CHAPTER XIII

M. Villenave's house--The master's despotic rule--The savant's coquetry--Description of the sanctuary of the man of science--I am admitted, thanks to an autograph of _Buonaparte_--The crevice in the wall--The eight thousand folios--The pastel by Latour--Voyages of discovery for an Elzevir or a _Faust_--The fall of the portrait and the death of the original

I meant to talk of M. Villenave, and behold I have been talking about Cathelineau, Stofflet, Sauveur and Carrier. What a strange thing imagination is! the wayward inhabitant of one's house, thought to be a slave therein, but in reality its queen!

I left off saying that we were going to take tea at M. Villenave's house.

Every bird makes its own nest, whether of twigs or of different kinds of feathers; and each man makes his own home--when he possesses one at all--indicative of his character, his temperament and his idiosyncrasy. And so M. Villenave's house had its own characteristics, reflecting the taste of its occupant. It was built of stones which had once been white, but which time had coloured grey, and which were fast turning into black. It did not open out on the road; it was a severe and gloomy-looking house which did not lend itself to any such frivolous doings; a wall, ten feet high, faced the street, like a kind of outwork, ornamented at the top by a formidable fringe of jagged glass. This wall had in it two gates, a large one and a small one. Unless carriages wanted to enter, the large one was always kept shut, its hinges rusty, its lock broken; the small door, next to the porter's lodge, opened upon and gave access to the garden--a garden trodden hard into paths without flower-borders, possessing vines without grapes, and leafless trees that did not afford any shade. If, by any chance, a flower pushed its way up in some corner, it was a wild flower that had mistaken that damp enclosure for waste ground and had sprung up there unawares--a bindweed, a daisy or a buttercup. One day the poor flower would hear a cry of surprise and see a pretty, rosy-cheeked child, with curly golden hair, running to it in breathless haste and with eager feet, her eyes fixed on it, and then furtively grasp it as carefully as though it were a butterfly; when she had picked it, she would run with joyful surprise to her mother, crying--

"See, mamma! a flower!..."

The garden, which may have been fifteen mètres square, was bounded on the side of the house by a pathway of paving-stones, leading to a corridor tiled with square red bricks, a staircase at the end completing the vista. But before you reached this staircase, you first passed four doors. The one on the left belonged to the dining-room, the window of which looked out upon the tidiest part of the garden; on the right, opposite it, was a small room, not much used, where a table and three or four old arm-chairs were left to grow damp. In several places the wall paper was bulging out and falling off, without anybody taking any notice of it, and was becoming pitted with green and white damp spots. Then, on the left again, came the kitchen door, and, on the right, the larder and pantry. This dark and damp ground-floor was like a catacomb, and was only descended into at meal-times. The real dwelling-rooms, where we were entertained, were on the first floor. This floor contained a small and a large drawing-room, and the bedrooms belonging to Madame Villenave and Madame Waldor. We will leave the small drawing-room and the two bedrooms and give our whole attention to the large salon, which, after the attics (let us hasten to mention these here, before we have the right of entering them), was the strangest room in the house. Its shape was a long rectangle, having, at each of its angles, a console table supporting a bust. One of these busts was that of the master of the house. Between the two busts, at the bottom end, on a marble-topped table opposite the fireplace, was the most important piece of art and archæology in the room: this was the bronze urn that had once contained the heart of Bayard. A little bas-relief encircled the urn depicting the "chevalier _sans peur et sans reproche_" leaning against a tree and kissing his sword handle. Next came four large pictures--three of them portraits and the fourth a landscape. Let us begin with the landscape--honour to whom honour is due--the landscape was by Claude Lorraine. One of the portraits represented Anne Boleyn and was signed by Holbein. I forget by whom the two other paintings were: one was of Madame de Montespan and the other either Madame de Sévigné or de Grignan, I am not sure which. The walls were covered with one of those indefinite papers that leave no impression on the memory; the furniture was upholstered in Utrecht velvet; large couches with thin white arms, like the arms of a hunchback, invited friends of the family to be comfortable; while there were chairs and arm-chairs for more formal visitors. That storey had both its king and its vice-queen: the king was M. Villenave, the vice-queen was Madame Waldor. We purposely say "vice-queen," because immediately M. Villenave entered his salon he became the master of it, the king--more than king, the despot! M. Villenave was inclined to be tyrannical in character, and exercised this tyranny over strangers as well as over his own family. Like those petty princes of Italy whose principles people are obliged to adopt as soon as they have crossed the borders of their limited territories, so with M. Villenave, when you had stepped across the threshold of his salon, he would not allow you to hold a different opinion from his own on any subject. You became part of the being of the man, who had seen everything and studied everything, and, in fact, knew everything. Although this tyrannical spirit was tempered by the courtesy appertaining to the master of the house, it none the less had a depressing effect on the company generally. Although in the presence of M. Villenave the conversation was, as they used to express it, _bien menée_--i.e. skilfully managed--yet it was always less amusing, more fettered and less brilliant than when he was not present. It was just like the difference between a minuet and the game of puss-in-the-corner. It was exactly the reverse at Nodier's social evenings: Nodier liked people to make themselves as much at home as he was.

