The new life I was leading, the half-starvation system to which I was
condemned, and most likely more than everything else, the air of Padua,
brought me health such as I had never enjoyed before, but that very state
of blooming health made it still more difficult for me to bear the hunger
which I was compelled to endure; it became unbearable. I was growing
rapidly; I enjoyed nine hours of deep sleep, unbroken by any dreams, save
that I always fancied myself sitting at a well-spread table, and
gratifying my cruel appetite, but every morning I could realize in full
the vanity and the unpleasant disappointment of flattering dreams! This
ravenous appetite would at last have weakened me to death, had I not made
up my mind to pounce upon, and to swallow, every kind of eatables I could
find, whenever I was certain of not being seen.

Necessity begets ingenuity. I had spied in a cupboard of the kitchen some
fifty red herrings; I devoured them all one after the other, as well as
all the sausages which were hanging in the chimney to be smoked; and in
order to accomplish those feats without being detected, I was in the
habit of getting up at night and of undertaking my foraging expeditions
under the friendly veil of darkness. Every new-laid egg I could discover
in the poultry-yard, quite warm and scarcely dropped by the hen, was a
most delicious treat. I would even go as far as the kitchen of the
schoolmaster in the hope of pilfering something to eat.

The Sclavonian woman, in despair at being unable to catch the thieves,
turned away servant after servant. But, in spite of all my expeditions,
as I could not always find something to steal, I was as thin as a walking
skeleton.

My progress at school was so rapid during four or five months that the