to precedent. Imitation lies at the root of most human actions. A respectable person is one who conforms to custom. People are called good when they do as others do.’

V. Crainquebille submits to the Laws of the Republic

Having been taken back to his prison, Crainquebille sat down on his chained stool, filled with astonishment and admiration. He, himself, was not quite sure whether the magistrates were mistaken. The tribunal had concealed its essential weakness beneath the majesty of form. He could not believe that he was in the right, as against magistrates whose reasons he had not understood: it was impossible for him to conceive that anything could go wrong in so elaborate a ceremony. For, unaccustomed to attending Mass or frequenting the Élysée, he had never in his life witnessed anything so grand as a police court trial. He was perfectly aware that he had never cried: ‘Mort aux vaches!’ That for having said it he should have been sentenced to a fortnight’s imprisonment seemed to him an august mystery, one of those articles of faith to which believers adhere without understanding them, an obscure, striking, adorable and terrible revelation.

This poor old man believed himself guilty of having mystically offended Constable 64, just as the little boy learning his first Catechism believes himself guilty of Eve’s sin. His sentence had taught him that he had cried: ‘Mort aux vaches!’ He must, therefore have cried: ‘Mort aux vaches!’ in some mysterious manner, unknown to himself. He was transported into a supernatural world. His trial was his apocalypse.

If he had no very clear idea of the offence, his idea of the penalty was still less clear. His sentence appeared to him a solemn and superior ritual, something dazzling and incomprehensible, which is not to be discussed, and for which one is neither to be praised nor pitied. If at that moment he had seen President Bourriche, with white wings and a halo round his forehead, coming down through a hole in the ceiling, he would not have been surprised at this new manifestation of judicial glory. He would have said: ‘This is my trial continuing!’

On the next day his lawyer visited him:

‘Well, my good fellow, things aren’t so bad after all! Don’t be discouraged. A fortnight is soon over. We have not much to complain of.’

‘As for that, I must say the gentlemen were very kind, very polite: not a single rude word. I shouldn’t have believed it. And the ‘cipal was wearing white gloves. Did you notice?’

‘Everything considered, we did well to confess.’

‘Perhaps.’

‘Crainquebille, I have a piece of good news for you. A charitable person, whose interest I have elicited on your behalf, gave me fifty francs for you. The sum will be used to pay your fine.’

‘When will you give me the money?’

‘It will be paid into the clerk’s office. You need not trouble about it.’

‘It does not matter. All the same I am very grateful to this person.’ And Crainquebille murmured meditatively: ‘It’s something our of the common that’s happening to me.’

‘Don’t exaggerate, Crainquebille. Your case is by no means rare, far from it.’

‘You couldn’t tell me where they’ve put my barrow?’

VI. Crainquebille in the Light of Public Opinion