Chapter IV: Un Seul Homme Sait Où Est Caché Le Trésor (3)

Une voix
Un jour en sortira qu'on entendra sept fois.
En attendant, glacé, mais écoutant, il pense;
Couvant le châtiment, couvant la récompense;
Et toute l'épouvante éparse au ciel est soeur
De cet impénétrable et morne avertisseur.

Je le considérais dans les vapeurs funèbres
Comme on verrait se taire un coq dans les ténèbres.
Pas un murmure autour du clairon souverain.
Et la terre sentait le froid de son airain,
Quoique, là, d'aucun monde on ne vît les frontières.

Et l'immobilité de tous les cimetières,
Et le sommeil de tous les tombeaux, et la paix
De tous les morts couchés dans la fosse, étaient faits
Du silence inouï qu'il avait dans la bouche;
Ce lourd silence était pour l'affreux mort farouche
L'impossibilité de faire faire un pli
Au suaire cousu sur son front par l'oubli.
Ce silence tenait en suspens l'anathème.
On comprenait que tant que ce clairon suprême
Se tairait, le sépulcre, obscur, roidi, béant,
Garderait l'attitude horrible du néant,
Que la momie aurait toujours sa bandelette,
Que l'homme irait tombant du cadavre au squelette,
Et que ce fier banquet radieux, ce festin
Que les vivants gloutons appellent le destin,
Toute la joie errante en tourbillons de fêtes,
Toutes les passions de la chair satisfaites,
Gloire, orgueil, les héros ivres, les tyrans soûls,
Continueraient d'avoir pour but, et pour dessous,
La pourriture, orgie offerte aux vers convives;
Mais qu'à l'heure où soudain, dans l'espace sans rives,
Cette trompette vaste et sombre sonnerait,
On verrait, comme un tas d'oiseaux d'une forêt,
Toutes les âmes, cygne, aigle, éperviers, colombes,
Frémissantes, sortir du tremblement des tombes,
Et tous les spectres faire un bruit de grandes eaux,
Et se dresser, et prendre à la hâte leurs os,
Tandis qu'au fond, au fond du gouffre, au fond du rêve
Blanchissant l'absolu, comme un jour qui se lève,
Le front mystérieux du juge apparaîtrait.

Ce clairon avait l'air de savoir le secret.

On sentait que le râle énorme de ce cuivre
Serait tel qu'il ferait bondir, vibrer, revivre
L'ombre, le plomb, le marbre, et qu'à ce fatal glas
Toutes les surdités voleraient en éclats;
Que l'oubli sombre avec sa perte de mémoire
Se lèverait au son de la trompette noire;
Que dans cette clameur étrange, en même temps
Qu'on entendrait frémir tous les cieux palpitants,
On entendrait crier toutes les consciences;
Que le sceptique au fond de ses insouciances,
Que le voluptueux, l'athée et le douteur,
Et le maître tombé de toute sa hauteur,
Sentiraient ce fracas traverser leurs vertèbres;
Que ce déchirement céleste des ténèbres
Ferait dresser quiconque est soumis à l'arrêt;
Que qui n'entendit pas le remords, l'entendrait;
Et qu'il réveillerait, comme un choc à la porte,
L'oreille la plus dure et l'âme la plus morte,
Même ceux qui, livrés au rire, aux vains, combats,
Aux vils plaisirs, n'ont point tenu compte ici-bas
Des avertissements de l'ombre et du mystère,
Même ceux que n'a point réveillés sur la terre
Le tonnerre, ce coup de cloche de la nuit!

Oh! dans l'esprit de l'homme où tout vacille et fuit,
Où le verbe n'a pas un mot qui ne bégaie,
Où l'aurore apparaît, hélas! comme une plaie,
Dans cet esprit, tremblant dès qu'il ose augurer,
Oh! comment concevoir, comment se figurer
Cette vibration communiquée aux tombes,
Cette sommation aux blêmes catacombes
Du ciel ouvrant sa porte et du gouffre ayant faim,
Le prodigieux bruit de Dieu disant: Enfin!

Oui, c'est vrai,--c'est du moins jusque-là que l'oeil plonge,--
C'est l'avenir,--du moins tel qu'on le voit en songe;--
Quand le monde atteindra son but, quand les instants,
Les jours, les mois, les ans, auront rempli le temps,
Quand tombera du ciel l'heure immense et nocturne,
Cette goutte qui doit faire déborder l'urne,
Alors, dans le silence horrible, un rayon blanc,
Long, pâle, glissera, formidable et tremblant,
Sur ces haltes de nuit qu'on nomme cimetières;
Les tentes frémiront, quoiqu'elles soient des pierres,
Dans tous ces sombres camps endormis; et, sortant
Tout à coup de la brume où l'univers l'attend,
Ce clairon, au-dessus des êtres et des choses,
Au-dessus des forfaits et des apothéoses,
Des ombres et des os, des esprits et des corps,
Sonnera la diane effrayante des morts.

O lever en sursaut des larves pêle-mêle!
Oh! la Nuit réveillant la Mort, sa soeur jumelle!

Pensif, je regardais l'incorruptible airain.

Les volontés sans loi, les passions sans frein,
Toutes les actions de tous les êtres, haines,
Amours, vertus, fureurs, hymnes, cris, plaisirs, peines,
Avaient laissé, dans l'ombre où rien ne remuait,
Leur pâle empreinte autour de ce bronze muet;
Une obscure Babel y tordait sa spirale.

Sa dimension vague, ineffable, spectrale,
Sortant de l'éternel, entrait dans l'absolu.
Pour pouvoir mesurer ce tube, il eût fallu
Prendre la toise au fond du rêve, et la coudée
Dans la profondeur trouble et sombre de l'idée;
Un de ses bouts touchait le bien, l'autre le mal;
Et sa longueur allait de l'homme à l'animal,
Quoiqu'on ne vît point là d'animal et point d'homme;
Couché sur terre, il eût joint Ëden à Sodome.

Son embouchure, gouffre où plongeait mon regard,
Cercle de l'inconnu ténébreux et hagard,
Pleine de cette horreur que le mystère exhale,
M'apparaissait ainsi qu'une offre colossale
D'entrer dans l'ombre où Dieu même est évanoui.
Cette gueule, avec l'air d'un redoutable ennui,
Morne, s'élargissait sur l'homme et la nature,
Et cette épouvantable et muette ouverture
Semblait le bâillement noir de l'éternité.

Au fond de l'immanent et de l'illimité,
Parfois, dans les lointains sans nom de l'Invisible,
Quelque chose tremblait de vaguement terrible,
Et brillait et passait, inexprimable éclair.
Toutes les profondeurs des mondes avait l'air
De méditer, dans l'ombre où l'ombre se répète,
L'heure où l'on entendrait de cette âpre trompette
Un appel aussi long que l'infini jaillir.
L'immuable semblait d'avance en tressaillir.

