登陆注册
5256400000146

第146章 CHAPTER I(2)

There was another moment when, while laughing diabolically at himself, he represented to himself la Esmeralda as he had seen her on that first day, lively, careless, joyous, gayly attired, dancing, winged, harmonious, and la Esmeralda of the last day, in her scanty shift, with a rope about her neck, mounting slowly with her bare feet, the angular ladder of the gallows; he figured to himself this double picture in such a manner .that he gave vent to a terrible cry.

While this hurricane of despair overturned, broke, tore up, bent, uprooted everything in his soul, he gazed at nature around him. At his feet, some chickens were searching the thickets and pecking, enamelled beetles ran about in the sun;overhead, some groups of dappled gray clouds were floating across the blue sky; on the horizon, the spire of the Abbey Saint-Victor pierced the ridge of the hill with its slate obelisk; and the miller of the Copeaue hillock was whistling as he watched the laborious wings of his mill turning. All this active, organized, tranquil life, recurring around him under a thousand forms, hurt him. He resumed his flight.

He sped thus across the fields until evening. This flight from nature, life, himself, man, God, everything, lasted all day long. Sometimes he flung himself face downward on the, earth, and tore up the young blades of wheat with his nails.

Sometimes he halted in the deserted street of a village, and his thoughts were so intolerable that he grasped his head in both hands and tried to tear it from his shoulders in order to dash it upon the pavement.

Towards the hour of sunset, he examined himself again, and found himself nearly mad. The tempest which had raged within him ever since the instant when he had lost the hope and the will to save the gypsy,--that tempest had not left in his conscience a single healthy idea, a single thought which maintained its upright position. His reason lay there almost entirely destroyed. There remained but two distinct images in his mind, la Esmeralda and the gallows; all the rest was blank. Those two images united, presented to him a frightful group; and the more he concentrated what attention and thought was left to him, the more he beheld them grow, in accordance with a fantastic progression, the one in grace, in charm, in beauty, in light, the other in deformity and horror;so that at last la Esmeralda appeared to him like a star, the gibbet like an enormous, fleshless arm.

One remarkable fact is, that during the whole of this torture, the idea of dying did not seriously occur to him. The wretch was made so. He clung to life. Perhaps he really saw hell beyond it.

Meanwhile, the day continued to decline. The living being which still existed in him reflected vaguely on retracing its steps. He believed himself to be far away from Paris; on taking his bearings, he perceived that he had only circled the enclosure of the University. The spire of Saint-Sulpice, and the three lofty needles of Saint Germain-des-Prés, rose above the horizon on his right. He turned his steps in that direction. When he heard the brisk challenge of the men-at-arms of the abbey, around the crenelated, circumscribing wall of Saint-Germain, he turned aside, took a path which presented itself between the abbey and the lazar-house of the bourg, and at the expiration of a few minutes found himself on the verge of the Pré-aux-Clercs. This meadow was celebrated by reason of the brawls which went on there night and day; it was the hydra of the poor monks of Saint-Germain: ~quod mouachis Sancti-Germaini pratensis hydra fuit, clericis nova semper dissidiorum capita suscitantibus~. The archdeacon was afraid of meeting some one there; he feared every human countenance; he had just avoided the University and the Bourg Saint-Germain; he wished to re-enter the streets as late as possible. He skirted the Pré-aux-Clercs, took the deserted path which separated it from the Dieu-Neuf, and at last reached the water's edge. There Dom Claude found a boatman, who, for a few farthings in Parisian coinage, rowed him up the Seine as far as the point of the city, and landed him on that tongue of abandoned land where the reader has already beheld Gringoire dreaming, and which was prolonged beyond the king's gardens, parallel to the Ile du Passeur-aux-Vaches.

The monotonous rocking of the boat and the ripple of the water had, in some sort, quieted the unhappy Claude. When the boatman had taken his departure, he remained standing stupidly on the strand, staring straight before him and perceiving objects only through magnifying oscillations which rendered everything a sort of phantasmagoria to him. The fatigue of a great grief not infrequently produces this effect on the mind.

The sun had set behind the lofty Tour-de-Nesle. It was the twilight hour. The sky was white, the water of the river was white. Between these two white expanses, the left bank of the Seine, on which his eyes were fixed, projected its gloomy mass and, rendered ever thinner and thinner by perspective, it plunged into the gloom of the horizon like a black spire. It was loaded with houses, of which only the obscure outline could be distinguished, sharply brought out in shadows against the light background of the sky and the water. Here and there windows began to gleam, like the holes in a brazier.

