I made him pull up before the library, and I begged them to lend me Dr. Herrmann Herestauss’s treatise on the unknown inhabitants of the ancient and modern world.

Then, as I was getting into my carriage, I intended to say:  “To the railway station!” but instead of this I shouted—­I did not say, but I shouted—­in such a loud voice that all the passers-by turned round:  “Home!” and I fell back onto the cushion of my carriage, overcome by mental agony.  He had found me out and regained possession of me.

August 17th.  Oh!  What a night! what a night!  And yet it seems to me that I ought to rejoice.  I read until one o’clock in the morning!  Herestauss, Doctor of Philosophy and Theogony, wrote the history and the manifestation of all those invisible beings which hover around man, or of whom he dreams.  He describes their origin, their domains, their power; but none of them resembles the one which haunts me.  One might say that man, ever since he has thought, has had a foreboding of, and feared a new being, stronger than himself, his successor in this world, and that, feeling him near, and not being able to foretell the nature of that master, he has, in his terror, created the whole race of hidden beings, of vague phantoms born of fear.

Having, therefore, read until one o’clock in the morning, I went and sat down at the open window, in order to cool my forehead and my thoughts, in the calm night air.  It was very pleasant and warm!  How I should have enjoyed such a night formerly!

There was no moon, but the stars darted out their rays in the dark heavens.  Who inhabits those worlds?  What forms, what living beings, what animals are there yonder?  What do those who are thinkers in those distant worlds know more than we do?  What can they do more than we can?  What do they see which we do not know?  Will not one of them, some day or other, traversing space, appear on our earth to conquer it, just as the Norsemen formerly crossed the sea in order to subjugate nations more feeble than themselves?

We are so weak, so unarmed, so ignorant, so small, we who live on this particle of mud which turns round in a drop of water.

I fell asleep, dreaming thus in the cool night air, and then, having slept for about three quarters of an hour, I opened my eyes without moving, awakened by I know not what confused and strange sensation.  At first I saw nothing, and then suddenly it appeared to me as if a page of a book which had remained open on my table, turned over of its own accord.  Not a breath of air had come in at my window, and I was surprised and waited.  In about four minutes, I saw, I saw, yes I saw with my own eyes another page lift itself up and fall down on the others, as if a finger had turned it over.  My armchair was empty, appeared empty, but I knew that he was there, he, and sitting in my place, and that he was reading.  With a furious bound, the bound of an enraged wild beast that wishes to disembowel its tamer, I crossed my room to seize him, to strangle him, to kill him!...  But before I could reach it, my chair fell over as if somebody had run away from me ... my table rocked, my lamp fell and went out, and my window closed as if some thief had been surprised and had fled out into the night, shutting it behind him.