Total . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3,000 "


Such was M. Myriel's budget.

As for the chance episcopal perquisites, the fees for marriage bans,
dispensations, private baptisms, sermons, benedictions, of churches
or chapels, marriages, etc., the Bishop levied them on the wealthy
with all the more asperity, since he bestowed them on the needy.

After a time, offerings of money flowed in. Those who had and
those who lacked knocked at M. Myriel's door,--the latter in search
of the alms which the former came to deposit. In less than a year
the Bishop had become the treasurer of all benevolence and the cashier
of all those in distress. Considerable sums of money passed through
his hands, but nothing could induce him to make any change whatever
in his mode of life, or add anything superfluous to his bare necessities.

Far from it. As there is always more wretchedness below than there
is brotherhood above, all was given away, so to speak, before it
was received. It was like water on dry soil; no matter how much
money he received, he never had any. Then he stripped himself.

The usage being that bishops shall announce their baptismal
names at the head of their charges and their pastoral letters,
the poor people of the country-side had selected, with a sort of
affectionate instinct, among the names and prenomens of their bishop,
that which had a meaning for them; and they never called him
anything except Monseigneur Bienvenu [Welcome]. We will follow
their example, and will also call him thus when we have occasion