d for the young Thenardiers. A very young kitten was
playing about among the chairs. Laughter and chatter were audible in
the adjoining room, from two fresh children's voices: it was Eponine and
Azelma.

In the chimney-corner a cat-o'-nine-tails was hanging on a nail.

At intervals the cry of a very young child, which was somewhere in the
house, rang through the noise of the dram-shop. It was a little boy
who had been born to the Thenardiers during one of the preceding
winters,--"she did not know why," she said, "the result of the
cold,"--and who was a little more than three years old. The mother had
nursed him, but she did not love him. When the persistent clamor of the
brat became too annoying, "Your son is squalling," Thenardier would
say; "do go and see what he wants." "Bah!" the mother would reply, "he
bothers me." And the neglected child continued to shriek in the dark.

CHAPTER II--TWO COMPLETE PORTRAITS

So far in this book the Thenardiers have been viewed only in profile;
the moment has arrived for making the circuit of this couple, and
considering it under all its aspects.

Thenardier had just passed his fiftieth birthday; Madame Thenardier was
approaching her forties, which is equivalent to fifty in a woman; so
that there existed a balance of age between husband and wife.

Our readers have possibly preserved some recollection of this Thenardier
woman, ever since her first appearance,--tall, blond, red, fat, angular,
square, enormous, and agile; she belonged, as we have said, to the
race of those colossal wild women, who contort themselves at fairs with
paving-stones hanging from their hair. She did everything about the
house,--made the beds, did the washing, the cooking, and everything
else. Cosette was her only servant; a mouse in the service of an
elephant. Everything trembled at the sound of her voice,--window panes,
furniture, and people. Her big face, dotted with red blotches,
presented the appearance of a skimmer. She had a beard. She was an ideal
market-porter dressed in woman's clothes. She swore splendidly; she
boasted of being able to crack a nut with one blow of her fist. Except
for the romances which she had read, and which made the affected lady
peep through the ogress at times, in a very queer way, the idea would
never have occurred to any one to say of her, "That is a woman."
This Thenardier female was like the product of a wench engrafted on a
fishwife. When one heard her speak, on