The first letter which I received from Paris was full of sympathy and
congratulations on the termination of my laborious and perilous
adventures; it was from a man already in possession of an European
reputation, but whom I had never seen: M. de Humboldt, after what he had
heard of my misfortunes, offered me his friendship. Such was the first
origin of a connection which dates from nearly forty-two years back,
without a single cloud ever paving troubled it.

M. Dubois Thainville had numerous acquaintances in Marseilles; his wife
was a native of that town, and her family resided there. They received,
therefore, both of them, numerous visits in the parlour of the
lazaretto. The bell which summoned them, for me alone was dumb; and I
remained as solitary and forsaken, at the gates of a town peopled with a
hundred thousand of my countrymen, as if I had been in the heart of
Africa. One day, however, the parlour-bell rang three times (the number
of times corresponding to the number of my room); I thought it must be a
mistake. I did not, however, allow this to appear. I traversed proudly
under the escort of my guard of health the long space which separates
the lazaretto, properly so called, from the parlour; and there I found,
with very lively satisfaction, M. Pons, the director of the Observatory
at Marseilles, and the most celebrated discoverer of comets of whom the
annals of Astronomy have ever had to register the success.

At any time a visit from the excellent M. Pons, whom I have since seen
director of the Observatory at Florence, would have been very agreeable
to me; but, during my quarantine, I felt it unappreciably valuable. It
proved to me that I had returned to my native soil.

Two or three days before our admission to freedom, we experienced a loss
which was deeply felt by each of us. To pass away the heavy time of a