the same time, but, so far as sentimentalism was concerned, given to the perusal of Pigault-Lebrun, and “in what concerns the sex,” as he said in his jargon—a downright, unmitigated lout. His wife was twelve or fifteen years younger than he was. Later on, when her hair, arranged in a romantically drooping fashion, began to grow gray, when the Megaera began to be developed from the Pamela, the female Thénardier was nothing but a coarse, vicious woman, who had dabbled in stupid romances. Now, one cannot read nonsense with impunity. The result was that her eldest daughter was named Éponine; as for the younger, the poor little thing came near being called Gulnare; I know not to what diversion, effected by a romance of Ducray-Dumenil, she owed the fact that she merely bore the name of Azelma.
However, we will remark by the way, everything was not ridiculous and superficial in that curious epoch to which we are alluding, and which may be designated as the anarchy of baptismal names. By the side of this romantic element which we have just indicated there is the social symptom. It is not rare for the neatherd’s boy nowadays to bear the name of Arthur, Alfred, or Alphonse, and for the vicomte—if there are still any vicomtes—to be called Thomas, Pierre, or Jacques. This displacement, which places the elegant name on the plebeian and the rustic name on the aristocrat, is nothing else than an eddy of equality. The irresistible penetration of the new inspiration is there as everywhere else. Beneath this apparent discord there is a great and a profound thing—the French Revolution.
III
The Lark
It is not all in all sufficient to be wicked in order to prosper. The cook-shop was in a bad way.