Chapter V: Quasimodo

In the twinkling of an eye, all was ready to execute Coppenole’s
idea. _Bourgeois_, scholars and law clerks all set to work. The
little chapel situated opposite the marble table was selected for
the scene of the grinning match. A pane broken in the pretty rose
window above the door, left free a circle of stone through which
it was agreed that the competitors should thrust their heads. In
order to reach it, it was only necessary to mount upon a couple
of hogsheads, which had been produced from I know not where, and
perched one upon the other, after a fashion. It was settled that
each candidate, man or woman (for it was possible to choose a
female pope), should, for the sake of leaving the impression of
his grimace fresh and complete, cover his face and remain
concealed in the chapel until the moment of his appearance. In
less than an instant, the chapel was crowded with competitors,
upon whom the door was then closed.

Coppenole, from his post, ordered all, directed all, arranged
all. During the uproar, the cardinal, no less abashed than
Gringoire, had retired with all his suite, under the pretext of
business and vespers, without the crowd which his arrival had so
deeply stirred being in the least moved by his departure.
Guillaume Rym was the only one who noticed his eminence’s
discomfiture. The attention of the populace, like the sun,
pursued its revolution; having set out from one end of the hall,
and halted for a space in the middle, it had now reached the
other end. The marble table, the brocaded gallery had each had
their day; it was now the turn of the chapel of Louis XI.
Henceforth, the field was open to all folly. There was no one
there now, but the Flemings and the rabble.

The grimaces began. The first face which appeared at the
aperture, with eyelids turned up to the reds, a mouth open like a
maw, and a brow wrinkled like our hussar boots of the Empire,
evoked such an inextinguishable peal of laughter that Homer would
have taken all these louts for gods. Nevertheless, the grand hall
was anything but Olympus, and Gringoire’s poor Jupiter knew it
better than any one else. A second and third grimace followed,
then another and another; and the laughter and transports of
delight went on increasing. There was in this spectacle, a
peculiar power of intoxication and fascination, of which it would
be difficult to convey to the reader of our day and our salons
any idea.

Let the reader picture to himself a series of visages presenting
successively all geometrical forms, from the triangle to the
trapezium, from the cone to the polyhedron; all human
expressions, from wrath to lewdness; all ages, from the wrinkles
of the new-born babe to the wrinkles of the aged and dying; all
religious phantasmagories, from Faun to Beelzebub; all animal
profiles, from the maw to the beak, from the jowl to the muzzle.
Let the reader imagine all these grotesque figures of the Pont
Neuf, those nightmares petrified beneath the hand of Germain
Pilon, assuming life and breath, and coming in turn to stare you
in the face with burning eyes; all the masks of the Carnival of
Venice passing in succession before your glass,—in a word, a
human kaleidoscope.

The orgy grew more and more Flemish. Teniers could have given but
a very imperfect idea of it. Let the reader picture to himself in
bacchanal form, Salvator Rosa’s battle. There were no longer
either scholars or ambassadors or _bourgeois_ or men or women;
there was no longer any Clopin Trouillefou, nor Gilles Lecornu,
nor Marie Quatrelivres, nor Robin Poussepain. All was universal
license. The grand hall was no longer anything but a vast furnace
of effrontry and joviality, where every mouth was a cry, every
individual a posture; everything shouted and howled. The strange
visages which came, in turn, to gnash their teeth in the rose
window, were like so many brands cast into the brazier; and from
the whole of this effervescing crowd, there escaped, as from a
furnace, a sharp, piercing, stinging noise, hissing like the
wings of a gnat.

“Ho hé! curse it!”

“Just look at that face!”

“It’s not good for anything.”

“Guillemette Maugerepuis, just look at that bull’s muzzle; it
only lacks the horns. It can’t be your husband.”

“Another!”

“Belly of the pope! what sort of a grimace is that?”

“Holà hé! that’s cheating. One must show only one’s face.”

“That damned Perrette Callebotte! she’s capable of that!”

“Good! Good!”

“I’m stifling!”

“There’s a fellow whose ears won’t go through!” Etc., etc.

