The Hunchback of Notre Dame - Victor Hugo [114]
As was the fashion of that period, a Latin inscription on the wall informed the learned passers-by of the pious purpose of this cell. The custom was retained until the middle of the sixteenth century, of explaining the purpose of a building by a brief device inscribed above the door. Thus we still read in France, over the gate of the prison belonging to the manor of the Lord of Tourville: “Sileto et spera;”bzin Ireland, under the escutcheon over the great door of Fortescue Castle: “Forte scutum, salus ducum;”ca and in England, over the main entrance to the hospitable manor of Earl Cowper: “Tuum est.”cbIn those days every edifice embodied a thought.
As there was no door to the walled cell in the Tour-Roland, some one had carved in Roman capitals over the window these two words:—
“TU, ORA.”cc
Hence the people, whose mind never grasps such nice distinctions, and who are quite ready to translate Ludovico Magno into the Porte Saint-Denis, gave this dark, damp, gloomy cavern the name of the “Trou-aux-Rats,” or the Rat-Hole,—an explanation possibly less sublime, but certainly more picturesque than the other.
CHAPTER III
The Story of a Wheaten Cake
At the time of which this story treats, the cell in the Tour-Roland was occupied. If the reader wishes to know by whom, he has but to listen to the conversation of three worthy gossips, who, at the moment when we drew his attention to the Rat-Hole, were walking directly that way, going from the Châtelet towards the Place de Grève, along the water’s edge.
Two of these women were dressed like good citizens of Paris. Their fine white gorgets; their petticoats of striped linsey-woolsey, red and blue; their white knitted stockings, with colored clocks, pulled well up over the leg; their square-toed shoes of tan-colored leather with black soles; and above all their head-dress,—a sort of tinsel horn overloaded with ribbons and lace, still worn by the women of Champagne and by the grenadiers of the Russian Imperial Guard,—proclaiming that they belonged to that class of rich tradesfolk occupying the middle ground between what servants call “a woman” and what they call “a lady.” They wore neither rings nor gold crosses; and it was easy to see that this was not from poverty, but quite simply from fear of a fine. Their companion was attired in much the same style; but there was something in her appearance and manner which bespoke the country notary’s wife. It was evident by the way in which her girdle was arranged high above her hips, that she had not been in Paris long; add to this a pleated gor get, knots of ribbon on her shoes, the fact that the stripes of her petticoat ran breadthwise and not lengthwise, and a thousand other enormities revolting to good taste.
The first two walked with the gait peculiar to Parisian women showing Paris to their country friends. The country-woman held by the hand a big boy, who grasped in his hand a large wheaten cake. We regret that we must add that, owing to the severity of the season, his tongue did duty as a pocket-handkerchief.
The child loitered (“non passibus œquis,” as Virgil has it), and stumbled constantly, for which his mother scolded him well. True, he paid far more attention to the cake than to the pavement. Undoubtedly he had some grave reason for not biting it (the cake), for he contented himself with gazing affectionately at it. But his mother should have taken charge of the cake. It was cruel to make a Tantalus of the chubby child.
But the three damsels (for the term “dame” was then reserved for noble ladies) were all talking at once.
“Make haste, Damoiselle Mahiette,” said the youngest of the three, who was also the biggest, to the country-woman. “I am mightily afraid we shall be too late; they told us at the Châtelet that he was to be taken directly to the pillory.”
“Nonsense! What do you mean, Damoiselle Oudarde Musnier?” replied the other Parisian.