This recalls to my mind that I have not mentioned Nodier since I described him as helping me to gain entrance to the Théâtre-Français. Excellent and beloved Nodier!--one of my dearest friends! He shall not lose, you may be sure, by the postponement.

Happily, M. Villenave very rarely appeared in the salon, except on the Athénée nights. He spent the rest of his time on the second floor, only appearing among his family for dinner; then, after a few minutes' chat, after lecturing his son and scolding his wife, he would stretch himself out in an armchair, have his curls attended to by his daughter and return to his own apartments. The quarter of an hour during which the teeth of the comb gently scratched his head was the happiest time of the day to M. Villenave, the only rest he allowed himself from his unending absorption in scribbling.

"But why did he curl his hair?" someone asks.

That was the question I myself put.

Madame Waldor declared that it was purely an excuse for having his head scratched. M. Villenave must have been a parrot in one of the metamorphoses that preceded his life as a human being. Madame Villenave, who had known her husband longer than her daughter had, and who therefore could claim to know him better, averred that it was from vanity. And, indeed, M. Villenave, who was a good-looking old man, must have been splendidly handsome as a young man. His strongly marked features were wonderfully set off in their frame of flowing white hair, which showed up the fiery light of his fine black eyes. In fact, although M. Villenave was a learned man, he was also vain--a combination of virtue and fault rarely found together--but he was only vain about his head. As for the rest of his appearance, with the exception of his cravat, which was invariably white, he left it to his tailor and his bootmaker, or rather, to his daughter's care, who looked after these matters for her father. Whether his coat were blue or black, his trousers wide or narrow, the toes of his boots round or square, so long as M. Villenave's hair was well dressed, it was all he cared about. We have mentioned that when his daughter had combed and curled his locks, M. Villenave went upstairs to his own rooms--or _home>_ as the English say. Good gracious! what a curious place it was, too!

Follow me, reader, if these minute details after the fashion of Balzac amuse you, and if you believe nature takes as much pains over the making of a hyssop as over the making of a cedar-tree. Besides, we may perhaps be able to unearth some curious anecdote from out the medley, concerning a charming pastel by Latour. But we have not got there yet; we shall come to it in the end, just as at last we have come to M. Villenave's sanctum.

We have divided up the ground floor into dining-room, kitchen, pantry; and on the first floor into the small and large salons and the bedrooms; there was nothing like that on the second floor. The second floor had five rooms, five rooms full of nothing else but books and boxes. These five rooms must have contained forty thousand volumes and four thousand boxes, piled up on the floor and on tables. The anteroom alone was a vast library. It had two entrances: that on the right led to M. Villenave's bedroom--a chamber to which we shall return. That on the left opened into a large room, which, in its turn, led into a much smaller one. These two rooms, be it understood, were nothing but two libraries. The four walls of them were tapestried with books upheld on a substratum of boxes. This was odd enough in itself, as will readily be imagined, but it was not the most original thing that caught one's notice. The most ingenious arrangement was a square construction which stood in the middle of the room like an enormous block and formed a second library within the first, leaving only space for a pathway round the room, bordered with books on left and right, just wide enough to allow a single person to move freely; a second person would have blocked the traffic. Moreover, only M. Villenave's most intimate friends ever presumed to be allowed the privilege of admission to this _sanctum sanctorum._ The substratum of boxes contained autographs. The age of Louis XIV. alone needed five hundred boxes! Herein were contained the result of fifty years of daily labour, concentrated on this one object; hour after hour taken up by this one passion. It was, in a word, the gentle and ardent passion of a born collector, into which he put his mind and happiness and joy and life!

