He has stated in his article ‘Justice,’ published in Paris on his return from exile, that during most of the time he spent in England he was virtually in a desert.  There were people about him of course; but he retired into himself as it were, communing with his own thoughts, and seeking no intercourse with strangers.  This is true of the period to which I am now referring.  Still he did not complain of solitude.  In fact he knew that quiet was essential for his work.  Only once or twice did anything happen of a nature to cause any anxiety.  Neither Wareham nor myself was much troubled at this period; there was a lull even in the periodical visits which gentlemen of the Press kindly favoured me.

Still we had taken our precautions by admitting a mutual friend, Mr. A. W. Pamplin, into our confidence.  If M. Zola’s communications with Paris, through Wareham and myself, should be threatened, Mr. Pamplin was to take upon himself the duty of re-establishing them.

At M. Zola’s house there was, so far as I am aware, but one brief alerte.  This occurred one afternoon, when a servant came to my daughter with the tidings that there was a French hunchback at the door.  Violette impulsively rushed off to tell M. Zola of it; but when in her turn she went to the door to see who the person might be, she found that he was an Englishman, a traveller for some county directory, who had merely performed his legitimate work in requesting to know the name of the occupier of the house.  Of course the only name given was that of the owner, then absent at the seaside.

Thus the hot days sped by peacefully enough.  M. Zola had at least found occupation and quietude, though it was naturally impossible that he should feel content with his lot.  Each day brought more and more home to him the consciousness that he was in exile, and that contumely had been his reward for seeking to save France from the shame of a great crime.

I have previously mentioned that during the first week or so of his sojourn in England he had refused to look at newspapers and—­at least so it seemed to me—­had sought to banish the Dreyfus affair and his own troubles from his mind, much as one might seek to drive away a hateful nightmare.  But before long he again fell under the spell and followed the course of events with the keenest interest.  And again and again, reading of the great battle being waged in France, he longed to return home, and grew restless and impatient.

Moreover a complaint from which he has suffered on and off for some years troubled him on more than one occasion.  He always rallied, however, and returned to his work with renewed energy.  ‘Fecondite’ was already taking shape in the leafy solitude in which he dwelt.  And undoubtedly the steady task of creation, resumed morning by morning, greatly helped him to quiet the anguish of heart which the course of events in France would otherwise have rendered intolerable.