The Dog and His Master — The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

Quasimodo excepts one man from his hatred, and loves him even more, perhaps, than the cathedral. That man is Claude Frollo, who took him in, fed him, reared him, taught him to talk, to read, and to write, and made him bellringer. As a child he hid between Claude's legs when dogs and children came barking after him. To give him the great bell, the narrator says, was to give Juliet to Romeo.

The gratitude is passionate and unbroken, though Claude is often severe, and his words are harsh. The archdeacon has in him the most obedient slave, the most docile servant, and the most watchful of dogs. Once Quasimodo is deaf, they share a language of signs understood by them alone, and Claude is the only person with whom he can still communicate. He is in sympathy with two things only: Notre-Dame and Claude Frollo. A sign, and the wish to please, would send him from the summit. All his great strength lies blindly in the archdeacon's hands. The narrator calls this a son's devotion, the fascination of one mind by another, and above all gratitude, greater than the love of any dog, horse, or elephant for a master.