Page 1141 - les-miserables

is a mask; the lie lurks beneath it. A people which accepts a
charter abdicates. The law is only the law when entire. No!
no charter!’
It was winter; a couple of fagots were crackling in the fire-
place. This was tempting, and Courfeyrac could not resist.
He crumpled the poor Touquet Charter in his fist, and flung
it in the fire. The paper flashed up. Combeferre watched
the masterpiece of Louis XVIII. burn philosophically, and
contented himself with saying:—
‘The charter metamorphosed into flame.’
And sarcasms, sallies, jests, that French thing which is
called entrain, and that English thing which is called hu-
mor, good and bad taste, good and bad reasons, all the wild
pyrotechnics of dialogue, mounting together and crossing
from all points of the room, produced a sort of merry bom-
bardment over their heads.

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