Page 228 - les-miserables

times even decorated with the fleur-de-lys, like the bourgeois,
scattered over the large square and the Marigny square, were
playing at rings and revolving on the wooden horses; others
were engaged in drinking; some journeyman printers had
on paper caps; their laughter was audible. Every thing was
radiant. It was a time of undisputed peace and profound roy-
alist security; it was the epoch when a special and private
report of Chief of Police Angeles to the King, on the subject
of the suburbs of Paris, terminated with these lines:—
‘Taking all things into consideration, Sire, there is noth-
ing to be feared from these people. They are as heedless and
as indolent as cats. The populace is restless in the provinces;
it is not in Paris. These are very pretty men, Sire. It would
take all of two of them to make one of your grenadiers. There
is nothing to be feared on the part of the populace of Paris
the capital. It is remarkable that the stature of this popula-
tion should have diminished in the last fifty years; and the
populace of the suburbs is still more puny than at the time
of the Revolution. It is not dangerous. In short, it is an ami-
able rabble.’
Prefects of the police do not deem it possible that a cat
can transform itself into a lion; that does happen, however,
and in that lies the miracle wrought by the populace of Paris.
Moreover, the cat so despised by Count Angles possessed the
esteem of the republics of old. In their eyes it was liberty in-
carnate; and as though to serve as pendant to the Minerva
Aptera of the Piraeus, there stood on the public square in
Corinth the colossal bronze figure of a cat. The ingenuous
police of the Restoration beheld the populace of Paris in too

228 Les Miserables