Madame Prune, who had come upstairs after me, always officious and eager,
manifested by her gestures her sentiments of indignation on beholding the
careless reception accorded by Chrysantheme to her lord and master, and
advanced to wake her.

"Pray do nothing of the kind, my good Madame Prune; you don't know how
much I prefer her like that!" I had left my shoes below, according to
custom, beside the little shoes and sandals; and I entered on the tips of
my toes, very, very, softly to sit awhile on the veranda.

What a pity this little Chrysantheme can not always be asleep; she is
really extremely decorative seen in this manner--and like this, at least,
she does not bore me. Who knows what may be passing in that little head
and heart! If I only had the means of finding out! But strange to say,
since we have kept house together, instead of advancing in my study of
the Japanese language, I have neglected it, so much have I felt the
impossibility of ever interesting myself in the subject.

Seated upon my veranda, my eyes wandered over the temples and cemeteries
spread at my feet, over the woods and the green mountains, over Nagasaki
lying bathed in the sunlight. The cicalas were chirping their loudest,
the strident noise trembling feverishly in the hot air. All was calm,
full of light and full of heat.

Nevertheless, to my taste, it is not yet enough so! What, then, can have
changed upon the earth? The burning noondays of summer, such as I can
recall in days gone by, were more brilliant, more full of sunshine;
Nature seemed to me in those days more powerful, more terrible. One
would say this was only a pale copy of all that I knew in early years--
a copy in which something is wanting. Sadly do I ask myself--Is the