"jacques," returned defarge, drawing himself up, "if madame my wife undertook to keep the register in her memory alone, she would not lose a word of it not a syllable of it. knitted, in her own stitches and her own symbols, it will always be as plain to her as the sun. confide in madame defarge. it would be easier for the weakest poltroon that lives, to erase himself from existence, than to erase one letter of his name or crimes from the knitted register of madame defarge."