Penny Blood Serial Cover — page 104: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

96 ALFRED DE ROSANN. Belle-Rose mingled fearlessly with the members of the bagne, and instantly became a great favourite, on account of his naturally lively disposition, his garru- lity, and the perpetual good. humour which marked his countenance. He moreover recognised amongst the convicts several of his ancient associates, and-soon -made acquaintance with others; for it is not in the “eriminal gaols that the ceremony of introduction, ob- ~ served by the world without, is very prevalent. Still his soul was not so deeply tainted as that of many of his comrades: there was no species of swindling, chi- canery, nor dishonesty that Belle-Rose was not capa- ble of ; but he would have shrunk from spilling blood with the same horror as would a purely virtuous man. He affected no false sanctity; he merely said, in his own peculiar style of jocularity, “ That so long as there were widows to be duped, minors to be fleeced, and tradesmen to give credit, he did not see the use of cutting a man’s throat to procure a purse ; and that for his part he never had a very high opinion of the cunning of the individual, who preferred scouring the highways at night, to living on his wits within the walls of Paris.’’ Where all:are bad, and where it is nevertheless ne- cessary to make choice of an associate, both for the purpose of concocting plans to further an escape, and to avoid an appearance of selfishness and constraint, we’must-choose the best. Therefore, even if circum- stances had not particularly linked the present interests of Belle-Rose and De Rosann together, it is more than probable that our hero would have selected Pierre as his intimate companion and chum. Neither Belle- Rose, De Rosann, nor Champignon, had. been branded at Paris, as was customary with criminals found guilty _-. of enormous crimes; and they were the only three, out of the fifty or sixty convicts that accompanied them from Bicétre, who had escaped this mark of eter- nal degradation. tiiis As for poor Champignon, he soon became the butt of his companions; but he bore all their jokes with Gomichdooksrtco