furnished, but neatly, and with some taste. The hand which had lent its
aid in this furnishing rendered it inestimable in my eyes, and I thought
it charming to be the guest of my female friend in a house I had made
choice of, and which she had caused to be built purposely for me.

Although the weather was cold, and the ground lightly covered with snow,
the earth began to vegetate: violets and primroses already made their
appearance, the trees began to bud, and the evening of my arrival was
distinguished by the song of the nightingale, which was heard almost
under my window, in a wood adjoining the house. After a light sleep,
forgetting when I awoke my change of abode, I still thought myself in the
Rue Grenelle, when suddenly this warbling made me give a start, and I
exclaimed in my transport: "At length, all my wishes are accomplished!"
The first thing I did was to abandon myself to the impression of the
rural objects with which I was surrounded. Instead of beginning to set
things in order in my new habitation, I began by doing it for my walks,
and there was not a path, a copse, a grove, nor a corner in the environs
of my place of residence that I did not visit the next day. The more I
examined this charming retreat, the more I found it to my wishes. This
solitary, rather than savage, spot transported me in idea to the end of
the world. It had striking beauties which are but seldom found near
cities, and never, if suddenly transported thither, could any person have
imagined himself within four leagues of Paris.

After abandoning myself for a few days to this rural delirium, I began to
arrange my papers, and regulate my occupations. I set apart, as I had
always done, my mornings to copying, and my afternoons to walking,
provided with my little paper book and a pencil, for never having been
able to write and think at my ease except 'sub dio', I had no inclination
to depart from this method, and I was persuaded the forest of