New Troubles — Les Misérables

When the hour comes to leave the galleys, Jean Valjean hears in his ear the strange words, Thou art free. The moment seems improbable. A ray of the true light of the living enters him. It is not long before the ray pales. He has been dazzled by the idea of liberty. He believed in a new life. He very speedily perceives what sort of liberty it is to which a yellow passport is provided.

Bitterness surrounds the lesson. He had calculated that his earnings ought to amount to a hundred and seventy-one francs. He forgot the forced repose of Sundays and festival days across nineteen years, about eighty francs gone. Various local levies reduce the hoard further to a hundred and nine francs fifteen sous, counted out on departure. He understands nothing of this. He thinks himself wronged. Hugo will say the word: robbed. The next day, at Grasse, men are unloading bales in front of an orange-flower distillery. He offers his services. Business is pressing; they accept. He is intelligent, robust, adroit. He does his best. The master seems pleased. A gendarme passes, observes him, demands his papers. The yellow passport is shown. Valjean goes back to the work. He has already asked a workman what they earn: thirty sous a day. At evening, forced to set out again the next day, he asks to be paid. The owner hands him fifteen sous without a word. He objects. That is enough for thee. He persists. The master looks him straight between the eyes: Beware of the prison.

There, again, he considers that he has been robbed. Society, the State, diminished his hoard wholesale. Now the individual is robbing him at retail. Liberation is not deliverance. One gets free from the galleys, but not from the sentence. That is what happened to him at Grasse. We have seen in what manner he was received at D.