Des porches de l'abîme, antres hideux, cavernes
Que nous nommons enfers, puits, gehennams, avernes,
Bouches d'obscurité qui ne prononcent rien;
Du vide où ne flottait nul souffle aérien;
Du silence où l'haleine osait à peine éclore,
Ceci se dégageait pour l'âme: Pas encore.

Par instants, dans ce lieu triste comme le soir,
Comme on entend le bruit de quelqu'un qui vient voir,
On entendait le pas boiteux de la justice;
Puis cela s'effaçait. Des vermines, le vice,
Le crime, s'approchaient; et, fourmillement noir,
Fuyaient. Le clairon sombre ouvrait son entonnoir.
Un groupe d'ouragans dormait dans ce cratère,
Comme cet organum des gouffres doit se taire
Jusqu'au jour monstrueux où nous écarterons
Les clous de notre bière au-dessus de nos fronts,
Nul bras ne le touchait dans l'invisible sphère;
Chaque race avait fait sa couche de poussière
Dans l'orbe sépulcral de son évasement;
Sur cette poudre l'oeil lisait confusément
Ce mot: RIEZ, écrit par le doigt d'Épicure;
Et l'on voyait, au fond de la rondeur obscure,
La toile d'araignée horrible de Satan.

Des astres qui passaient murmuraient: 'Souviens-t'en!
Prie!' et la nuit portait cette parole à l'ombre.

Et je ne sentais plus ni le temps ni le nombre.

Une sinistre main sortait de l'infini.
Vers la trompette, effroi de tout crime impuni,
Qui doit faire à la mort un jour lever la tête,
Elle pendait énorme, ouverte, et comme prête
A saisir ce clairon qui se tait dans la nuit,
Et qu'emplit le sommeil formidable du bruit.
La main, dans la nuée et hors de l'Invisible,
S'allongeait A quel être était-elle? Impossible
De le dire, en ce morne et brumeux firmament.
L'oeil dans l'obscurité ne voyait clairement
Que les cinq doigts béants de cette main terrible;
Tant l'être, quel qu'il fût, debout dans l'ombre horrible,
--Sans doute, quelque archange ou quelque séraphin
Immobile, attendant le signe de la fin,--
Plongeait profondément, sous les ténébreux voiles,
Du pied dans les enfers, du front dans les étoiles!

FIN

NOTES

LA CONSCIENCE.

It has been thought that the subject of this poem was suggested to Victor Hugo by a passage in _Les tragiques_, a satirical poem in seven books, depicting the misfortunes and vices of France, written by Théodore Agrippa D'Aubigné (1551-1630), whom Sainte-Beuve calls the Juvenal of the sixteenth century. The passage relating to Cain occurs in the sixth book, called _Les Vengeances_. The following extracts indicate the spirit in which the author dealt with his theme.

Il avoit peur de tout, et il avoit peur de lui
. . . . . . .
La mort ne put avoir de mort pour récompense:
L'Enfer n'eut point de morts à punir cette offense;
Mais autant de jours il sentit de trespas:
Vif, il ne vescut point; mort, il ne mourut pas.
Il fuit d'effroi transi, troublé, tremblant et blesme,
Il fuit de tout le monde, il s'enfuit de soy-mesme
. . . . . . .
Il possedoit le monde et non une asseurance;
Il estoit seul partout, hors mis sa conscience,
Et fut marqué au front affin qu'en s'enfuiant
Aucun n'osast tuer ses maux en le tuant.

It is clear that if the poem suggested the subject to Hugo it suggested nothing else.

With _Caïn_ may be compared _Le Parricide_, one of the 1859 series, which is also inspired by the theme of the guilty conscience pursuing the murderer. In this case remorse is symbolized by a drop of blood which falls upon the head of the criminal wherever he goes.

_Assur_, English Asshur; the name occurs in the marginal rendering of Gen. x. II (Revised Version).

The names of persons and their descriptions are taken from the account of Cain's descendants in Gen. iv. 17-23.

_Jabel_, English Jabal, son of Lamech, a descendant of Cain and Adah. 'He was the father of such as dwell in tents and have cattle.'

_Tsilla_, English Zillah, one of Lamech's wives.

_Jubal_, the brother of Jabal. 'He was the father of all such a handle the harp and pipe.'

_Hénoch_, English Enoch, Cain's son.

_Tubalcaïn_, English Tubal-cain, the son of Lamech and his wife Zillah. He was 'the forger of every cutting instrument of brass and iron.'

_Seth_ was the third son of Adam and Eve, and

_Énos_ was the son of Seth.

PUISSANCE ÉGALE BONTÉ.

_Iblis_, one of the names used in the Koran for the Spirit of Evil. He was a spirit who refused to prostrate himself before Adam at the command of the Almighty, and was therefore expelled from Eden. Instead of being immediately destroyed, however, he was given a respite till the Day of Judgement. The word is derived from the Arabic _balas_, wicked.

Another tradition, not found in the Koran, is that Iblis was a warrior angel whom the Almighty sent to exterminate the Djinns, the beings, half men, half angels, who inhabited the country of the Genii. Instead of performing this command, the spirit rebelled and was cast down into hell. It is hardly necessary to add that Hugo's story is of his own invention.

_Bonté_ (see heading), one of Hugo's favourite words for expressing the moral attributes of the Almighty power. The theme that God is goodness, which is more than justice, is developed in _Dieu: La Lumière_.

La justice, c'est vous, l'humanité; mais Dieu
Est la bonté.

Compare also the concluding lines of _Le Crapaud_.

The word has no exact equivalent in English. It comprehends kindness, tenderness, and gentleness.

It may be interesting to note that Hugo was fond of comparing an object composed of a centre and rays to a spider. Edmond Huguet (_Les Sens de la Forme dans les Métaphores de Victor Hugo_) gives the following examples:

'De la hauteur où je suis, la rade pleine de nacelles (à
quatre rames) figure une mare couverte d'araignées d'eau.'
(_Alpes et Pyrénées_.)

'Nous estimons une araignée chose hideuse et nous sommes
ravis de retrouver sa toile en rosace sur les façades des
cathédrales, et son corps et ses pattes en clef de voûte dans
les chapelles.' (_France et Belgique_.)

'Les lanternes de ce temps-là ressemblaient à de grosses
étoiles rouges pendues à des cordes, et jetaient sur le
pavé une ombre qui avait la forme d'une grande araignée.'
(_Les Misérables_.)

