THE GRASS COVERS AND THE RAIN EFFACES Les Miserables, Volume V, Jean Valjean | ||
3.V.9.6. THE GRASS COVERS AND THE RAIN EFFACES
IN the cemetery of Pere-Lachaise, in the vicinity of the common grave, far from the elegant quarter of that city of sepulchres, far from all the tombs of fancy which display in the presence of eternity all the hideous fashions of death, in a deserted corner, beside an old wall, beneath a great yew tree over which climbs the wild convolvulus, amid dandelions and mosses, there lies a stone. That stone is no more exempt than others from the leprosy of time, of dampness, of
This stone is perfectly plain. In cutting it the only thought was the requirements of the tomb, and no other care was taken than to make the stone long enough and narrow enough to cover a man.
No name is to be read there.
Only, many years ago, a hand wrote upon it in pencil these four lines, which have become gradually illegible beneath the rain and the dust, and which are, to-day, probably effaced:
Il dort. Quoique le sort fut pour lui bien etrange,Il vivait. Il mourut quand il n'eut plus son ange.
La chose simplement d'elle-meme arriva,
Comme la nuit se fait lorsque le jour s'en va.
He Was Dead.
[Description: Jean Valjean lies dead in his chair, attended by Cosette and Marius.]
THE GRASS COVERS AND THE RAIN EFFACES Les Miserables, Volume V, Jean Valjean | ||