Page 295 - les-miserables

succeeded there. At forty years of age he was an inspector.
During his youth he had been employed in the convict
establishments of the South.
Before proceeding further, let us come to an understand-
ing as to the words, ‘human face,’ which we have just applied
to Javert.
The human face of Javert consisted of a flat nose, with
two deep nostrils, towards which enormous whiskers as-
cended on his cheeks. One felt ill at ease when he saw these
two forests and these two caverns for the first time. When
Javert laughed,—and his laugh was rare and terrible,—his
thin lips parted and revealed to view not only his teeth, but
his gums, and around his nose there formed a flattened and
savage fold, as on the muzzle of a wild beast. Javert, serious,
was a watchdog; when he laughed, he was a tiger. As for the
rest, he had very little skull and a great deal of jaw; his hair
concealed his forehead and fell over his eyebrows; between
his eyes there was a permanent, central frown, like an im-
print of wrath; his gaze was obscure; his mouth pursed up
and terrible; his air that of ferocious command.
This man was composed of two very simple and two
very good sentiments, comparatively; but he rendered them
almost bad, by dint of exaggerating them,—respect for
authority, hatred of rebellion; and in his eyes, murder, rob-
bery, all crimes, are only forms of rebellion. He enveloped
in a blind and profound faith every one who had a function
in the state, from the prime minister to the rural police-
man. He covered with scorn, aversion, and disgust every
one who had once crossed the legal threshold of evil. He

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