_Fulton_,égendedesSiè the American inventor (1765-1815), who was one of the first mechanicians to construct a steamboat.
_Képler_. The German Kepler (1571-1630) was one of the founders of modern astronomy.
These three men are chosen as typical embodiments of the spirit of progress.
_mistral_. In the South of France the north-east wind is so called.
_Sous le renversement de l'urne_. The urn is the symbol of that 'Fatalité' which to Hugo was the dark shadow over human life. Cf. LA TROMPETTE.
Andromeda, Orion, and the Pleiades are well-known constellations. Arcturus is a star of the first magnitude in Bootes.
The Scorpion and the Archer are next each other in the heavens. The lines express in a somewhat bizarre manner the effect of the outpouring of life on the stars.
_Aldebaran_, a reddish star of the first magnitude in the constellation of Taurus.
_Céphée_. Cepheus is the name of a constellation, as also is Perseus.
_des espaces vermeils_. See note on AYMERILLOT.
L. 232. _Zoroastre_. Zoroaster was the founder of the Persian religion. He was a great observer of the stars.
L. 245. _Fatalité_. In Victor Hugo the word denotes, not so much destiny, as the feeling or the doctrine that man is the helpless victim of an unseen and cruel power. It is a gloom which overhangs human life, from which in the progress of the ages man will be delivered. Compare _La Vision d'où sortit ce livre_, where the spirit of 'Fatalité' is associated with paganism and contrasted with the spirit of religion. In _Dieu_ again 'Fatalité' is one of the three sombre deities of paganism, the other two being Venus, the goddess of pleasure, and Hecate, the goddess of death. Cf. also the following lines from _La Fin de Satan_, put into the mouth of man's evil angel:--
Je suis Lilith-Isis, l'âme noire du monde. Tremble! l'être inconnu, funeste, illimité, Que l'homme en frémissant nomme Fatalité, C'est moi. Tremble! Ananké, c'est moi. Tremble! Le voile C'est moi.
And again in Satan's speech to the Almighty:--
_Notre-Dame de Paris_ is based upon this theme. See especially Livre VII. iv.
L. 255. For the metaphor compare 'la fausse clef du fatal gouffre bleu', l. 37, and the following passage in _L'Ane_ about the prison of life:--
La porte en est massive et la voûte en est dure; Tu regardes parfois au trou de la serrure, Et tu nommes cela science; mais tu n'as Pas de clef pour ouvrir le fatal cadenas.