There were to be found a portion of the papers of Louis XVI., discovered in the iron chest; there was the correspondence of Malesherbes, two hundred autographs of Rousseau, and four hundred of Voltaire together with autographs of all the kings of France, from Charlemagne down to our own time; there were drawings by Raphael and Jules Romain, by Leonardo da Vinci, Andrea del Sarto, Lebrun, Lesueur, Greuze, Vanloo, Watteau, Boucher, Vien, David, Girodet, etc.

M. Villenave would not have parted with the contents of those two rooms for a hundred thousand crowns.

I There now only remain the bedroom and the black cabinet behind M. Villenave's alcove, which was reached by a corridor, about which we shall have occasion to say a few words. Only those who saw that bedroom, wherein the bed was the least conspicuous piece of furniture, can conceive any idea of what the bedroom of a bibliomaniac is like. It was in this room that M. Villenave received his friends. After four or five months' intimacy in the household, I had the honour of being received in it. An old servant, called, I believe, Françoise, conducted me to it. I had promised M. Villenave an autograph--not that of Napoleon, of which he possessed five or six, or that of Bonaparte, of which he had three or four--but one of _Buonaparte._

He had given orders that I was to be shown upstairs as soon as I arrived.

Françoise half opened the door.

"M. Dumas is here," she said.

Generally, when anyone was announced, even were he an intimate friend who had come unexpectedly, M. Villenave would utter a loud cry, scold Françoise and fling up his arms in despair; then, finally, when he had indulged his fit of despair, and moaned and sighed his fill, he would say--

"Very well, Françoise, as he is there, show him in."

Then the intruder would be let in.

My reception was quite otherwise. M. Villenave had hardly caught my name before he exclaimed--

"Show him in! show him in!"

In I went.

"Ah! here you are," he said. "Well, I wager you have not been able to find it!"

"What?"

"That famous autograph you promised me yesterday."

"Yes, indeed ... I have found it."

"And have you brought it?"

"To be sure I have!..."

"Really?"

"Here it is!"

"Quick, let me see it!"

I handed it to him. M. Villenave rushed up to the window.

"Yes, it is genuine," he said; "there is the _u_!... Oh! there is his very own _u_, there is no doubt about it. Let us see: '29 vendémiaire, year IV,' that is it!... Stop, stop!" He went to a box. "See, here is one of _frimaire_ in the same year, signed 'Bonaparte, 12 frimaire'; so it must have been between 29 vendémiaire and 12 frimaire that he dropped his _u_; this determines a great historic question!"

While this monologue was being carried on, I had been glancing round the bedchamber thoroughly, and I had noticed that the only piece of furniture that was not encumbered with books was the arm-chair from which he had just risen. After M. Villenave had carefully examined the autograph, he put it into a white wrapper, wrote on the wrapper, placed it in a box, put the box in its place and flung himself back into his arm-chair, with a sigh of joy.

"Ah! now, sit down," he said.

"I should like nothing better," I replied; "but what do you mean me to sit on?"

"Why, on the couch."

"Oh yes, on the couch!"

"What about it?"

"Well, just look at the couch for yourself."

"Upon my word, you are right; it is full of books. Never mind, pull up an arm-chair."

"With great pleasure. But the arm-chairs ...?"

"The arm-chairs?"

"Are littered just like the couch."

"Ah! I have so many books.... Have you noticed the great crack in the walls of the house?"

"No."

"It is visible enough, nevertheless.... Well, my dear monsieur, it is the books! The books are pulling down the house."

"The books? How?"

"Yes, twelve hundred folios, monsieur, twelve hundred splendid and rare folios; I even believe there are quite unknown ones among them, so rare are they! I put all those in the garret and I was intending to put more there, for there was room for another twelve hundred; when, suddenly, the house trembled, uttered a groan and cracked."

"Why, you must have thought it was an earthquake?"

"Exactly!... but when we found the damage was limited we sent for an architect. The architect examined the house from the cellar to the second floor and declared that the accident could only have been caused by too heavy a weight. And, consequently, he asked to be allowed to look at the attics. Alas! this was what I dreaded. Oh! if it had only been a question of myself, I would never have given him the key; but one has to sacrifice oneself for the general good.... He visited the attics, discovered the folios, reckoned that the weight must come to eight thousand pounds, and declared that they must be sold or he would not answer for the consequences.... And they were sold, monsieur!"

