Notre Dame de Paris - Bartleby.com

Dame—were fortified. The Abbey of Saint-Germain-des-Prés was castellated like a baronial mansion,
and more copper had been used there for bombards than for bells. These fortifications were still to be
seen in 1610; now scarcely the church remains.
But to return to Notre Dame.
The first arrangements completed—and it must be said, to the honour of the truand discipline, that
Clopin’s orders were carried out in silence and with admirable precision—the worthy leader mounted
the parapet of the Parvis, turned his face to Notre Dame, and raising his harsh and churlish voice while
he shook his torch—the light of which flaring in the wind and veiled at intervals by its own smoke, made
the dark front of the Cathedral vanish and reappear by turns—
“Unto thee,” he cried, “Louis de Beaumont, Bishop of Paris, Councillor in the Court of Parliament,
thus say I, Clop in Trouillefou, King of Tunis, Grand Coësre, Prince of Argot, Bishop of the Fools: Our
sister, falsely condemned for witchcraft, has taken refuge in thy church. Thou art bound to accord her
shelter and safeguard; but now the Parliament designs to take her thence, and thou consentest thereunto,
so that she would be hanged to-morrow at the Grève if God and the truands were no at hand. We come to
thee, then, Bishop. If thy church is sacred, our sister is so too; if our sister is not sacred, neither is thy
church. Wherefore we summon thee to give up the maid if thou wouldst save thy church, or we will take
the maid ourselves sand plunder the church: which will most certainly happen. In token where of I here
set up my banner. And so God help thee, Bishop of Paris!”
Unfortunately Quasimodo could no hear these words, which were delivered with a sort of savage and
morose dignity. A Vagabond handed Clop in his banner, which he gravely planted between two
paving-stones. It was a pitchfork on which hung gory piece of carrion.
This done, the King of Tunis turned about and cast his eye over his army, a ferocious multitude whose
eyes gleamed almost as savagely as their pikes. After a moment’s pause—“Forward, lads!” he cried.
“To your work, house breakers!”
Thirty thick-set, strong-limbed men with hammers, pincers, and iron crowbars on their shoulders,
stepped from the ranks They advanced towards the main entrance of the church, ascended the steps, and
immediately set to work on the door with pincers and levers. A large party of truands followed them to
assist or look on, so that the whole flight of eleven steps was crowded with them.
The door, however, held firm. “The devil! but she’s hard and headstrong!” said one. “She’s old, and
her gristle’s tough!” said another. “Courage, comrades!” said Clop in. “I wager my head against a
slipper that you’ll have burst the door, got the maid, and stripped the high altar before ever there’s a
beadle of them all awake. There—I believe the lock’s going.”
Clop in was interrupted by a frightful noise which at that moment resounded behind him. He turned
round. An enormous beam had just fallen from on high, crushing a dozen truands on the steps of the
church and rebounding on to the pavement with the noise of a piece of artillery, breaking here and there
the legs of others among the Vagabond crowd, which fled in all directions with cries of terror. In a trice
the enclosure of the Parvis was empty. The doorbreakers, though protected by the deep arches of the
doorway, abandoned it, and Clop in himself fell back to a respectful distance from the church.
“Tête-bœuf! I had a narrow escape!” cried Jean. “I felt the wind of it; but Pierre the Feller is felled at
last.”