Rostabat prend pour fronde, ayant Roland pour cible,
Un noir grappin qui semble une araignée horrible.
(_La Légende des Siècles, Le Petit Roi de Galice._)

'Trois ou quatre larges araignées de pluie s'écrasèrent
autour de lui sur la roche.' (_Les Travailleurs de la Mer._)

Hugo appears to have had a feeling of antipathy for the spider and frequently chose it as the symbol of evil. In __Dieu: Le Corbeau_,_ the spirits of good and evil are thus described:--

L'un est l'Esprit de vie, au vol d'aigle, aux yeux d'astre,
Qui rayonne, crée, aime, illumine, construit;
Et l'autre est l'araignée énorme de la nuit.

In _La Fin de Satan_, of the days before the Flood,

Depuis longtemps l'azur perdait ses purs rayons,
Et par instants semblait plein de hideuses toiles
Où l'araignée humaine avait pris les étoiles.

And of Ignatius Loyola,

Sombre araignée à qui Dieu, pour tisser sa toile,
Donnait des fils d'aurore et des rayons d'étoile.

Compare also:--

La toile d'araignée horrible de Satan.
(_La Trompette du Jugement._)

In other passages the spider is a type of the unpleasant.

La nuit, qui sert de fond au guet mystérieux
Du hibou promenant la rondeur de ses yeux,
Ainsi qu'à l'araignée ouvrant ses pâles toiles.
(_La Confiance du Marquis Fabrice._)

See also the passage from _La Bouche d'Ombre_, quoted in the notes to _Le Crapaud._

BOOZ ENDORMI.

The subject of this exquisite little idyll is taken from the Book of Ruth, chapter iii, in which Ruth the Moabitess is described as lying at the feet of Boaz, the kinsman of her dead husband, Mahlon the Hebrew, in order that she might claim from him that he should marry her and continue the family of Mahlon, as provided by the law of Moses.

_Judith._ There was a Judith, daughter of Beer the Hittite, one of the wives of Esau (Gen. xxxvi. 34). Hugo may or may not have had this personage in his mind.

_asphodèle_. Hugo is not always accurate in his local colouring. Asphodels are not found in Palestine.

_Galgala_, the form found in the Septuagint and Vulgate of the place-name Gilgal.

_Les grelots des troupeaux._ Here, again, Hugo is inaccurate. Sheep in Palestine do not have bells attached to them.

_Jérimadeth_. The name seems to be of Hugo's own invention. It was a trick of the poet's to make proper names suit the exigencies of rime, as in this instance, in which 'Jérimadeth rimes with' demandait.

AU LION D'ANDROCLÈS.

It is impossible to name the period to which Hugo is referring in this poem more precisely than by saying that it is the age of Rome under the Empire. As will be seen from the notes, the personages and events alluded to are not all contemporaneous. It was enough for Hugo that they were typical of the Roman decadence.

_Trimalcion_. The festival of Trimalcion is an episode in the _Satyricon_ of Petronius Arbiter, the poem in which are described all the excesses of Roman luxury and debauchery. Petronius Arbiter lived in the time of Claudius.

_Lesbie_. Hugo is guilty of one of his inaccuracies here. Lesbia was the lady to whom the poems of Catullus (87-47 B.C.?) were addressed, while Delia, who is mentioned below in connexion with Catullus, was in reality the mistress of Tibullus (54 B.C.-19 A.D.).

_Crassus_. Hugo no doubt refers to M. Licinius Crassus (died 53 B.C.), the Triumvir, who, when praetor, led an army against the revolted gladiators under Spartacus. He twice defeated them and subsequently crucified or hung, along the road from Capua to Rome, six thousand slaves who had been taken prisoners.

_Épaphrodite_. Epaphroditus, a freedman and favourite of the Emperor Nero, was the master of Epictetus, the lame slave and Stoic philosopher, who was amongst the greatest of pagan moralists. Epaphroditus, who treated his slave with great cruelty, is said to have been one day twisting his leg for amusement. Epictetus said, 'If you continue, you will break my leg.' Epaphroditus went on, the leg was broken, and Epictetus only said, 'Did I not tell you that you would break it?'

Hugo seems to have in mind the short reigns of Galba (r. A.D. 68-9), Otho (r. A.D. 69), and Vitellius (r. A.D. 69), all of whom perished by violence.

_Vitellius_ was famous even among the later Romans for his gluttony and voracious appetite. During the four months of his reign he is said to have spent seven millions sterling on the pleasures of his table. When at last the people rose against him, and the soldiers proclaimed another emperor, Vitellius was found hiding in his palace. He was dragged out into the Forum and killed on the Gemoniae _(les Gémonies)_, a staircase which went up the Capitoline Hill and on which the corpses of criminals were exposed before being thrown into the Tiber. This is the _Escalier_ referred to in the next line.

l. 57. These tortures were not known in Rome. They suggest rather the Middle Ages.

_le cirque_. The circus where chariot-races took place. Hugo seems to be confusing it with the Colosseum, where the gladiatorial combats were fought.

_Le noir gouffre cloaque_. The Cloaca Maxima was the great sewer of Rome. It is still in existence and in use. Hugo here first makes it the symbol of the destruction towards which the Roman Empire was tending, and then treats it half as a concrete reality, half as a figure for some underworld in which dethroned but living emperors meet. This blending of the symbol and the thing symbolized is characteristic of the poet.

_chiffres du fatal nombre_: the figures or digits that stand for the doomed number, i.e. the number with which a doomed man is marked.

_Attila_, the famous king of the Huns, 'the Scourge of God' as he was called, reigned A.D. 434-53.

LE MARIAGE DE ROLAND.

The poem is founded on the 'Chanson de Girart de Viane,' one of the Carolingian cycles of epic poems, written by Bertrand de Bar-sur-Aube, a poet of Champagne who lived in the first half of the thirteenth century.

