July 21. I dined at Bougival, and then I spent the evening at a
boatmen's ball. Decidedly everything depends on place and
surroundings. It would be the height of folly to believe in the
supernatural on the Ile de la Grenouilliere.[1] But on the top of
Mont Saint-Michel or in India, we are terribly under the
influence of our surroundings. I shall return home next week.

[1] Frog-island.

July 30. I came back to my own house yesterday. Everything is
going on well.

August 2. Nothing fresh; it is splendid weather, and I spend my
days in watching the Seine flow past.

August 4. Quarrels among my servants. They declare that the
glasses are broken in the cupboards at night. The footman accuses
the cook, she accuses the needlewoman, and the latter accuses the
other two. Who is the culprit? It would take a clever person to
tell.

August 6. This time, I am not mad. I have seen --I have seen--I
have seen!--I can doubt no longer --I have seen it!

I was walking at two o'clock among my rose-trees, in the full
sunlight--in the walk bordered by autumn roses which are
beginning to fall. As I stopped to look at a Geant de Bataille,
which had three splendid blooms, I distinctly saw the stalk of
one of the roses bend close to me, as if an invisible hand had
bent it, and then break, as if that hand had picked it! Then the