From Charybdis to Scylla — The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

Night has already darkened the streets when Gringoire leaves the Courts. He dare not return to the Rue Grenier-sur-l'Eau. The provost's pay for his wedding poem was meant to cover twelve sols of rent, twelve times all he owns, and he thinks of a mounting-stone in the Rue de la Savaterie as a pillow. The Pope of the Fools comes out with torches and with Gringoire's own music, and he flees. Fireworks turn him from the Pont Saint-Michel. Banners of the king, the dauphin, and Marguerite of Flanders turn him from the Pont au Change.

He trips on a May truss, then walks the muddy strand to the western point of the city. The cow ferryman's dark islet makes him envy a man who writes no marriage songs. A cracker bursts from the hut. He looks at the Seine and says he would drown himself if the water were not so cold. He sets off for the Place de Grève, to warm himself at the fire and to find crumbs of the city's sugar coats of arms.