But we must do justice to our friend Jehan. In the midst of this
witches’ sabbath, he was still to be seen on the top of his
pillar, like the cabin-boy on the topmast. He floundered about
with incredible fury. His mouth was wide open, and from it there
escaped a cry which no one heard, not that it was covered by the
general clamor, great as that was but because it attained, no
doubt, the limit of perceptible sharp sounds, the thousand
vibrations of Sauveur, or the eight thousand of Biot.

As for Gringoire, the first moment of depression having passed,
he had regained his composure. He had hardened himself against
adversity.—“Continue!” he had said for the third time, to his
comedians, speaking machines; then as he was marching with great
strides in front of the marble table, a fancy seized him to go
and appear in his turn at the aperture of the chapel, were it
only for the pleasure of making a grimace at that ungrateful
populace.—“But no, that would not be worthy of us; no, vengeance!
let us combat until the end,” he repeated to himself; “the power
of poetry over people is great; I will bring them back. We shall
see which will carry the day, grimaces or polite literature.”

Alas! he had been left the sole spectator of his piece. It was
far worse than it had been a little while before. He no longer
beheld anything but backs.

I am mistaken. The big, patient man, whom he had already
consulted in a critical moment, had remained with his face turned
towards the stage. As for Gisquette and Liénarde, they had
deserted him long ago.

Gringoire was touched to the heart by the fidelity of his only
spectator. He approached him and addressed him, shaking his arm
slightly; for the good man was leaning on the balustrade and
dozing a little.

“Monsieur,” said Gringoire, “I thank you!”

“Monsieur,” replied the big man with a yawn, “for what?”

“I see what wearies you,” resumed the poet; “’tis all this noise
which prevents your hearing comfortably. But be at ease! your
name shall descend to posterity! Your name, if you please?”

“Renauld Chateau, guardian of the seals of the Châtelet of Paris,
at your service.”

“Monsieur, you are the only representative of the muses here,”
said Gringoire.

“You are too kind, sir,” said the guardian of the seals at the
Châtelet.

“You are the only one,” resumed Gringoire, “who has listened to
the piece decorously. What do you think of it?”

“He! he!” replied the fat magistrate, half aroused, “it’s
tolerably jolly, that’s a fact.”

Gringoire was forced to content himself with this eulogy; for a
thunder of applause, mingled with a prodigious acclamation, cut
their conversation short. The Pope of the Fools had been elected.

“Noël! Noël! Noël!”[6] shouted the people on all sides. That was,
in fact, a marvellous grimace which was beaming at that moment
through the aperture in the rose window. After all the
pentagonal, hexagonal, and whimsical faces, which had succeeded
each other at that hole without realizing the ideal of the
grotesque which their imaginations, excited by the orgy, had
constructed, nothing less was needed to win their suffrages than
the sublime grimace which had just dazzled the assembly. Master
Coppenole himself applauded, and Clopin Trouillefou, who had been
among the competitors (and God knows what intensity of ugliness
his visage could attain), confessed himself conquered: We will do
the same. We shall not try to give the reader an idea of that
tetrahedral nose, that horseshoe mouth; that little left eye
obstructed with a red, bushy, bristling eyebrow, while the right
eye disappeared entirely beneath an enormous wart; of those teeth
in disarray, broken here and there, like the embattled parapet of
a fortress; of that callous lip, upon which one of these teeth
encroached, like the tusk of an elephant; of that forked chin;
and above all, of the expression spread over the whole; of that
mixture of malice, amazement, and sadness. Let the reader dream
of this whole, if he can.

The acclamation was unanimous; people rushed towards the chapel.
They made the lucky Pope of the Fools come forth in triumph. But
it was then that surprise and admiration attained their highest
pitch; the grimace was his face.

Or rather, his whole person was a grimace. A huge head, bristling
with red hair; between his shoulders an enormous hump, a
counterpart perceptible in front; a system of thighs and legs so
strangely astray that they could touch each other only at the
knees, and, viewed from the front, resembled the crescents of two
scythes joined by the handles; large feet, monstrous hands; and,
with all this deformity, an indescribable and redoubtable air of
vigor, agility, and courage,—strange exception to the eternal
rule which wills that force as well as beauty shall be the result
of harmony. Such was the pope whom the fools had just chosen for
themselves.

One would have pronounced him a giant who had been broken and
badly put together again.

