"Listen!" she mutters. "No, I cannot! No! . . ." She tries to say
something, but hesitates. Now I see from her face that she has come
to some decision. With gleaming eyes and swollen nose she snatches
my hand, and says hurriedly, "_Nicolas_, I am yours! Love you I
cannot, but I promise to be true to you!"

Then she squeezes herself to my breast, and at once springs away.

"Someone is coming," she whispers. "Farewell! . . . To-morrow at
eleven o'clock I will be in the arbour. . . . Farewell!"

And she vanishes. Completely at a loss for an explanation of her
conduct and suffering from a painful palpitation of the heart, I
make my way home. There the "Past and Future of the Dog Licence"
is awaiting me, but I am quite unable to work. I am furious. . . .
I may say, my anger is terrible. Damn it all! I allow no one to
treat me like a boy, I am a man of violent temper, and it is not
safe to trifle with me!

When the maid comes in to call me to supper, I shout to her: "Go
out of the room!" Such hastiness augurs nothing good.

Next morning. Typical holiday weather. Temperature below freezing,
a cutting wind, rain, mud, and a smell of naphthaline, because my
_maman_ has taken all her wraps out of her trunks. A devilish
morning! It is the 7th of August, 1887, the date of the solar
eclipse. I may here remark that at the time of an eclipse every one
of us may, without special astronomical knowledge, be of the greatest
service. Thus, for example, anyone of us can (1) take the measurement