Had I not taken this resolution I should have died of ennui in that dimly-lighted house, among those sepulchral toys, in the presence of that pale phantom enveloped in a dismal wrapper, cut in the monkish style, and speaking in a trembling and languishing tone of voice.

La Trappe or Chartreuse would have been preferable—­I would have gained at least my salvation.  Although it may be the act of a Cossack, a shocking irregularity, I have given her no sign of my existence, except that I told her that my mother’s recovery promised to be very slow, and she would need the devoted attention of a good son.

Judge, dear Roger, after this recital, of which I have subdued the horrors and dramatic situations out of regard to your sensibility, whether I could return to Paris to be the comforter in your sorrow.  Yet I could brave an encounter with the Marquise were it not that I am retained in Normandy by an expected visit of two months from our friend Raymond.  This fact certainly ought to make you decide to share our solitude.  Our friend is so poetical, so witty, so charming.  He has but one fault, that of being a civilized Don Quixote de la Mancha; instead of the helmet of Mambrino he wears a Gibus hat, a Buisson coat instead of a cuirass, a Verdier cane by way of a lance.  Happy nature! in which the heart is not sacrificed to the intellect; where the subtlety of a diplomate is united to the ingenuousness of a child.

Since your ideal has fled, are not all places alike to you?  Then why should you not come to me, to Richeport, but a step from Pont de l’Arch?

I am perched upon the bank of the river, in a strange old building, which I know will please you.  It is an old abbey half in ruins, in which is enshrined a dwelling, with many windows at regular intrevals, and is surmounted by a slate roof and chimneys of all sizes.  It is built of hewn stone, that time has covered with its gray leprosy, and the general effect, looking through the avenue of grand old trees, is fine.  Here my mother dwells.  Profiting by the walls and the half-fallen towers of the old enclosure, for the abbey was fortified to resist the Norman invasions, she has made upon the brow of the hill a garden terrace filled with roses, myrtles and orange trees, while the green boxes surrounding them replace the old battlements.  In this quarter of the old domain, I have not interfered with any of these womanly fancies.

She has collected around her all manner of pretty rusticities; all the comfortable elegancies she could imagine.  I have not opposed any system of hot-air stoves, nor the upholstering of the rooms, nor objected to mahogany and ebony, wedgwood ware, china in blue designs, and English plate.  For this is the way that middle-aged, and in fact, all reasonable people live.

For myself, I have reserved the refectory and library of the brave monks, that is, all that overlooks the river.  I have not permitted the least repairing of the walls, which present the complete flora of the native wild flowers.  An arched door, closed by old boards covered with a remnant of red paint, and opening on the bank, serves me as a private entrance.  A ferry worked by a rope and pulley establishes communication with an island opposite the abbey, which is verdant with a mass of osiers, elder bushes and willows.  It is here also that my fleet of boats is moored.