous was so furiously uproarious, now waited calmly for the fulfillment of the actor’s promise, which proves that enduring truth, still verified in our own theatres, that the best way to make your audience wait patiently is to assure them that you will begin right away.
    However, the young scholar Joannes was not asleep.
    “Hello, ho!” he cried out suddenly, in the midst of the calm expectation which followed confusion. “Jupiter, Madame Virgin, devilish mountebanks! are you mocking us? The play! the play! Begin, or we will stir you up again!”
    This was quite enough.
    The sound of musical instruments pitched in various keys was heard from the interior of the scaffolding. The tapestry was raised; four characters painted and clad in motley garb came out, climbed the rude stage ladder, and, gaining the upper platform, ranged themselves in line before the public, bowing low; then the symphony ceased. The mystery was about to begin.
    These four personages, having been abundantly repaid for their bows by applause, began, amid devout silence, a prologue which we gladly spare the reader. Moreover, as happens even nowadays, the audience was far more interested in the costumes of the actors than in the speeches which they recited; and, to tell the truth, they were quite right. They were all four dressed in gowns partly yellow and partly white, which only differed from each other in material; the first was of gold and silver brocade, the second of silk, the third of wool, the fourth of linen. The first of these characters had a sword in his right hand, the second two golden keys, the third a pair of scales, the fourth a spade; and to aid those indolent understandings which might not have penetrated the evident meaning of these attributes, might be read embroidered in big black letters—on the hem of the brocade gown, “I AM NOBILITY,” on the hem of the silk gown, “I AM RELIGION,” on the hem of the woollen gown, “I AM COMMERCE,” and on the hem of the linen gown, “I AM LABOR.” The sex of the two male