第一百五十二章 六 一段历史
六 一段历史
本书故事发生的时代，大致与现在相去不远。那时，街头巷尾还没有像今天这样到处都有保安警察（这个好处我们还没有时间讨论），在巴黎，流浪儿童比比皆是。据统计，当时警察巡逻队每年平均在空地上、在建的房屋里和桥拱下捡到二百六十个无家可归的孩子。其中一个很有名的“窝”产生了“阿尔科拉桥的燕子”。这无疑是社会最悲惨的迹象。人的所有罪恶都是从儿童的流浪开始的。
不过，我们得为巴黎说句公道话。尽管我们刚才提到了那个令人难忘的例子，但在一定程度上，这种说法还是公正的。在其他任何大城市里，流浪儿童就是一个迷失的人；几乎在所有地方，被抛弃的孩子都在某种程度上被牺牲、被遗弃，仿佛被一种致命的命运投入公共罪恶的深渊，吞噬了他身上的诚实和良心——而巴黎的街头孩子，尽管表面上被玷污、受伤害，内心却几乎完好无损。这是一件值得记录的光辉事实，它在我们人民革命的辉煌正直中闪闪发光：正如海洋的水中有盐分一样，巴黎的空气中存在着某种思想，由此产生了一种不可腐蚀性。呼吸巴黎的空气就能净化灵魂。
我们刚才说的，并不能减轻每次遇到这些孩子时内心的痛苦，我们总觉得他们周围飘荡着破碎家庭的蛛丝。在当今的文明中，虽然还不完善，但看到这些破碎的家庭把自己的孩子抛入黑暗，不知道孩子们的下落如何，任由自己的骨肉流落街头，这并不算太反常。于是就有了这些黑暗的命运。人们给这种悲惨的事情起了一个名称，叫做“被抛弃在巴黎的街头”。
顺便说一句，古代的君主政体并不阻止这种遗弃儿童的现象。下层社会有一点埃及和波西米亚的色彩，反而符合上层社会的需要，有助于达官贵人的目的。仇视平民子弟受教育是一种信条。“半明半暗”有什么用？这就是他们的口号。而流浪儿童就是愚昧儿童的必然结果。
此外，君主政体有时也需要孩子，在这种情况下，它就在街头搜寻。
不必追溯得太远，只说路易十四时代吧。当时国王想要建立一支舰队，这个想法不错。但得看看他们使用的手段。如果没有那种能按照自己意愿行驶的船只——无论是用桨划还是用蒸汽推动——作为风帆船只的补充和必要时拖曳之用，舰队就不能成立。当时的战船就相当于今天的蒸汽船。因此需要战船；但战船只能靠划船的苦役犯来驱动，所以就需要苦役犯。柯尔贝尔让各省的专员和议会尽可能多地制造苦役犯。司法部门对此表现出了极大的热情。一个男人在游行队伍面前没有脱帽——这就是胡格诺派的态度；他就会被送去当苦役犯。在街上遇到一个孩子，只要他年满十五岁，并且没有地方睡觉，就会被送去当苦役犯。伟大的王朝，伟大的世纪。
在路易十五时代，巴黎的孩子不见了；警察把他们抓走了，没人知道是为了什么神秘的目的。人们惊恐地低声谈论着关于国王的“紫色浴”的可怕猜测。巴尔比耶天真地谈到这些事情。有时，警卫队的豁免官在缺少孩子时，甚至会绑架那些有父亲的孩子。父亲们绝望之余，会去攻击豁免官。在这种情况下，议会就会出面，绞死一些人。绞死谁？豁免官吗？不，是父亲们。
At the epoch, nearly contemporary by the way, when the action of this
book takes place, there was not, as there is to-day, a policeman at the
corner of every street (a benefit which there is no time to discuss
here); stray children abounded in Paris. The statistics give an average
of two hundred and sixty homeless children picked up annually at that
period, by the police patrols, in unenclosed lands, in houses in
process of construction, and under the arches of the bridges. One of
these nests, which has become famous, produced “the swallows of the
bridge of Arcola.” This is, moreover, the most disastrous of social
symptoms. All crimes of the man begin in the vagabondage of the child.
Let us make an exception in favor of Paris, nevertheless. In a relative
measure, and in spite of the souvenir which we have just recalled, the
exception is just. While in any other great city the vagabond child is
a lost man, while nearly everywhere the child left to itself is, in
some sort, sacrificed and abandoned to a kind of fatal immersion in the
public vices which devour in him honesty and conscience, the street boy
of Paris, we insist on this point, however defaced and injured on the
surface, is almost intact on the interior. It is a magnificent thing to
put on record, and one which shines forth in the splendid probity of
our popular revolutions, that a certain incorruptibility results from
the idea which exists in the air of Paris, as salt exists in the water
of the ocean. To breathe Paris preserves the soul.
What we have just said takes away nothing of the anguish of heart which
one experiences every time that one meets one of these children around
whom one fancies that he beholds floating the threads of a broken
family. In the civilization of the present day, incomplete as it still
is, it is not a very abnormal thing to behold these fractured families
pouring themselves out into the darkness, not knowing clearly what has
become of their children, and allowing their own entrails to fall on
the public highway. Hence these obscure destinies. This is called, for
this sad thing has given rise to an expression, “to be cast on the
pavements of Paris.”
Let it be said by the way, that this abandonment of children was not
discouraged by the ancient monarchy. A little of Egypt and Bohemia in
the lower regions suited the upper spheres, and compassed the aims of
the powerful. The hatred of instruction for the children of the people
was a dogma. What is the use of “half-lights”? Such was the
countersign. Now, the erring child is the corollary of the ignorant
child.
Besides this, the monarchy sometimes was in need of children, and in
that case it skimmed the streets.
Under Louis XIV., not to go any further back, the king rightly desired
to create a fleet. The idea was a good one. But let us consider the
means. There can be no fleet, if, beside the sailing ship, that
plaything of the winds, and for the purpose of towing it, in case of
necessity, there is not the vessel which goes where it pleases, either
by means of oars or of steam; the galleys were then to the marine what
steamers are to-day. Therefore, galleys were necessary; but the galley
is moved only by the galley-slave; hence, galley-slaves were required.
Colbert had the commissioners of provinces and the parliaments make as
many convicts as possible. The magistracy showed a great deal of
complaisance in the matter. A man kept his hat on in the presence of a
procession—it was a Huguenot attitude; he was sent to the galleys. A
child was encountered in the streets; provided that he was fifteen
years of age and did not know where he was to sleep, he was sent to the
galleys. Grand reign; grand century.
Under Louis XV. children disappeared in Paris; the police carried them
off, for what mysterious purpose no one knew. People whispered with
terror monstrous conjectures as to the king’s baths of purple. Barbier
speaks ingenuously of these things. It sometimes happened that the
exempts of the guard, when they ran short of children, took those who
had fathers. The fathers, in despair, attacked the exempts. In that
case, the parliament intervened and had some one hung. Who? The
exempts? No, the fathers.
