Page 326 - les-miserables

Pont-A-Mousson, grow old as dullards, never work, serve
no use, and do no great harm.
M. Felix Tholomyes, had he remained in his own prov-
ince and never beheld Paris, would have been one of these
men.
If they were richer, one would say, ‘They are dandies;’
if they were poorer, one would say, ‘They are idlers.’ They
are simply men without employment. Among these un-
employed there are bores, the bored, dreamers, and some
knaves.
At that period a dandy was composed of a tall collar, a
big cravat, a watch with trinkets, three vests of different col-
ors, worn one on top of the other—the red and blue inside;
of a short-waisted olive coat, with a codfish tail, a double
row of silver buttons set close to each other and running
up to the shoulder; and a pair of trousers of a lighter shade
of olive, ornamented on the two seams with an indefinite,
but always uneven, number of lines, varying from one to
eleven—a limit which was never exceeded. Add to this, high
shoes with little irons on the heels, a tall hat with a narrow
brim, hair worn in a tuft, an enormous cane, and conversa-
tion set off by puns of Potier. Over all, spurs and a mustache.
At that epoch mustaches indicated the bourgeois, and spurs
the pedestrian.
The provincial dandy wore the longest of spurs and the
fiercest of mustaches.
It was the period of the conflict of the republics of South
America with the King of Spain, of Bolivar against Morillo.
Narrow-brimmed hats were royalist, and were called moril-

326 Les Miserables