"At a loss?"

"No.... Alas! I made a profit of five or six thousand francs on them, because, you know, books increase in value from having been in the possession of a bibliophile; but the poor folios were lost to me--hounded from beneath the roof that had sheltered them.... I shall never come across such a collection again. But pray take a chair."

The chairs were in a similar condition to the easy-chairs and couches--not one was unoccupied. I decided to change the conversation.

"Oh!" I said to M. Villenave, approaching towards his recess, at the back of which an open door leading to the corridor permitted me to see what was there. "Oh! monsieur, what a beautiful pastel you have down there!"

"Yes, yes," replied M. Villenave, with that old-fashioned courtly air that I have only met with in two or three old men who were as vain as he. "Yes, that is the portrait of an old friend of mine--I say old, because I am no longer young, and she, if I remember correctly, was five or six years older than I. We became acquainted in the year 1784; you see that is not yesterday. We have not seen each other again since 1802, but that has not prevented us from writing to one another every week, or from looking forward to the weekly letters with exactly the same pleasure.... Yes, you are right, the pastel is charming, but if you had known the original you would have thought her still more charming!"

And a sweet reflection of youth, like a ray of sunlight, passed over the handsome face of the old man, making it look forty years younger.

Alas! I only entered that sacred tabernacle of the intellect twice: I have described what happened on my first visit, and I will immediately tell what happened at the second. But I ought previously to answer the question as to how M. Villenave managed to collect all these valuable treasures since he had not a large fortune. It was by patience and perseverance, as la Fontaine would say. This collection had been the work of his whole life. Just as Ghiberti began the gates of the Baptistery at Florence when he was a young man and finished them as an old one, so M. Villenave had given up fifty years to this task. He never burnt a single paper or destroyed a letter. I wrote two or three times to M. Villenave to ask for information; well, my unworthy epistles were put into their wrappers, classified and labelled. Why was I thus honoured? Who can tell? Perhaps he thought even I might some day become a great celebrity. It will readily be imagined that, if he preserved such letters as mine, he would religiously preserve other things. Notices of meetings of learned societies, invitations to marriage ceremonies, funeral cards, all were kept, classified and put in their place. I cannot say what M. Villenave's collection did _not_ contain; I saw amongst it a collection of half-burnt volumes which had been snatched out of the fire of the Bastille on 14 July.

M. Villenave employed two aides-de-camp, or, rather, bloodhounds: one named Fontaine, himself the author of a book called the _Manuel des Autographes_; the other an employé in the War Office. Twice a week they went a hunting; they rummaged the shops of the grocers, who, accustomed to these visits, would put aside all the papers that they thought might be rare or curiosities. From amongst these papers the two visitors would make a selection, paying the grocers fifteen sous a pound, M. Villenave paying them at the rate of thirty sous. There also were what might be described as royal hunting-days; on these days M. Villenave hunted in person; every grocer in Paris knew him, and came up to him with his hands full of papers, far more precious to him than roses and lilies.

The reader should have seen M. Villenave when he sallied forth to take his leisure, or, rather, when he went out to accomplish the principal work of his life. He was no vain, becurled dandy on these days, neither did he wear the white cravat or the blue coat with gold buttons; no, he did not wish to look too well-to-do in the presence of the old second-hand booksellers amongst whom he was going to glean; on these days he wore a rather dirty old hat, a black cravat cut away by his beard and an unbrushed coat. Then the indefatigable bibliomaniac proceeded along the quays. Here, with both hands in his trousers' pockets, his big body bent down, his fine intelligent head lit up with desire, he would send his piercing glances right into the depths of the assemblage of wares, looking incessantly for some unknown treasure, a text of _Faust_ or an Elzevir. Sometimes the hunter would return home empty-handed; then he would be sullen, and silent at dinner, and would grumble that his daughter was pulling his hair while she was curling it; after this he would pick up his candlestick and go upstairs to his room without wishing anyone good-night. On the other hand, if a hunting-day proved to be productive, and M. Villenave returned with a precious volume or a scarce edition, then he would come in with his face radiant with smiles; he would toss Élisa up and down in his arms; he would joke with his son, kiss his daughter, pay his wife compliments on the dinner; and, when dinner was over, he would thank his hairdresser, purring like a contented cat. M. Villenave had but one cause for disquiet: where was the fresh acquisition to be put? The books were squeezed into their shelves so tightly that you could not get a paper knife in between. He would walk from one side to another, turning round, tacking, complaining, lifting up his long arms to the heavens in despair, finally deciding to put the book on a couch or on one of the arm-chairs or chairs, saying with a sigh--

"We must find a place for it later."

