Page 291 - les-miserables

CHAPTER V

VAGUE FLASHES ON

THE HORIZON

Little by little, and in the course of time, all this op-
position subsided. There had at first been exercised against
M. Madeleine, in virtue of a sort of law which all those who
rise must submit to, blackening and calumnies; then they
grew to be nothing more than ill-nature, then merely mali-
cious remarks, then even this entirely disappeared; respect
became complete, unanimous, cordial, and towards 1821
the moment arrived when the word ‘Monsieur le Maire’ was
pronounced at M. sur M. with almost the same accent as
‘Monseigneur the Bishop’ had been pronounced in D—— in
1815. People came from a distance of ten leagues around to
consult M. Madeleine. He put an end to differences, he pre-
vented lawsuits, he reconciled enemies. Every one took him
for the judge, and with good reason. It seemed as though
he had for a soul the book of the natural law. It was like an
epidemic of veneration, which in the course of six or seven
years gradually took possession of the whole district.
One single man in the town, in the arrondissement,

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