Page "The Hunchback of Notre-Dame" Paragraph 9

* Esmeralda, born Agnes, is a beautiful young gypsy, naturally compassionate, and kind.

She is the center of the human drama within the story.

A popular focus of the citizens ' attentions, she experiences their changeable attitudes, being first adored as an entertainer, then hated as a witch, before being lauded again for her dramatic rescue by Quasimodo.

When the King finally decides to put her to death, he does so in the belief that the Parisian mob wants her dead.

She is loved by both Quasimodo and Claude Frollo, but falls deeply in love with Captain Phoebus, a handsome soldier who she believes will rightly protect her but who simply wants to seduce her.

She is the only character to show the hunchback a moment of human kindness: as he is being whipped for punishment and jeered by a horrid rabble, she approaches the public stock and gives him a drink of water.

Because of this, he falls fiercely in love with her, even though she is too disgusted by his ugliness even to let him kiss her hand.