That place would never be found, and the book would remain on the couch, the arm-chair or the chair, where it had been placed, a fresh obstacle in the way of any visitor who had to find a seat.

I was too well aware of M. Villenave's dislike to be disturbed, to have ventured on a second visit to his sanctum, until, when recasting _Christine_ afresh, I wished to consult the autograph writing of the daughter of Gustavus-Adolphus; I wanted to acquaint myself with certain oddities in her character that might possibly, I thought, be reflected in her writing. So I made up my mind to venture to disturb M. Villenave in those intellectual regions wherein he soared far above common humanity. It was in the month of March 1829, about five o'clock in the afternoon, when I rang the bell and the gate was opened. I asked for M. Villenave and was shown in. I had not gone many steps towards the house before Françoise called me back.

"Monsieur!" she said, "monsieur!"

"What is it, Françoise?"

"Does Monsieur want to go up to M. Villenave's rooms?"

"Yes, Françoise."

"I thought Monsieur was visiting the ladies as usual."

"You are wrong, Françoise."

"Then Monsieur will be good enough to spare my poor legs going up two flights of stairs and give M. Villenave this letter for him that has just come."

"Willingly, Françoise."

Françoise gave me the letter, and I took it and went upstairs. I knocked when I reached the door, but there was no answer. I knocked a little louder. Again no answer. I began to feel uncomfortable; the key was in the door, and the presence of that key invariably indicated the presence of M. Villenave in his room. Surely some accident must have happened to him. I knocked a third time, meaning to enter if I was not answered. There was no response, and I entered. M. Villenave was asleep in his arm-chair. The noise I made in entering and, perhaps, the draught that I caused, disturbed some magnetic influences, and M. Villenave uttered a cry, awoke and jumped up.

"Ah! pardon me," I exclaimed. "I beg a thousand pardons! I have disturbed you."

"Who are you? What is your business?" asked M. Villenave quickly.

"Why, upon my word, do you not recognise me?... Alexandre Dumas."

"Oh!" said M. Villenave, with a gasp.

"Really, monsieur," I said, "I am very sorry. I will withdraw."

"No, no; on the contrary, come in," said M. Villenave, as he passed his hand across his forehead; "you will render me a service."

I went in.

"Take a seat," he said, from customary habit.

Eight or ten folios lay tossed about on the floor; I formed a pile of them and sat down on the top.

"Yes," continued M. Villenave, "it was a very singular thing.... I fell asleep, the dusk came on and, in the meantime, my fire went out. You awoke me and found me in the dark, so I could not account for the noise inside my room; it was, no doubt, the draught from the passage that touched my face, but, in waking, I seemed to see something white, like a shroud, dancing before my eyes.... Curious, was it not?" went on M. Villenave, with a shiver, as though he felt cold through and through. "But here you are, so much the better!" And he held out his hand to me.

I responded to his courtesy, transferring to my left hand the letter I had brought him in my right.

"What have you there?" asked M. Villenave.

"Ah! pardon, I was forgetting ... it is a letter which Françoise gave me for you and that is the reason I disturbed you."

"Thanks ... Stop a minute, would you please feel about for a match? I am really quite bewildered still, and if I were superstitious I should believe I had had a presentiment."

He took the match I held out to him and lit it in the red embers on the hearth. Directly the match caught fire, we could distinguish objects in the room by its flickering light, faint though it was.

"Oh! good gracious!" I exclaimed suddenly, "what has happened to your beautiful pastel?"

"As you see, the glass and the frame are broken; I am waiting to send it to the glazier's and picture-framer's ... it was a most incomprehensible thing!"

"What was?"

"The way it fell."

"Did the nail come out, or the ring break?"

