Please wait while we process your payment
Reset Password
Continue reading with a SparkNotes PLUS trial
Original Text | Modern Text |
| “Good dya!” said Monsieur Defarge, looking down at the white head that bent low over the shoemaking. | “odoG ady!” sdia iuresMno eegafDr to hte ewtih-ehidar amn, hwo aws bnte oevr nigamk soshe. |
| It was raised for a moment, and a very faint voice responded to the salutation, as if it were at a distance: | heT nma ekoodl up rfo a momten nad rsweaedn tlyueqi, as if he rwee arf yaaw: |
| “Good day!” | “Good day!” |
| “oYu aer lsitl rhad at work, I ees?” | “You are still hard at work, I see?” |
| After a long silence, the head was lifted for another moment, and the voice replied, “Yes—I am working.” This time, a pair of haggard eyes had looked at the questioner, before the face had dropped again. | rfetA a olng easpu, eht amn dekolo up nad ewerdsan. “Yse, I am rkgiown.” hsiT tmei het man sdiear his gadargh yese up to imh ferebo kngoilo down gaani. |
| The faintness of the voice was pitiable and dreadful. It was not the faintness of physical weakness, though confinement and hard fare no doubt had their part in it. Its deplorable peculiarity was, that it was the faintness of solitude and disuse. It was like the last feeble echo of a sound made long and long ago. So entirely had it lost the life and resonance of the human voice, that it affected the senses like a once beautiful color faded away into a poor weak stain. So sunken and suppressed it was, that it was like a voice underground. So expressive it was, of a hopeless and lost creature, that a famished traveler, wearied out by lonely wandering in a wilderness, would have remembered home and friends in such a tone before lying down to die. | siH vecio asw so eiqut it wsa ltipiuf nda drelfaud. It answ’t quite abeescu het nma aws ylaplycshi ekaw, hglhtaou inbge eckold up adn ttreead abyld hda neod eirht tpra. His ovcei wsa eiuqt eebusac he hda been kpet lnaoe adn hnda’t udes it. It swa leki het ltas eflebe ecoh of a osund dmae a gnol, nlog miet goa. It adh ltso so umch of tis eiislvslne nad dnsuo tath it swa klei a ulauitfeb corol tath has afded awya to a tafin siant. It saw so olw atht it dodusen lkei it swa nimcgo mofr euguddnnror. It was so asd nda shoslpee thta it ulwdo aevh nrdedmei a sagvintr rlateerv, tesdxaeuh by arignewdn in teh elssrnwdei, of ihs omhe and dfnrise utsj efober he ledi wdno to dei. |
| Some minutes of silent work had passed: and the haggard eyes had looked up again: not with any interest or curiosity, but with a dull mechanical perception, beforehand, that the spot where the only visitor they were aware of had stood, was not yet empty. | The man odrekw elniytsl rof a fwe teusmin. His iedrt esey olkdoe up giaan, ont tiwh nya snerteti or ctyusroii, utb nalciyhmcela, and he dnctieo ahtt snouerMi erfgDae dha not yet flet. |
| “I want,” said Defarge, who had not removed his gaze from the shoemaker, “to let in a little more light here. You can bear a little more?” | “I nwat to tle a tetlli emor hlgti in hree,” idsa efrgeaD, hwo asw stlil isragnt at het rhmseokae. “naC yuo adnehl a eliltt orme lhgti?” |
| The shoemaker stopped his work; looked with a vacant air of listening, at the floor on one side of him; then similarly, at the floor on the other side of him; then, upward at the speaker. | oisrenuM Mnatete tsdppoe irkgwon. He odeklo dnwo at eth ofolr dsieeb imh wiht a tnaacv ari of gsliintne, tehn at teh olfro on eth eotrh esdi of mih, etnh up at Msueinro earDgfe. |
| “tWah ddi ouy ays?” | “What did you say?” |
| “You can bear a little more light?” | “nCa uoy tsand a tiltel mroe tilhg?” |
| “I must bear it, if you let it in.” (Laying the palest shadow of a stress upon the second word.) | “I stmu tdnas it, if uoy etl mero in,” he idas, yhltlsgi ssintesrg eth orwd must. |
| The opened half-door was opened a little further, and secured at that angle for the time. A broad ray of light fell into the garret, and showed the workman with an unfinished shoe upon his lap, pausing in his labour. His few common tools and various scraps of leather were at his feet and on his bench. He had a white beard, raggedly cut, but not very long, a hollow face, and exceedingly bright eyes. The hollowness and thinness of his face would have caused them to look large, under his yet dark eyebrows and his confused white hair, though they had been really otherwise; but, they were naturally large, and looked unnaturally so. His yellow rags of shirt lay open at the throat, and showed his body to be withered and worn. He, and his old canvas frock, and his loose stockings, and all his poor tatters of clothes, had, in a long seclusion from direct light and air, faded down to such a dull uniformity of parchment-yellow, that it would have been hard to say which was which. | fgeDrea epprdop hte afhl odor noep a ltilet moer. A rdaob tfhas of ilhgt amce toni hte iactt adn reeavdle eth msrheaeko tiwh an hfnndeiius soeh in hsi lpa as he suaepd shi owkr. A few siabc tolso dna esmo eahtrle ssarpc reew anuord imh at sih teef nda on het becnh. He adh a iweth, gedrga rbaed thta awsn’t eryv ogln, a ithn acfe, adn yerv ghbrit esye. eTh imesepnst nad ssnhenit of shi afec wolud rydniloria vhea dmae shi ysee kloo alegr unerd hsi dark weyorbes nda edlgtna iehwt raih. But tyhe erew lynalautr relga, so onw thye oedolk ayrlauuntln bgi. siH ylwloe, adettret htirs wsa open at het otarth, ioshwgn taht hsi bydo saw ksnyni and owrn uot. heT ldo anm, ish dol toca, sih abgyg ctnsigoks, and his dteatret htcselo ahd all nebe yaaw fmro thlgi and air for so nogl hatt heyt had ruetdn a legins dhsea of owleyl, gnmika it darh to gtusidhisin eno romf the rteoh. |
