be unhappy, he will be so forever if I do not strive to discipline
his inclinations and to break his intractable disposition. The
child was born under an evil star. At once feeble and violent, he
unites with very ardent passions a deplorable puerility of mind;
incapable of serious thought, the merest trivialities move him to
fever heat, and he talks childish prattle with all the gestures of
great passion. And what is worse, interesting himself greatly in
himself, he thinks it very natural that this interest should be
shared by all the world. Do not imagine that his is a loving heart
that feels a necessity of spending itself on others. He likes to
make his emotions spectacular, and as his impressions are events
for him, he would like to display them, even to the inhabitants of
Sirius. His soul is like a lake swept by a gale of wind that would
drive a man-of-war at the rate of twenty-five knots an hour; and on
this lake Stephane sails his squadrons of nutshells, and he sees
them come, go, tack, run around, and capsize. He keeps his log-
book very accurately, pompously registers all the shipwrecks, and
as these spectacles transport him with admiration, he is indignant
to find that he alone is moved by them. This is what makes him
unhappy; and you will agree with me that it is not my fault. The
regime which I prescribe for my invalid may appear to you a little
severe, but it's the only way by which I can hope to cure him.
Leading a regular, uniform life,--and sad enough I admit--he will
gradually become surfeited with his own emotions when the objects
of them are never renewed, and he will end, I hope, by demanding
the diversions of work and study. May he be able some day to
discover that a problem of Euclid is more interesting than the
wreck of a nutshell! Upon that day he will enter upon full
convalescence, and I shall not be the last to rejoice in it."