CHAPTER I--NUMBER 24,601 BECOMES NUMBER 9,430

  Jean Valjean had been recaptured.

  The reader will be grateful to us if we pass rapidly over the saddetails. We will confine ourselves to transcribing two paragraphspublished by the journals of that day, a few months after the surprisingevents which had taken place at M. sur M.

  These articles are rather summary. It must be remembered, that at thatepoch the _Gazette des Tribunaux_ was not yet in existence.

  We borrow the first from the _Drapeau Blanc_. It bears the date of July25, 1823.

  An arrondissement of the Pas de Calais has just been the theatre of anevent quite out of the ordinary course. A man, who was a stranger in theDepartment, and who bore the name of M. Madeleine, had, thanks to thenew methods, resuscitated some years ago an ancient local industry, themanufacture of jet and of black glass trinkets. He had made his fortunein the business, and that of the arrondissement as well, we will admit.He had been appointed mayor, in recognition of his services. The policediscovered that M. Madeleine was no other than an ex-convict who hadbroken his ban, condemned in 1796 for theft, and named Jean Valjean.Jean Valjean has been recommitted to prison. It appears that previousto his arrest he had succeeded in withdrawing from the hands of M.Laffitte, a sum of over half a million which he had lodged there, andwhich he had, moreover, and by perfectly legitimate means, acquired inhis business. No one has been able to discover where Jean Valjean hasconcealed this money since his return to prison at Toulon.

  The second article, which enters a little more into detail, is anextract from the _Journal de Paris_, of the same date.

  A former convict, who had been liberated, named Jean Valjean, has justappeared before the Court of Assizes of the Var, under circumstancescalculated to attract attention. This wretch had succeeded in escapingthe vigilance of the police, he had changed his name, and had succeededin getting himself appointed mayor of one of our small northern towns;in this town he had established a considerable commerce. He has at lastbeen unmasked and arrested, thanks to the indefatigable zeal of thepublic prosecutor. He had for his concubine a woman of the town, whodied of a shock at the moment of his arrest. This scoundrel, who isendowed with Herculean strength, found means to escape; but three orfour days after his flight the police laid their hands on him once more,in Paris itself, at the very moment when he was entering one of thoselittle vehicles which run between the capital and the village ofMontfermeil (Seine-et-Oise). He is said to have profited by thisinterval of three or four days of liberty, to withdraw a considerablesum deposited by him with one of our leading bankers. This sum has beenestimated at six or seven hundred thousand francs. If the indictment isto be trusted, he has hidden it in some place known to himself alone,and it has not been possible to lay hands on it. However that may be,the said Jean Valjean has just been brought before the Assizes of theDepartment of the Var as accused of highway robbery accompanied withviolence, about eight years ago, on the person of one of those honestchildren who, as the patriarch of Ferney has said, in immortal verse,

  ". . . Arrive from Savoy every year, And who, with gentle hands, do clear Those long canals choked up with soot."

  This bandit refused to defend himself. It was proved by the skilful andeloquent representative of the public prosecutor, that the theft wascommitted in complicity with others, and that Jean Valjean was a memberof a band of robbers in the south. Jean Valjean was pronounced guiltyand was condemned to the death penalty in consequence. This criminalrefused to lodge an appeal. The king, in his inexhaustible clemency, hasdeigned to commute his penalty to that of penal servitude for life. JeanValjean was immediately taken to the prison at Toulon.

  The reader has not forgotten that Jean Valjean had religious habits atM. sur M. Some papers, among others the _Constitutional_, presented thiscommutation as a triumph of the priestly party.

  Jean Valjean changed his number in the galleys. He was called 9,430.

  However, and we will mention it at once in order that we may not beobliged to recur to the subject, the prosperity of M. sur M. vanishedwith M. Madeleine; all that he had foreseen during his night of feverand hesitation was realized; lacking him, there actually was _asoul lacking_. After this fall, there took place at M. sur M. thategotistical division of great existences which have fallen, that fataldismemberment of flourishing things which is accomplished every day,obscurely, in the human community, and which history has noted onlyonce, because it occurred after the death of Alexander. Lieutenantsare crowned kings; superintendents improvise manufacturers out ofthemselves. Envious rivalries arose. M. Madeleine's vast workshops wereshut; his buildings fell to ruin, his workmen were scattered. Someof them quitted the country, others abandoned the trade. Thenceforth,everything was done on a small scale, instead of on a grand scale;for lucre instead of the general good. There was no longer a centre;everywhere there was competition and animosity. M. Madeleine had reignedover all and directed all. No sooner had he fallen, than each pulledthings to himself; the spirit of combat succeeded to the spirit oforganization, bitterness to cordiality, hatred of one another to thebenevolence of the founder towards all; the threads which M. Madeleinehad set were tangled and broken, the methods were adulterated, theproducts were debased, confidence was killed; the market diminished,for lack of orders; salaries were reduced, the workshops stood still,bankruptcy arrived. And then there was nothing more for the poor. Allhad vanished.

  The state itself perceived that some one had been crushed somewhere.Less than four years after the judgment of the Court of Assizesestablishing the identity of Jean Valjean and M. Madeleine, for thebenefit of the galleys, the cost of collecting taxes had doubled in thearrondissement of M. sur M.; and M. de Villèle called attention to thefact in the rostrum, in the month of February, 1827.