ision.

Meanwhile Master Florian, the auditor, turned over attentively the
document in the complaint entered against Quasimodo, which the clerk
handed him, and, having thus glanced at it, appeared to reflect for a
moment. Thanks to this precaution, which he always was careful to take
at the moment when on the point of beginning an examination, he knew
beforehand the names, titles, and misdeeds of the accused, made cut
and dried responses to questions foreseen, and succeeded in extricating
himself from all the windings of the interrogation without allowing his
deafness to be too apparent. The written charges were to him what the
dog is to the blind man. If his deafness did happen to betray him
here and there, by some incoherent apostrophe or some unintelligible
question, it passed for profundity with some, and for imbecility with
others. In neither case did the honor of the magistracy sustain any
injury; for it is far better that a judge should be reputed imbecile
or profound than deaf. Hence he took great care to conceal his deafness
from the eyes of all, and he generally succeeded so well that he had
reached the point of deluding himself, which is, by the way, easier
than is supposed. All hunchbacks walk with their heads held high, all
stutterers harangue, all deaf people speak low. As for him, he believed,
at the most, that his ear was a little refractory. It was the sole
concession which he made on this point to public opinion, in his moments
of frankness and examination of his conscience.

Having, then, thoroughly ruminated Quasimodo's affair, he threw back
his head and half closed his eyes, for the sake of more majesty and
impartiality, so that, at that moment, he was both deaf and blind. A
double condition, without which no judge is perfect. It was in this
magisterial attitude that he began the examination.

"Your name?"

Now this was a case which had not been "provided for by law," where a
deaf man should be obliged to question a deaf man.

Quasimodo, whom nothing warned that a question had been addressed to
him, continued to stare intently at the judge, and made no reply. The
judge, being deaf, and being in no way warned of the deafness of the
accused, thought that the latter had answered, as all accused do in
general, and therefore he pursued, with his mechanical and stupid
self-possession,--

"Very well. And your age?"

Again Quasimodo made no reply to this question. The judge supposed that
it had bee