Page 2171 - les-miserables

leap tumultuously under the feet of the passer-by.
The man pursues his way, he walks on, turns towards
the land, endeavors to approach the shore. He is not uneasy.
Uneasy about what? Only he is conscious that the heavi-
ness of his feet seems to be increasing at every step that he
takes. All at once he sinks in. He sinks in two or three inch-
es. Decidedly, he is not on the right road; he halts to get his
bearings. Suddenly he glances at his feet; his feet have disap-
peared. The sand has covered them. He draws his feet out of
the sand, he tries to retrace his steps, he turns back, he sinks
in more deeply than before. The sand is up to his ankles, he
tears himself free from it and flings himself to the left, the
sand reaches to mid-leg, he flings himself to the right, the
sand comes up to his knees. Then, with indescribable terror,
he recognizes the fact that he is caught in a quicksand, and
that he has beneath him that frightful medium in which
neither man can walk nor fish can swim. He flings away his
burden, if he have one, he lightens himself, like a ship in dis-
tress; it is too late, the sand is above his knees.
He shouts, he waves his hat, or his handkerchief, the
sand continually gains on him; if the beach is deserted, if
the land is too far away, if the bank of sand is too ill-famed,
there is no hero in the neighborhood, all is over, he is con-
demned to be engulfed. He is condemned to that terrible
interment, long, infallible, implacable, which it is impossi-
ble to either retard or hasten, which lasts for hours, which
will not come to an end, which seizes you erect, free, in the
flush of health, which drags you down by the feet, which, at
every effort that you attempt, at every shout that you utter,

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