The story, as told in the _Chanson_, is as follows:--

Girard, or Girart, the son of Garin of Montglave, a poor nobleman, goes with his brother Renier to the court of Charlemagne to seek his fortune. After being at court for some time he quarrelled with the Emperor, owing to the latter marrying the widow of Aubery, duc de Bourgogne, who was pledged to Girart. As a compensation for the loss of his bride, he was given the Comté of Vienne, in Dauphiné. When he presented himself before Charlemagne to do homage, the queen, whose affection for her old lover had changed to contempt, forced him by a trick to kiss her foot instead of that of her husband. Some time after, Girart learnt the truth, and, furious at the insult placed upon him, he rebelled against his sovereign. Renier, who had been made duke of Genoa, with his son Olivier and his daughter 'la belle Aude,' came to help him. Charlemagne besieged Vienne with a great army, and amongst his warriors was his nephew Roland, who was his principal champion, just as Olivier was that of Girart. A siege, like that of Troy, ensued, many doughty deeds being done by the two heroes. In the course of the fighting Roland sees Aude and falls in love with her. He takes her prisoner, and almost succeeds in carrying her off to his tent, but Olivier rescues her. Finally, it is agreed that the quarrel between the monarch and his vassal shall be settled by a duel between the two champions. Needless to say, the latter fall in readily with the proposal. Olivier is armed by an aged Jew, Joachim, who with others of his nation had fled to Vienne with Pontius Pilate after the Crucifixion, and had not yet succeeded in dying. The combat takes place in an island in the Rhone, and la Belle Aude, with mingled feelings, watches from a window her brother and her lover contending for victory. The struggle is full of tremendous incident. At the outset each of the champions cuts the horse of the other in two and the fight is continued on foot. Olivier's sword is broken, and Roland invites him to send for another and take a little rest and refreshment. A boatman goes to Vienne and procures from the old Jew a famous sword, called Hauteclere, and some wine. The fight is renewed and lasts till nightfall, when an angel descends from heaven, and orders the two heroes to be reconciled and to fight together against the Saracens. The warriors embrace and Olivier promises Roland the hand of his sister. Such was the beginning of the friendship of the two mighty champions ofChristendom.

Hugo's poem, however, is not based directly on the story, but on a modern prose adaptation by Achille Jubinal which appeared in _Le Journal du Dimanche_ in 1846. Léon Gautier indeed, in _Les Épopées françaises, says: `Victor Hugo s'est proposé de traduire notre vieux poème, dont il avait sans doute quelque texte sous les yeux.' But it is clear from the mistake about the word Closamont and other details that Gautier was mistaken and that the source from which Hugo drew was Jubinal's reproduction.

Hugo omitted from his adaptation two incidents of great poetic interest, namely, the picture of Aude watching the fight, and the miraculous intervention of the angel. He has, on the other hand, inserted the barbaric incident of the fight with trees. He has eliminated, that is to say, the tender and the religious elements from the story and made it simply the narrative of a Homeric combat, with more than a touch of the grotesque. Nevertheless, he has retained the characteristic incident of the chivalrous behaviour of Roland in sending for a new sword for his enemy and in giving him time for rest, a trait which finds a parallel in many other _Chansons_, notably in the story of the battle of Roland with Ferragus, a Saracen giant. When Ferragus is worn out with fighting, Roland watches over him while he sleeps, and on his awakening enters into a theological discussion with him in the hope of converting him to Christianity. When this pious desire fails, the combat is renewed.

_Saint Michael_ is described in Rev. xii. 7-9 as fighting against Satan and casting him out of heaven.

Hugo is mistaken in his description of _Olivier_, who was not lord of Vienne and a sovereign count, but only the son of Renier, duke of Genoa. The only statement in these two lines which is correct is that his grandfather was Garin.

L. 27. As already noted, in the original story it is an aged Jew who arms Olivier for the fight.

_Rollon_ (English _Rollo_) was the Norse pirate who invaded France in A.D. 912 and founded the Duchy of Normandy. The reference to him is of course an anachronism.

_estoc_ (_c_ pronounced), a long narrow sword used for thrusting.

_cimier_ (from Latin _cyma_, the young sprout of a cabbage), the crest on the helmet.

Roland's sword, _Durandal_, which was given him by Charlemagne, plays the same part in the French _Chansons_ as Siegfried's sword Balmung in the _Nibelunglied_, or Excalibur in the Arthurian cycle. Other forms of the name are _Durendas, Durrenda, Durandarda_.

_en franc neveu du roi_, like a real or genuine nephew of the king.

_Tournon_, a town situated on the right bank of the Rhone, in the department of Ardèche. It still produces a well-known wine, called _Vins de l'Ermitage_.

1. 70. Here is a curious mistake, which Jubinal originated and Hugo copied. Closamont was the original possessor of the sword, not another name for the weapon. The lines in the 'Chanson de Girart de Viane' are:--

Une en aporte ke molt fut onoree.
plus de c. anz l'ot li iuis gardee,
Closamont fut, k'iert de grand renommee,
li emperere de Rome la loee.

_Sinnagog or Sinnagos_ was the Saracen king of Alexandria with whose attack on the castle of Garin, Olivier's grandfather, the story of 'Girart de Viane' begins.

1. 144. This is another deviation from tradition, as we have it in the Carolingian cycle. Roland never married Aude. He was still betrothed to her when he fell at Roncesvalles.

AYMERILLOT.

The poem on part of which this is based is an anonymous _Chanson_ written in the thirteenth century and belonging to the cycle known as the cycle of _Guillaume_.

The story is as follows. Charlemagne is returning from Spain, after the defeat at Roncesvalles, his army discouraged, his knights exhausted, and wishing only to be at home and in comfort. Suddenly he catches sight of a city, surrounded by a crenelated wall, splendid within, with a palace the roofs of which shine in the sun, its feet bathed in the sea, which is covered by the ships of its commerce. Charlemagne wishes to attack it, but the duke of Bavaria advises him to let it alone; it is garrisoned by thousands of pagans and his men are exhausted. The Emperor addresses several of his barons in turn, offering to each the city if he will take it. One and all refuse: Charlemagne upbraids them for their cowardice, bids them go home, and declares he will take the town by himself. Then Hernaut de Beaulande brings forward his son Aimeri, who volunteers to undertake the task. With the aid of one hundred barons he captures the city and is made Count of Narbonne. Hugo has selected the first and the best part of the _Chanson_ for modernization. Léon Gautier (_Les Épopeés françaises_) says: 'Rien n'égale en majesté le début de ce poème, dont le dénoûment est presque trivial... Rien de plus ennuyeux que le récit de tant de combats contre les Sarrasins; rien de plus attachant que le tableau de ce grand désespoir de Charlemagne à la vue de Narbonne, dont aucun de ses Barons ne veut entreprendre la conquête. Il n'y a peut-être dans aucune poésie aucun épisode comparable à ce discours de l'Empereur, lorsqu'il crie à tous ses chevaliers: "Ralés vos en, Bourguignon et François...je remenrai ici, à Narbonois." C'est ce qu'a bien compris Victor Hugo, qui a si fidèlement traduit et surpassé encore les beautés du texte original.'

Hugo's poem, however, is not based directly on the _Chanson_, but on two prose adaptations written by Achille Jubinal, and published respectively in the _Musée des Familles_ (1843) and the _Journal du Dimanche _(1846). Yet these stories did little more than furnish the framework for the poem, by far the greater part of which is the original work of Hugo.

_à la barbe fleurie_, white-bearded. Expression taken from the _Chanson_. In mediaeval poetry Charlemagne is always described as an old man.

