BOOK IX.

My impatience to inhabit the Hermitage not permitting me to wait until the return of fine weather, the moment my lodging was prepared I hastened to take possession of it, to the great amusement of the ’Coterie Holbachaque’, which publicly predicted I should not be able to support solitude for three months, and that I should unsuccessfully return to Paris, and live there as they did.  For my part, having for fifteen years been out of my element, finding myself upon the eve of returning to it, I paid no attention to their pleasantries.  Since contrary to my inclinations, I have again entered the world, I have incessantly regretted my dear Charmettes, and the agreeable life I led there.  I felt a natural inclination to retirement and the country:  it was impossible for me to live happily elsewhere.  At Venice, in the train of public affairs, in the dignity of a kind of representation, in the pride of projects of advancement; at Paris, in the vortex of the great world, in the luxury of suppers, in the brilliancy of spectacles, in the rays of splendor; my groves, rivulets, and solitary walks, constantly presented themselves to my recollection, interrupted my thought, rendered me melancholy, and made me sigh with desire.  All the labor to which I had subjected myself, every project of ambition which by fits had animated my ardor, all had for object this happy country retirement, which I now thought near at hand.  Without having acquired a genteel independence, which I had judged to be the only means of accomplishing my views, I imagined myself, in my particular situation, to be able to do without it, and that I could obtain the same end by a means quite opposite.  I had no regular income; but I possessed some talents, and had acquired a name.  My wants were few, and I had freed myself from all those which were most expensive, and which merely depended on prejudice and opinion.  Besides this, although naturally indolent, I was laborious when I chose to be so. and my idleness was less that of an indolent man, than that of an independent one who applies to business when it pleases him.  My profession of a copyist of music was neither splendid nor lucrative, but it was certain.  The world gave me credit for the courage I had shown in making choice of it.  I might depend upon having sufficient employment to enable me to live.  Two thousand livres which remained of the produce of the ‘Devin du Village’, and my other writings, were a sum which kept me from being straitened, and several works I had upon the stocks promised me, without extorting money from the booksellers, supplies sufficient to enable me to work at my ease without exhausting myself, even by turning to advantage the leisure of my walks.  My little family, consisting of three persons, all of whom were usefully employed, was not expensive to support.  Finally, from my resources, proportioned to my wants and desires, I might reasonably expect a happy and permanent existence, in that manner of life which my inclination had induced me to adopt.