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CHAPTER V
DEPOSIT YOUR MONEY
IN A FOREST RATHER
THAN WITH A NOTARY
The reader has, no doubt, understood, without neces-
sitating a lengthy explanation, that Jean Valjean, after the
Champmathieu affair, had been able, thanks to his first
escape of a few days’ duration, to come to Paris and to
withdraw in season, from the hands of Laffitte, the sum
earned by him, under the name of Monsieur Madeleine, at
Montreuil-sur-Mer; and that fearing that he might be re-
captured,— which eventually happened—he had buried and
hidden that sum in the forest of Montfermeil, in the local-
ity known as the Blaru-bottom. The sum, six hundred and
thirty thousand francs, all in bank-bills, was not very bulky,
and was contained in a box; only, in order to preserve the
box from dampness, he had placed it in a coffer filled with
chestnut shavings. In the same coffer he had placed his other
treasures, the Bishop’s candlesticks. It will be remembered
that he had carried off the candlesticks when he made his