_Roncevaux_, which we call by the Spanish name Roncesvalles, is the valley in the Pyrenees where Charlemagne's rearguard was attacked and cut to pieces by the Moors during his retreat from Spain.

_Ganelon_, the knight through whose treachery the defeat of Charlemagne at Roncesvalles was brought about.

_les douze pairs_. The twelve Paladins of tradition, who formed Charlemagne's Round Table.

L. 6-10. These words are taken almost verbatim from Jubinal's adaptation of the story in the _Musée des Familles_. Jubinal's words are:

'L'etcheco-sauna (le laboureur des montagnes) est rentré chez lui avec son chien; il a embrassé sa femme et ses enfants. Il a nettoyé ses flèches ainsi que sa corne de boeuf, et les ossements des héros qui ne sont plus blanchissent déjà pour l'éternité.'

In a note Jubinal says: 'Ces paroles sont empruntées au chant basque d'Altabicar.'

_Son cheval syrien_. In the _Chanson_ Charlemagne rides on a _mulet de Sulie (Syrie)_. Jubinal changed the mule into a horse. This is one of the points of detail which show that Hugo followed the modern author.

L. 25. The city, as we learn subsequently, was Narbonne. Narbonne is on the west coast of the Gulf of Lyons, near the eastern end of the Pyrenees. Originally a Roman colony, it was one of the chief seats of the Visigoths, from whom it was taken by the Saracens, when they overran Southern France. Charlemagne took it from the latter in 759. Till the fourteenth century it was a port, but the sand has blocked up the harbour and the town is now some distance from the sea.

_mâchicoulis_, battlements; or, more exactly, a gallery round the tower with openings in it from which projectiles could be hurled upon an enemy below.

_vermeil_. The word is one of Hugo's favourite adjectives, and is used to suggest a bright vivid red, and almost invariably in connexion with objects that have pleasurable associations.

The following are a few typical instances of its use:--

'L'aube vermeille.' (_Les Feuilles d'Automne: Madame, autour de vous_.)

'Les cônes vermeils' (du palais dans les nuages). (Ibid.: _Soleils Couchants_.)

'Les beaux rosiers vermeils.' (_Les Quatre Vents: L'Immense Étre_.)

'Les astres vermeils.' (Ibid.: _La Nuit_.)

'Aux soirs d'été qu'embrase une clarté vermeille.' (_Dieu L'Ange_.)

'Les plats bordés de fleurs sont en vermeil: (_Eviradnus_.)

'Et, vermeille,

Mahaud, en même temps que l'aurore, s'éveille.' (Ibid.)

The word seems to be used without any definite suggestion of colour in such phrases as 'des espaces vermeils' (_Plein Ciel_), 'quand le satyre fut sur la cime vermeille' (_Le Satyre_), 'des arbres vermeils' (of trees lit up by the setting sun) (_Le Crapaud_).

The word is used with a bold extension of meaning in _Les Voix Intérieures: A Eugène_, where the appetite of boyhood is called 'l'appétit vermeil.'

_dromon_, mediaeval warship, worked by oars and sail, the ancestor of the galley. The word is also used, as apparently here, for merchantmen.

_Béarnais_, inhabitant of Béarn, the province in the Pyrenees from which Henri IV came.

_Turcs_. This is of course a mistake for Saracens or Moors. The word occurs in the original poem, Jubinal copied it, and Hugo copied Jubinal. The original, it maybe noted, had 'trente mille Turcs,' Jubinal cut them down to 'vingt mille.' Hugo's 'vingt mille' is another detail which shows that his poem is based on Jubinal's adaptation.

_preux_. The Old French adjective meant 'valiant.' At the present time the word is only used in the phrase _preux chevalier. Preux_ as a noun is rare, but de Vigny has 'Charlemagne et ses preux.'

_je ne farde guère_: I speak without affectation. _Farder_ used absolutely in this way is rare.

_rendus_: knocked up, overdone.

_arbalètes_, crossbows.

L. 80, For the metaphor compare the _Chanson_ in _Les Châtiments_, Livre VII

Berlin, Vienne étaient ses maîtresses;
Il les forçait,
Leste, et prenant les forteresses
Par le corset;
Il triompha de cent bastilles
Qu'il investit.--
Voici pour toi, voici des filles,
Petit, petit.

These two passages are good specimens of what Brunetière called Hugo's barbarous and Merovingian humour, a species of humour which suits well the reproduction of a mediaeval _Chanson_, even if it offends the critical in a modern satire.

_gentil_, used in its original sense of 'noble'.

_maillot_, Old French form of _maillet_, a mace or club. _salade_, head-piece worn by knights, a word used in the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries.

_duché_, which is now masculine, was formerly of the feminine gender.

_liais_, lias; _pierre de liais_ is Portland stone.

_douve_, as a term in fortification, means the wall of a ditch.

_estramaçon_, a long, straight, two-edged sword. The word is of Italian origin and first came into use in the sixteenth century. In an adaptation of a thirteenth-century _Chanson_ it is out of place, as is _salade_ above.

_escarcelle_, a kind of large purse which was carried at the belt.

l 193. The reference to the Sorbonne, which was founded in 1252, is of course an anachronism.

_estoc_. See note on MARIAGE DE ROLAND.

_bachelier_. In the Middle Ages the word was used of a young man of good birth who, being too poor to raise his own standard, fought under the banner of a knight, but not as a squire. The juxtaposition of _Je suis bachelier_ with _Je sais lire en latin_ has given rise to the suspicion that Hugo, who found the word in one of Jubinal's articles, understood it in the modern sense. In the absence of further evidence, however, the poet may be considered entitled to a verdict of 'not proven'.

BIVAR.

_Bivar_, in Spanish _Vivar_, was the name of the ancestral home of the Cid. It is a castle near Burgos, in which the Cid was born in 1040.

_patio_ (Spanish), a court or open space in front of a house. The _ti_ is pronounced as in French _question_.

_buenos dias_=good day.

l 18. The full name of the Cid was Rodrigue Ruy Diaz de Bivar, or in Spanish Rodrigo Diaz de Vivar.

_campéador_. The Spanish word _campeador_, derived from _campear_, to be eminent in the field, signifies _excellent_, _pre-eminent_, and was the title given to their champion by the Spaniards, The Moors called him the Cid, i.e. Seid, an Arabic word for _chief_.

_pavois_, an old word for a large shield, which protected the whole body, and on which the Franks raised the king whom they had elected.

_richomme_, from the Spanish _ricohombre_, a title given to the Barons of Aragon.

_servidumbre_ (Spanish), an establishment of servants. In Spanish the last syllable is sounded.

