Master Coppenole, in amazement, approached him.

“Cross of God! Holy Father! you possess the handsomest ugliness that I have ever beheld in my life.

You would deserve to be pope at Rome, as well as at Paris.”

So saying, he placed his hand gayly on his shoulder. Quasimodo did not stir. Coppenole went on, —

“You are a rogue with whom I have a fancy for carousing, were it to cost me a new dozen of twelve livres of Tours. How does it strike you?”

Quasimodo made no reply.

“Cross of God!” said the hosier, “are you deaf?”

He was, in truth, deaf.