bookshelves, so that they might live under his eyes.

But these were not the only pictures he had acquired to divert his
solitude.

Although he had surrendered to his servants the second story of his
house, which he himself never used at all, the ground floor had
required a number of pictures to fit the walls.

It was thus arranged:

A dressing room, communicating with the bedroom, occupied one of the
corners of the house. One passed from the bedroom to the library, and
from the library into the dining room, which formed the other corner.

These rooms, whose windows looked out on the Aunay Valley, composed
one of the sides of the dwelling.

The other side of the house had four rooms arranged in the same order.
Thus, the kitchen formed an angle, and corresponded with the dining
room; a long corridor, which served as the entrance, with the library;
a small dressing room, with the bedroom; and the toilet, forming a
second angle, with the dressing room.

These rooms received the light from the side opposite the Aunay Valley
and faced the Towers of Croy and Chatillon.

As for the staircase, it was built outside, against one of the sides
of the house, and the footsteps of his servants in ascending or
descending thus reached Des Esseintes less distinctly.