EVIRADNUS. (PAGE 26.)

As far as is known, the story is of Hugo's own invention. The epoch may be supposed to be the later Middle Ages, the place anywhere in Teuton lands. The proper names are mostly of Hugo's own invention; some are, however, echoes from German mediaeval history. The poem and another called _Le Petit Roi de Galice_ form a section of the _Légende_ called _Les Chevaliers Errants_.

l 1. There was a Ladislaus, King of Poland, in the fourteenth, and a Sigismund, Emperor of Germany, in the fifteenth century. But the personages of the poem are in reality wholly imaginary.

_stryge_ (written also _strige_), a vampire or demon that wanders about at night. Derived from Latin _striga_, a bird of night, or a witch.

_lémure_: Lémures (the singular is very rare) is the Latin _lemures_, the disembodied spirits which haunted houses and caused terror to the living.

_val_, valley, The word is now little used and only in poetry, except in the phrase _par monts et par vaux_.

_preux_. See note on AYMERILLOT, l 54.

_munster_ (German), cathedral.

_bauges_, properly the lairs of wild boars.

_Amadis_, commonly called Amadis of Gaul, the hero of a celebrated mediaeval poem, written originally in Spanish, which recounts his heroism in war and constancy in love. He is the typical knight-errant and true lover.

_Baudoin_. This is Baldwin, brother of Godfrey of Bouillon. He became King of Jerusalem and died in 1118. During the Crusade he went on a pilgrimage to the Holy City.

Sir G.Young in his _Poems from Victor Hugo_ suggests that _Corbus_ may stand for _Cottbus_, the capital of Old or Lower Lusatia.

_burg_ (German), a castle.

_guivre_ (also written _givre_), a heraldic term meaning a serpent.

_drée_, a fantastic stone ornament.

_fôhn_ (German _Föhn_), the south wind.

_le Grand Dormant_: Frederick Barbarossa, who, tradition says, never died, but is still sleeping in a cave.

_roture_, i.e. his position as a peasant. _Roture_ is derived from the Latin _ruptura_, the action of breaking the earth, and is the base of the common word _roturier_.

_relève_, used in its feudal sense of 'to hold of'; the castle was not feudally dependent on the city.

L. 214, i.e. the castle reflects the history of the ancient kings.

_les deux haches de pierre_. This is said figuratively and alludes to the deeds of Attila, who ravaged the Eastern Empire and extended his dominions almost to the Ural Mountains, whilst later on, crossing the Rhine, he attacked the Goths of Southern France and Spain.

_Lusace_, Latin Lusatia, German Lausitz, was a district between the Elbe and the Oder, in what is now the kingdom of Saxony. But the name has no significance. The personages and places in the poem are in reality all imaginary.

_la griffe_ is the claw of a beast or bird of prey; _la serre_ is the foot of a bird of prey.

_Sortent de leur tenaille_. A somewhat obscure expression. Apparently _tenaille_ is used in the sense of 'vice', and the words mean 'are of their manufacture or moulding.'

L. 291. i.e. the Emperor is the superior in rank.

_dromons_. See note on AYMERILLOT, L. 39.

_l'ordre teutonique_, the Order of Teutonic Knights. Originally founded to protect the Christians in Palestine, the Teutonic Knights received domains in Italy and Germany from the Pope and Emperor, conquered Prussia (1228), and established there a military power which lasted four centuries.

_hydre_. In Greek legend the hydra was a serpent with seven heads, and, when one of them was cut off, two grew in its place. It is Hugo's favourite figure for cruelty or tyranny.

_Lusace_ consisted of two margraviates, the upper and the lower.

_elle a peur du fleuron_, i.e. she is afraid to be marchioness. The flower-shaped ornaments in a crown are called _fleurons_. A marquis's coronet was adorned with 'fleurons' alternating with pearls and the contrast between the pointed 'fleuron' and the round pearl suggests the figure employed in the next line.

_tribunaux d'amour_, or _cours d'amour_, were the celebrated courts of the Middle Ages, presided over by ladies of high rank, which gave judgement in cases of love and gallantry and laid down laws for lovers. They existed principally in France, especially in Southern France.

L. 369. The Wends were a Slav people who lived in Lusatia, but the name Thassilo is Bavarian.

_Nemrod_. See note on PLEINE MER, l.107.

_Fenris_: the great wolf of Scandinavian mythology whose growth was such that the gods in fear chained him to a rock. Some day his upper jaw will touch the sky, while his lower still rests on earth, and then Odin will tremble for his throne.

_le serpent Asgar_. This serpent is probably of Hugo's invention and its name taken from the mythical city of the Scandinavians, Asgard, built by the gods and in which they often resided.

_l'archange Attila_. This is not the king of the Huns, nor is he one of the known archangels. However, as the Scriptures mention only three archangels, Gabriel, Michael, and Raphael, out of the seven, Hugo may or may not be right in speaking of an archangel of the name of Attila. _Le grand chandelier_ brought from the lower regions by the archangel is merely a poetic fancy and a reminiscence of the seven-branched candlestick of the tabernacle (Exod. XXV. 31-7).

_Actéon_. Actaeon in Greek mythology was a hunter who saw Diana bathing, and was in consequence changed by the goddess into a stag.

L. 437. _chanfrein_, the piece of armour which covered the head of the horse.

_Les chatons des cuissards sont barris de leurs clés_. A difficult line. The _chatons_ were the studs or screws which held the thigh-piece (_cuissard_) in its place, and the instrument which worked them was called _la clé_. _Barrés_ appears to mean simply 'fastened'. Sir G.Young translates:--

'Their cuissart-studs up to the socket braced'

_boutoir_, the sharp spike on the knee-piece.

_crible_. The word refers to the visor with seven bars, which was one of the marks of a marquis's rank.

_mortier_. The round cap which was the ancient emblem of sovereignty in France. It was worn by barons who possessed full powers of administering justice in their domains, also by the presidents of the 'parlements', and by the chancellors. A modified form is still part of the official dress of some of the judges of the highest courts.

It will be noted that the antiquities in this passage are French, not German.

_tortil_, a ribbon twisted round a crown, the special ornament of a baron, not of a duke. It also signifies in heraldry a circular band or pad to which heraldic negroes' heads were attached.

_rondache_, a round shield.

L. 492. The reference is to the coronet of a French marquis, which bore eight jewelled ornaments, four of which consisted each of three great pearls arranged as a trefoil, while the other four were 'feuilles d'ache,' the heraldic representation of the leaf of the wild parsley.

_hydre_: see note on L. 323.

_timbre_, in heraldry, signifies anything placed above the escutcheon to mark the rank of the person to whom it belonged. Here Hugo seems to use it of the shield, perhaps because the triangular shield was a mark of knightly rank.

