The Toilers of the Sea

by Victor Hugo

This ladder, starting from the ground, continues into the empyrean. The whole of hierarchical England comes into it at their appropriate levels. These are the various rungs, increasingly glorious as they go up: above the gentleman (the equivalent of Monsieur) is the esquire, above the esquire the knight (with the title Sir for life); then, still higher up, the baronet (with the hereditary title Sir), then the lord (laird in Scotland), then the baron, then the viscount, then the earl (count in France, jail in Norway), then the marquis, then the duke, then the peer, then the prince of the blood royal, then the king. The ladder ascends from the common people to the middle classes, from the middle classes to the baronetage, from the baronetage to the peerage, from the peerage to royalty.