my brother-in-law and myself were the first to enter the chateau
after it had been abandoned for thirty-two years. We found a
chestnut-tree growing in the middle of the parlour. As for the park,
it was useless trying to visit it, because there were no longer any
paths or alleys."

My companion ceased to speak; and only the regular hoof-beat of the
trotting horse, and the chirping of insects in the grass, broke the
silence. On either hand, the sheaves standing in the fields took,
in the vague moonlight, the appearance of tall white women kneeling
down; and I abandoned myself awhile to those wonderful childish
fancies which the charm of night always suggests. After driving
under the heavy shadows of the mall, we turned to the right and
rolled up a lordly avenue at the end of which the chateau suddenly
rose into view--a black mass, with turrets en poivriere. We
followed a sort of causeway, which gave access to the court-of-honor,
and which, passing over a moat full of running water, doubtless
replaced a long-vanished drawbridge. The loss of that draw-bridge
must have been, I think, the first of various humiliations to which
the warlike manor had been subjected ere being reduced to that
pacific aspect with which it received me. The stars reflected
themselves with marvelous clearness in the dark water. Monsieur
Paul, like a courteous host, escorted me to my chamber at the very
top of the building, at the end of a long corridor; and then,
excusing himself for not presenting me at once to his wife by reason
of the lateness of the hour, bade me good-night.

My apartment, painted in white and hung with chintz, seemed to keep
some traces of the elegant gallantry of the eighteenth century.
A heap of still-glowing ashes--which testified to the pains taken