_fauves_, here 'terrible'.

A chapter might be written on Hugo's bold and occasionally strange uses of this word. Its primary meaning is either 'dull red' or 'tawny', but in Hugo's poetry it is used rather as a somewhat vague epithet to suggest darkness, gloom, cruelty, savagery, or oppressive power. It never denotes merely a physical quality; in such expressions as 'leur fauve volée', speaking of the ravens in _La Fin de Satan_, 'le désert fauve' (_Androclès_), 'son bec fauve', of the vulture (_Sultan Mourad_), the suggestion of wildness or ruthlessness predominates. Usually the word is used in a wholly figurative sense. Thus in _La Fin de Satan_ the fallen archangel, flying from Jehovah, is 'fauve et hagard', Barabbas stumbling against the Cross is 'fauve', and of the lunatic in the tombs it is said: 'fauve il mordait'. In all these cases the meaning is 'wild','savage '. In _Dieu_ we have `Vénus, fauve et fatale' ('cruel'), in _L'Ane_ les canons dont les fauves gueulées' ('terrible'), in _L'Année Terrible_'un hallier fauve où des sabres fourmillent' ('wild'), and France is called upon to be 'franchement fauve et sombre' ('fierce'). In the following passages we have bolder uses still:

Le progrès a parfois l'allure vaste et fauve ('awe-inspiring')
Et le bien bondissant effare ceux qu'il sauve. (_Dieu_.)

If man had been unselfish,

L'ombre immense serait son fauve auxiliaire. (Ibid.)

Of war,

Elle chantait, terrible et tranquille, et sa bouche
Fauve bavait du sang dans le clairon farouche.
(_Changement d'Horizon._)
La fauve volupté de mourir. (_Mangeront-ils?_)

It is applied even to sound. 'Le fauve bruit' is used in _L'Ane_ of the battles of primeval monsters, and more mystically in _La Vision d'où sortit le livre_ of the passing of the Spirit of Fatality.

Also of smell

Que l'homme au ciel s'égare ou qu'il fanatise
Avec la fauve odeur des bûchers qu'il attise.
(_Religions et Religion_.)

Nor must the strange well-known line in _La Bouche d'Ombre_ be forgotten

Le fauve Univers est le forçat de Dieu.

_Fauve_ is always used of what is dark and gloomy, just as _vermeil_ is always applied to what is bright and pleasant.

_cimier_. See note on LE MARIAGE DE ROLAND.

_mélusine_. A heraldic figure, half woman, half serpent, bathing in a basin. Taken from the name of a fairy, celebrated in the folklore of Poitou.

_alérion_, a heraldic figure, representing an eagle without beak or claws.

_le manche d'une guitare_ is the small end.

_bourguignotte_, a small helmet without throat-piece, so called because it was first used by the Burgundians.

_Diane éblouissait le pâtre: a reference to the `old sweet mythos,' as Browning calls it, of Diana, the goddess of the Moon, stooping from heaven to kiss the shepherd Endymion, as he lay asleep on Mount Latmos.

_Rhodope_, the wife of Haemus, king of Thrace, who was changed into a mountain because she thought herself more beautiful than Hera.

1. 839. The allusions are to the quarrels between the Greek and Roman Churches.

_galoubet_. A little wind instrument in shape like a flageolet, with three holes. It was played with the left hand, while the right beat a tambourine. It was peculiar to Languedoc and Provence.

_marche_, German _Mark_, military frontier.

_L'idée._ In the original edition of 1859 the word was L'épée.

_Josaphat._ The valley of Josaphat or Jehosaphat is between Jerusalem and the Mount of Olives, and according to both Jewish and Moslem tradition is to be the place of the Last Judgment. This tradition may be based on Joel iii. 12, or on the meaning of the word Josaphat, which is, 'Jehovah will judge,' or on both.

_goules_, from Arabic _ghul_. English _ghoul_. The creatures who, according to Eastern superstition, devour dead bodies.

_lamies_, from Lat. _lamia_, a fabulous being possessing the head of a woman and the body of a sea-serpent, which was supposed to devour children.

_en rupture de ban_. _Rompre le ban_ is to set at defiance a decree of banishment, the punishment for which was death.

_un dogue en arrêt_. The name _dogue_ is given to a kind of large dog, akin to a bloodhound, but the term is not correctly used here, as _en arrêt_ means _pointing_.

_vermeille_. See note on AYMERILLOT.

SULTAN MOURAD.

In his preface to the volume of 1859 Hugo appeals to the history of the Turks by Cantemir as a justification for his picture of Sultan Mourad. This was Demetrius Cantemir (1673-1723), who had a remarkable history, and wrote a valuable book. Though not a Turk, he attached himself to the Turks, and fought under the banner of the Crescent during his early life. In 1710 he was made Waiwode, or Governor, of Moldavia, Then, deserting the setting for the rising sun, he allied himself with Czar Peter the Great, then at war with Turkey. But the campaign was unsuccessful, and Cantemir, flying from Moldavia, took refuge in the Ukraine. For the rest of his life he divided his time between study and instructing the Moldavians who had accompanied him. He is said to have spoken Persian, Turkish, Arabic, modern Greek, Russian, Moldavian, and Italian. The work to which Hugo refers was a history of the aggrandizement and decadence of the Ottoman Empire. Written in Latin, and translated subsequently into English, French, and German, it was long the standard work on the subject.

It does not seem probable that Hugo had any particular Sultan in mind when he delineated Sultan Mourad. Indeed the geography of the poem suggests that he is depicting an idealized Oriental tyrant.

The nearest approximation to the monster to be found in the pages of Cantemir is Ammath IV (r. 1623-40), of whose cruelty and bloodthirstiness the historian gives a vivid account. His principal exploit was the taking of Bagdad from the Persians, on which occasion he slaughtered 1,000 of the citizens in cold blood.

For Hugo's conception of the power and influence of the Turkish Empire when at its zenith, see _Le Rhin: Conclusion_, II, III.

_Liban_ is Lebanon.

_rampantes_. The word is used with the heraldic sense.

I. 19. The so-called Temple of Theseus (its real dedication is doubtful) stands on a low hill just outside Athens. It is in a state of almost perfect preservation. The nails which crowded its woodwork were doubtless those on which the heads of slaughtered Greeks were fastened. Of course in the Greek temple there was no woodwork, except possibly in the roof.

_cangiar_, a short Turkish sword, with an almost straight blade, having a single edge.

_Naxos_ is an island in the South Aegean Sea; _Ancyra_, a town in Asia Minor.

