INTRODUCTION

Of his prose works, those best known are Le Dernier Jour d'un Condamné (1829), Travailleurs de la Mer (1866), Quatre-znngt-treize (1873) and Les Misérables (1862), from which the sélection in this book has been taken.

Les Misérables is a plea for suffering humanity, an appeal for justice and more light for the masses. The " submerged tenth " people its pages, and the hero, Jean Val Jean, is a galley-slave. The book opens with a picture of the benevolent old Bishop of Digne, who has given ail in charity to the poor, even his own house; we find him living in the former hospital into which he had moved that the sick might enjoy the comforts of the episcopal mansion, Hugo says in describing him, " he inclined toward ail that groans and ail that expiâtes. * Love each other' was the whole of his doctrine, and the misery which reigns everywhere was but an excuse for his unfailing kindness." The power of this saintly bishop's love and kindness over the desperate galley-slave is shown in La Chute. It is the story of the rédemption of Jean Val Jean. We see the struggle of his soûl as he yields little by little, until, casting aside ail his resentment and défiance, he sinks to his knees in pénitence before the door of the kindly bishop.

However dark the other pictures of Les Misérables may be, this opening one is optimistic, for if the degraded, blunted soûl of Jean Valjean can be reclaimed, there is nothing of which we ought to despair in the upward progress of humanity.

I wîsh to express my thanks to Dr. E. C. Roedder of the University of Wisconsin, for much help and many valuable suggestions in the préparation of this édition.