When this species of cyclops appeared on the threshold of the
chapel, motionless, squat, and almost as broad as he was tall;
_squared_ on the _base_, as a great man says; with his doublet
half red, half violet, sown with silver bells, and, above all, in
the perfection of his ugliness, the populace recognized him on
the instant, and shouted with one voice,—

“’Tis Quasimodo, the bellringer! ’tis Quasimodo, the hunchback of
Notre-Dame! Quasimodo, the one-eyed! Quasimodo, the bandy-legged!
Noël! Noël!”

It will be seen that the poor fellow had a choice of surnames.

“Let the women with child beware!” shouted the scholars.

“Or those who wish to be,” resumed Joannes.

The women did, in fact, hide their faces.

“Oh! the horrible monkey!” said one of them.

“As wicked as he is ugly,” retorted another.

“He’s the devil,” added a third.

“I have the misfortune to live near Notre-Dame; I hear him
prowling round the eaves by night.”

“With the cats.”

“He’s always on our roofs.”

“He throws spells down our chimneys.”

“The other evening, he came and made a grimace at me through my
attic window. I thought that it was a man. Such a fright as I
had!”

“I’m sure that he goes to the witches’ sabbath. Once he left a
broom on my leads.”

“Oh! what a displeasing hunchback’s face!”

“Oh! what an ill-favored soul!”

“Whew!”

The men, on the contrary, were delighted and applauded.
Quasimodo, the object of the tumult, still stood on the threshold
of the chapel, sombre and grave, and allowed them to admire him.

One scholar (Robin Poussepain, I think), came and laughed in his
face, and too close. Quasimodo contented himself with taking him
by the girdle, and hurling him ten paces off amid the crowd; all
without uttering a word.

Master Coppenole, in amazement, approached him.

“Cross of God! Holy Father! you possess the handsomest ugliness
that I have ever beheld in my life. You would deserve to be pope
at Rome, as well as at Paris.”

So saying, he placed his hand gayly on his shoulder. Quasimodo
did not stir. Coppenole went on,—

“You are a rogue with whom I have a fancy for carousing, were it
to cost me a new dozen of twelve livres of Tours. How does it
strike you?”

Quasimodo made no reply.

“Cross of God!” said the hosier, “are you deaf?”

He was, in truth, deaf.

Nevertheless, he began to grow impatient with Coppenole’s
behavior, and suddenly turned towards him with so formidable a
gnashing of teeth, that the Flemish giant recoiled, like a
bull-dog before a cat.

Then there was created around that strange personage, a circle of
terror and respect, whose radius was at least fifteen geometrical
feet. An old woman explained to Coppenole that Quasimodo was
deaf.

“Deaf!” said the hosier, with his great Flemish laugh. “Cross of
God! He’s a perfect pope!”

“Hé! I recognize him,” exclaimed Jehan, who had, at last,
descended from his capital, in order to see Quasimodo at closer
quarters, “he’s the bellringer of my brother, the archdeacon.
Good-day, Quasimodo!”

“What a devil of a man!” said Robin Poussepain still all bruised
with his fall. “He shows himself; he’s a hunchback. He walks;
he’s bandy-legged. He looks at you; he’s one-eyed. You speak to
him; he’s deaf. And what does this Polyphemus do with his
tongue?”

“He speaks when he chooses,” said the old woman; “he became deaf
through ringing the bells. He is not dumb.”

“That he lacks,” remarks Jehan.

“And he has one eye too many,” added Robin Poussepain.

“Not at all,” said Jehan wisely. “A one-eyed man is far less
complete than a blind man. He knows what he lacks.”

In the meantime, all the beggars, all the lackeys, all the
cutpurses, joined with the scholars, had gone in procession to
seek, in the cupboard of the law clerks’ company, the cardboard
tiara, and the derisive robe of the Pope of the Fools. Quasimodo
allowed them to array him in them without wincing, and with a
sort of proud docility. Then they made him seat himself on a
motley litter. Twelve officers of the fraternity of fools raised
him on their shoulders; and a sort of bitter and disdainful joy
lighted up the morose face of the cyclops, when he beheld beneath
his deformed feet all those heads of handsome, straight,
well-made men. Then the ragged and howling procession set out on
its march, according to custom, around the inner galleries of the
Courts, before making the circuit of the streets and squares.