同类推荐
  • 望云集

    望云集

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 太上洞玄灵宝宣戒首悔众罪保护经

    太上洞玄灵宝宣戒首悔众罪保护经

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 嘉祐杂志

    嘉祐杂志

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 游城南记

    游城南记

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 千转大明陀罗尼经

    千转大明陀罗尼经

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
热门推荐
  • 捡个王妃来当当

    捡个王妃来当当

    河湘王有两个女儿,长女幽冉郡主温婉动人,仪态万千,琴棋书画样样精通,为诸家公子意中人。小女嚣张跋扈,蛮横任性,不知礼数,人人唯恐避之不及。幽冉郡主与陛下胞弟择清王大婚前夜,这郡主连夜出逃,全府惶恐,无奈只好将小小姐送上喜轿。择清王娶妻本就非他所愿,更何况还娶错了人,心里一万个不爽,好在娶谁对他而言都没差,便也作罢,只是这二小姐怎么跟传闻不太一样。那个夜半持剑以一敌十诛杀刺客还拿剑抵他脖颈一双冷目叫他不要出声的真的是他王妃吗?那个女扮男装夜闯地牢将他救出,又统领江湖各路奇人的,真的是他王妃吗?
  • 三国·荆州

    三国·荆州

    《三国·荆州》是朱苏进自小说创作转入编剧后的文学剧本代表作,是继《康熙王朝》《江山风雨情》《朱元璋》之后的又一历史巨作。本书同时收录《分享曹操》《最优美的最危险》《山是站起来的大海》《我就是酒》等多篇优美壮阔的杂文,这些杂文既体现了朱苏进文学创作水平和实力,又能切身感受到作家浓厚的理想主义和浪漫主义色彩。其中,《三国·荆州》是张艺谋导演年度大片《影》的初始版本。
  • 法国精神

    法国精神

    自中国被西方战舰轰开大门,西方大国就介入了中国近代历史的变迁。其中法国对于中国的影响不可小觑。如果说在19世纪下半叶,对中国改革运动起着重要影响的还主要是来自当时第一号强国大英帝国的社会政治思想(比如严复的著名翻译都采自英国思想家),那么在19、20世纪交替期间,由于大部分海外的中国留学生都来自于日本、美国和法国,因而这三个国家变成了外国影响中国最主要的国家。
  • 鲁迅

    鲁迅

    “青年又何须找那挂着金字招牌的导师呢?不如寻朋友,联合起来,同向着似乎可以生存的方向走。你们所多的是生力,遇见深林,可以开成平地的,遇见旷野,可以栽种树木的,遇见沙漠,可以开掘井泉的。向什么荆棘塞途的老路——寻什么乌烟瘴气的鸟导师。 ”他希望自己的作品速朽,希望人们忘记他。然而就其思想的影响力和艺术的穿透力而言,在20世纪的中国作家群中,是无人可与鲁迅比肩的。在现实社会条件下,在促使我们民族自省、自勉,昭示人们追求光明与进步方面,鲁迅的著作和思想依然是无可替代的,难以超越的。名人是世界的轴心,名传是人生的标尺,名人名传是我们不倦的家园。中国现代文学的伟大奠基者,现代中国最苦痛的灵魂,一个伟大的启蒙者,永生的民族魂。他的小说是号角,能唤醒国民麻木的神经,促进民族自我意识的觉醒;他的杂文是匕首,是投枪,能和读者杀出一条生存的血路,也能给人们愉快和休息。
  • 废都之崛起

    废都之崛起

    秦枫是一名历史系研究生,一次探险过程中被好友设计陷害,穿越到一个未知世界,看主人公如何用二十一世纪的大脑,纵横世界……
  • 异度剑神

    异度剑神

    一颗归家之心,一把弑杀之剑仅凭二者,便可在纷繁异世走出属于自己的路!长路漫漫,唯剑作伴(作者无tj前科,请放心收藏)
  • 化仙

    化仙

    草木为灵者,百年养精,千年诞念,三千年方可幻化人身!远古大战之后,人族昌盛,妖族没落,灵兽亿万却无化形之妖……东灵大地,剑祖霸世。南环之地,木家纵横。西陵险地,残妖广布。北寒极地,冰魔封帝。升仙殿雄踞中天灵地一统天下,七彩升仙桥凝聚人间仙脉,掌控升仙之事!升仙难,成仙难,化仙更难……且看一个身世如迷的少年,如何在这大争之世,走出属于他的仙路……
  • 主神调查员

    主神调查员

    这是个脑洞大开的爆笑故事,你将看到一个个与原作画风完全不同的剧情世界。我的名字叫罗锋,是一名主神调查员,日常工作是进入剧情世界,尽量扰乱剧情主线,收集数据与原剧情线做比对。我为什么要搅乱这些世界?当然是为了采集更多的主神数据进行科研,做到知己知彼,最终击败主神,将这个高维文明侵略者彻底消灭。本书会穿越的世界:《流星蝴蝶剑之蝙蝠侠归来》(已完结)《费伦大陆篇》(已完结)《漫威无限战争》(已完结)《火影篇》(已完结)《仙剑篇》柔情连载中。 书友群:686550401
  • 悠哉悠哉的异古生活

    悠哉悠哉的异古生活

    传闻,传承久远的逐风部落族长狼墨不近女色。江晴嘴角一抽。——扯淡!这个粘着、霸着他的是谁?“狼墨,知道什么叫做相互相助吗?”江晴怒吼。“帮了,要负责!”狼墨无视。感谢腾讯文学书评团提供书评支持
  • 灵宝九幽长夜起尸度亡玄章

    灵宝九幽长夜起尸度亡玄章

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。