_épiques_. A curious use of the word. It appears to mean `worthy of epic poetry,' i.e. the spectres were those of great heroic men. In _Les Chants du Crépuscule_ Hugo has 'des grenadiers épiques' (_Napoléon II_).

Elea, Megara, are towns in Greece, Famagusta is in Cyprus.

Agrigentum was a well-known Greek colony in Sicily; Fiume, at the head of the Adriatic Sea, is now an Austrian port.

_Modon_, a maritime town in the Peloponnesus.

_Alep_, Aleppo. _Brousse_, a town in Anatolia.

_Damas_, Damascus.

_Tarvis_ (English Treviso) is a town in the province of Venice.

_boyard_. The boyards were the feudal nobles of Roumania and other Balkan countries.

_Rhamséion_, a sepulchral monument built by Ramses III, king of Egypt, in the fourteenth century B.C.

_Généralife_, the palace of the Moorish kings at Granada in Spain. It is scarcely necessary to say that no Turkish Sultan ever held any part of Spain.

_échouait_. The word is here used transitively (a rare use) in the sense of 'drove against.'

_soudan_, a word of Arabic origin, was a mediaeval name for certain Mahometan princes in Egypt and Asia Minor. The word seems here loosely to designate the Turkish sultans.

_turbé_, a kind of small round chapel, usually attached to a mosque, in which the tombs of Sultans and other great persons are placed.

LA CONFIANCE DU MARQUIS FABRICE. (PAGE 71.)

This is the third section of a poem called _L'Italie: Ratbert_. The story is of Hugo's own invention, and is intended to delineate on the one hand the savagery, and on the other the knight-errantry, of the Middle Ages.

_Pharamond_, a somewhat legendary Frankish chieftain of the fifth century A.D.

_Final_. The name, alone or in composition, is borne by three small towns or villages on or near the Genoese coast. There was a marquisate of Final in the Middle Ages.

_Witikind_. Hugo possibly had in mind the Saxon chief of this name (A.D. 750-807) who for five years successfully resisted the power of Charlemagne, and finally made an honourable peace with him. It does not appear that he ever bore the title of king. His country was the ancient Saxony, that is the country between the lower Rhine and the lower Elbe. He had no connexion with Genoa, whither Hugo has dragged the Saxons without justification.

_Albenga_: the name is taken from a small town on the Genoese coast, not far from Final.

_abbé du peuple_, a name of a popularly elected magistrate at Genoa. The office was in existence from 1270 to 1339.

_tribun militaire de Rome_: Latin, _tribunus militaris_; the officers of the legion, six in number, who in republican times commanded in turn, six months at a time.

_architrave_, the lower part of the entablature, that which rests immediately on the column. To understand the line, it must be remembered that the tower is conceived as a ruin.

_alleux_, a feudal term, signifying hereditary property. The word is misused here in the sense of feudal dues.

_censive_. Another feudal term, meaning the dues owed by an estate to the lord of whom it was held.

_balistes_ (from Latin _ballista_), mediaeval machines for hurling stones and darts.

_le puits d'une sachette_, a hole in which a recluse lived. _Sachette_ (masc. _sachet_) was the name given to certain nuns of the Augustinian order who wore a loose woollen garment (_sac_), whence the name was derived. It afterwards became used of any recluse. In _Notre-Dame de Paris_ Hugo applies it to the half-crazy inhabitant of the Tour-Roland.

_cruzade_, an old Portuguese coin, so called because it was marked with a cross. There was an old cruzade worth about 3 fr. 30, and a new cruzade worth not quite 3 fr.

_Narse_, or Narses, was king of Persia A.D. 294-303.

_Tigrane_, the name of an Armenian, not a Persian dynasty. There were seven kings of this name, and they occupied the Armenian throne from 565 to 161 B.C.

_nonce_. This word is in strictness used only of the emissaries of the Pope. Its use in any sense is an anachronism, as it was not introduced till the sixteenth century.

_Ratbert_ is thus described at the beginning of the poem:--

Ratbert, fils de Rodolphe et petit-fils de Charles,
Qui se dit empereur et qui n'est que roi d'Arles.

Arles, which Hugo spells with or without the _s_ according to the exigencies of the metre, was the capital of the kingdom of Provence, one of the kingdoms formed out of the fragments of Charlemagne's empire. It embraced most of S.E. France, and lasted from A.D. 855 to 1032. This kingdom was frequently called _le royaume d'Arle_. _Roy d'Arle_ is therefore a historical title, but the names Ratbert and Rodolphe, as grandson and son respectively of Charlemagne, are imaginary.

_Macchabée_. Judas Maccabaeus, the Jewish hero, who freed his country from the tyranny of Antiochus Epiphanes.

_Amadis_ See note on EVIRADNUS.

_Aétius_, a Roman general who lived in the fifth century A.D. One of the last heroes and defenders of ancient Rome, he fought Franks, Burgundians, Huns, and succeeded in uniting the German kings of Gaul against Attila, and inflicting a crushing defeat upon him (A. D. 451).

_latobrige_. The Latobriges were an ancient German tribe who lived in what is now Wurtemberg and Baden.

_Platon_: the Athenian philosopher Plato, justly placed amongst the poets.

_Plaute_: Plautus, the Roman writer of comedies, who lived in the second century B.C.

_Scaeva Memor_, a Roman poet and tragedian of the first century A.D., rescued from oblivion by this line. The three make a bizarre trio; see note on BOOZ ENDORMI.

_Sicambre_. The Sicambres were the German tribe who in Roman times lived on the Rhine.

_incrusté d'érable_, i. e. inlaid with maple.

_bailli_, i. e. governor.

_reître_, an old word, derived from the German _Reiter_, used of the German knights.

_buccin_, properly a whelk, is a name given to a musical instrument very similar to a trombone.

_brassière_, a little jacket or vest worn close round the body. The word is usually used in the plural. Likely enough Hugo intends simply the corset.

_au penchant des mers_, i. e. where the land slopes to the sea. A peculiar expression; _au penchant de la terre_ would be more usual.

_les chouettes félines_. The epithet refers to their nocturnal habits.

L. 353. The antecedent of _que_ is _vautours_. The reference is to gladiatorial combats in the Roman Circus, and the _louve d'airain_ is the famous bronze wolf of the Capitol, a statue representing a wolf suckling two children.

_fauve_, here `savage'. See note on ÉVIRADNUS.

_cru_, i. e. unashamed.

_faîte vermeil_. See note on AYMERILLOT, where the same phrase occurs.

L. 391. figurant, 'suggesting the form of'. A highly characteritic touch. Hugo possessed a faculty of poetic vision which changed the shapes of things so as to bring them into harmony with the dominant ideas of the moment. Cf. LA ROSE DE L'INFANTE, and LA CONFIANCE.