A starlit and exquisite night. We start off with lighted lanterns,
followed by the three sorrowful ladies who accompany us, and by abrupt
slopes, dangerous in the darkness, we descend towards the sea.

The djins, stiffening their muscular legs, hold back with all their
might the heavily loaded little cars which would run down by
themselves if let alone, and that so rapidly, that they would rush
into empty space with my most valuable chattels. Chrysanthème walks by
my side, and expresses, in a soft and winning manner, her regret that
the _wonderfully tall friend_ did not offer to replace me for the
whole of my night-watch, as that would have allowed me to spend this
last night, even till morning, under our roof.

"Listen," she says, "come back to-morrow in the daytime, before
getting under way, to bid me good-by; I shall only return to my mother
in the evening; you will find me still up there."

And I promise.

They stop at a certain turn, from whence we have a bird's-eye view of
the whole roadstead; the black stagnant waters reflect innumerable
distant fires, and the ships--tiny immovable little objects, which
seen from our point of view take the shape of fish, seem also to
slumber,--little objects which serve to bear us _elsewhere_, to go far
away, and to forget.

The three ladies are going to turn back home, for the night is
already far advanced, and lower down, the cosmopolitan quarters near
the quays are not safe at this unusual hour.