"Neither the one nor the other. The day before yesterday I was working all evening; when it reached a quarter to twelve, I was tired, but I still had to correct a proof of a handy little edition of my _Ovid._ I decided to combine rest and work by going to bed and correcting the proofs when I was in bed. So I lay down: I put my candle on the table by the bedside, and the light from it shone on the portrait of my poor friend; my glance followed the candlelight and I said good-night to the picture as usual.... A half-open window let in a little breeze which blew the flame of my candle about so that it seemed to me as though the portrait returned my good-night by bending its head as I had done! You will understand that I looked upon this movement as visionary and foolish; but, whether folly or a vision, my mind persisted in dwelling upon the movement, and the more I pondered over it, the more real the incident seemed; my eyes would stray from my _Ovid_, and fix themselves on that one point, the picture; my wandering thoughts would fly back, in spite of myself, to the days of my youth; and these early days passed before me one by one.... Ah me! I think I have told you that the original of that pastel occupied a good deal of my attention in those early days! So there I was, going at full tilt over old recollections of twenty-five years back; I addressed the copy as though the original could hear me, and my memory answered for her; it seemed as though the lips in the pastel moved; I thought the colours of the painting began to fade, and the expression on the face grew sad and unhappy.... Something like a smile of farewell passed over her lips; a tear came into her eyes ready to moisten the glass. Midnight began to strike; and, in spite of myself, I shivered--why, I could not tell! The wind blew, and, at the last stroke of midnight, while the clock was still vibrating, the half-open window opened wide violently, I heard a sigh like a groan, the eyes of the portrait closed, and the picture fell without either the nail that held it or the cord being broken; and my candle went out. I tried to light it again, but there was no fire in the grate, there were no matches on the chimneypiece; it was midnight, everybody in the house was asleep; so there was no way of obtaining a light. I shut my window again and I went back to bed.... Although I was not afraid, I felt much moved, I was sad, I had a great desire to weep; I thought I heard something pass through my room like the rustle of a silk dress.... I heard this noise three times so distinctly that I asked, 'Is there anyone there?' Finally, I fell asleep, very late, and the first thing I looked at when I woke again was my poor pastel, which I found in the state in which you now see it."

"That is indeed a strange story!" I said. "And have you received your weekly letter as usual?"

"No, and that is what makes me uneasy; that is why I gave Françoise orders to bring or send up any letters that might come for me the moment they arrive."

"Well," said I, "perhaps the one I have just brought you...."

"That is not her style of folding:--still, never mind, as it comes from Angers...."

Then, turning it over to break the envelope he exclaimed, "Ah! my God! it is sealed in black! Poor soul, some misfortune has befallen her!"

And M. Villenave grew pale as he unsealed the letter; it enclosed a second one.

His eyes filled with tears as he read the first lines of the first letter.

"Look," he said, and he held it out to me, "read it"; and, while he silently and sadly opened the second letter, I took the first and read:--

"MONSIEUR,--It is with personal grief, increased by realising what you too will feel, that I have to inform you that Madame---died on Sunday last, at the last stroke of midnight. The day before, while she was writing to you, she was seized by an indisposition which we thought at first was only slight, but it grew worse, until she died. I have the sad duty of sending to you the letter she had begun to write to you, unfinished as it is. This letter will assure you that her affection for you remained unchanged to the end.

"I remain, Monsieur, in great grief, as you will readily believe, your very humble and very obedient servant,

"THÉRÈSE MIRAUD"

"So you see," resumed M. Villenave, "it was at the last stroke of midnight that the portrait fell, and it was at the last stroke of midnight that she died."

I felt that his grief needed a solitude peopled only by past recollections and uninterrupted by any poor attempts I could offer at consolation. I picked up my hat, pressed his hand and left.

This incident recalled to me the apparition of my father, on the very night of his death, which woke me up when I was a little child, and I put to myself the question that is so often asked and never answered, "What are the mysterious bonds which bind the dead to the living?" Later, when I lost my mother, whom I loved more than anyone else in the world, and who, on her side, loved me beyond all telling, I remembered these two visions and, kneeling down by the bed on which she had just expired, with my lips on her hand, I implored her, if anything of her had survived, to appear to me just once again; then, when night came, I lay down in a lonely room and waited with a beating heart, hoping to see the beloved vision. I counted in vain nearly all the hours of that night, and not the slightest sound or apparition came to solace my sorrowful watch. After that, I doubted all such experiences, whether my own or others'; for my mother's love for me, and mine for her, were so great that I knew if she had been able to rise once more from her resting-place to bid me a last farewell she would surely have done it. But perhaps it is only children and old people who are privileged--children because they are nearer the cradle, old people because they are nearer the grave.