now recovered the functions of life. The first effect of our disenchantment was manifested by an inundation of words; if silence had oppressed us, we paid it in full.

When this torrent of words had flowed by, I summoned the maid, and accompanied my mother and sister to their apartments. Before I came away, I was obliged to look under all the beds, up the chimneys, behind the doors, and to examine the staircases, passages, and galleries, in the vicinity. The various traditions of the château, about thieves and spectres, were recalled to memory. The belief was pretty general, that a certain Count de Combourg, with a wooden leg, who had died about three centuries before, appeared at stated times, and had been met on the great staircase of the tower; his wooden leg walked about also, sometimes in company with a black cat.

MY PRISON.

Montboissier, August, 1817.

These tales completely engaged the attention of my mother and sister whilst preparing for bed; and they retired to rest, almost dying with fear. I went to my turret; the cook retired to the great tower, and the servants went down to their subterranean abode.

The window of my room opened into the inner court; by day, I had a view of the battlements of the opposite curtain, which was covered with spleen-wort, and afforded sustenance to a wild plum-tree. The martlets, which during the summer screeched and buried themselves in the holes of the walls, were my only companions. By night, I only saw a small portion of the sky, and a few stars. When the moon shone, I was warned of its decline towards the west by the direction of its rays, which then fell upon my bed through the lozenge panes of my window. The jackdaws, flying from one tower to another, as they passed and repassed between myself and the moon, threw the fleeting shadow of their wings upon my

curtains. Banished to the most remote corner at the entrance of the galleries, I did not lose the slightest murmur during the hours of darkness. Sometimes the wind appeared to course at a rapid pace; sometimes it uttered melancholy wailings; suddenly my door was violently shaken, and the vaults of the castle sent forth their howlings; anon the noise gradually subsided, only to re-commence anew. At four o'clock, the voice of the master of the castle, calling his valet-de-chambre at the entrance to the cellars, sounded like the last phantom of the departing night. This voice served me as the substitute for that sweet harmony, by the sound of which the father of Montaigne awaked his son.

The obstinacy of Count Chateaubriand, in forcing a child to sleep alone at the summit of a tower, might have been attended with evil consequences; but it turned out to my advantage. This violent manner of treating me left me the courage of a man, without taking from me that liveliness of imagination, of which people now attempt to deprive our youth. Instead of endeavouring to convince me that there were no ghosts, I was forced to brave them. When my father said to me, with an ironical smile, "Would Monsieur le Chevalier be afraid?" it would have compelled me to lie down with a corpse. When my excellent mother said to me, "My son, nothing happens without the permission of God; you have nothing to fear from evil spirits, as long as you are a good christian," I gained much greater confidence than I could have derived from all the arguments of philosophy. My success was so complete, that the night-winds, in my solitary tower, merely served as the sport of my caprices, aud as wings to my dreams. My imagination once kindled, extended to everything around, but nowhere found sufficient aliment ; it could have devoured heaven and earth. Such is the moral condition, which I must now endeavour to describe. Plunging again into the days of my youth, I am about to try and recall myself from the past, to exhibit myself such as I was, such perhaps as I regret being no longer, in spite of the torments I then endured.

TRANSITION FROM YOUTH TO MANHOOD.

I had scarcely returned from Brest to Combourg, when a revolution took place in my existence; the boy disappeared, and the man came into view, with his joys that flee away, and his vexations which remain.

At first, everything within me became passion, whilst awaiting the passions themselves. When, after a silent dinner, during which I had not dared either to speak or eat, the moment arrived when I could escape, my delight was incredible; it was impossible to go leisurely down the steps; I was eager to bound down at a leap. I was obliged to sit down on one of the steps to allow my agitation to subside; but I had no sooner gained the green lawn and the woods, than I began to run, leap, and bound, to skip and enjoy myself, till I fell down exhausted, panting, and intoxicated with exultation and freedom.

My father took me shooting with him. A taste for the chase seized upon me, and I carried it to excess; I still see before me the very field where I killed my first hare. In autumn, I have often remained four or five hours up to the middle in water, watching for wild ducks by the banks of a pond; even till this hour, I cannot remain free from excitement when a dog scents game. My first ardour for the chase developed a spirit of independence; and it was my custom to clear the ditches, to stride over the fields, to traverse marshes and brushwood-to be alone with my gun in a desert place-in solitude and power. In my excursions I often went on so far, that I could no longer walk, and the keepers were obliged to convey me home on a couch of branches woven together.

The pleasures of the chase, however, no longer sufficed: I was urged on by a desire of happiness, which I could neither regulate nor understand; my mind and my heart at length became like two empty temples without altars or sacrifice; and no one knew yet what God was to be adored. I grew up with my sister Lucile; our friendship constituted the whole of our lives.

LUCILE.

LUCILE was tall, and her beauty was remarkable, but grave. Her face was pale, and shaded by long black hair. She often fixed her eyes upon heaven, or whilst walking, cast around glances full of sadness or fire. Her gait, her voice, her smile, her physiognomy, gave the impression of a dreamy, suffering mind.

Lucile and I were mutually useless. When we spoke of the world, it was of the world within us-and which bore but a very small resemblance to the reality. She looked upon me as her protector, and I upon her as my friend. Gloomy thoughts often found access to her mind, which I found it difficult to drive away. At seventeen, she deplored the loss of her early years; she wished to bury herself in a cloister; everything became a source of anxiety, vexation, and pain; a mere expression which she sought, or a chimera which she had formed, tormented her for whole months. I have often seen her in a reverie, motionless, and apparently lifeless, with one arm flung over her head; withdrawn towards her heart, life exhibited no outward manifestation-and even her bosom ceased to heave. In her attitude, her melancholy, and her gracefulness, she resembled a funereal genius. In such cases, I endeavoured to console her, and a moment after I myself fell into the depths of inexplicable despair. Lucile, towards the evening, loved to indulge alone in some pious reading; the oratory of her predilection was the branching of two country roads, marked by a stone cross, and by a poplar, whose lofty stem shot up to heaven. My pious mother, charmed with her daughter, said that she reminded her of a Christian of the Primitive Church, performing her devotions at the station, called Laura.

This concentration of soul produced extraordinary effects in my sister's mind: whilst asleep, she had prophetic dreams; and when awake she appeared to read the future. On a landing place of the stairs of the great tower, there hung a clock, which beat time to silence. In her visionary moods, Lucile was accustomed to sit down on a step opposite to this

clock; she looked at the dial by the light of her lamp placed on the ground. When the two hands came together at midnight, and by their formidable conjunction gave birth to the hour of disorder and crime, Lucile heard noises which revealed to her distant enormities. Being in Paris some days after the 10th of August, and residing with my other sisters in the neighbourhood of the Carmelite Convent, she cast her eyes upon a looking-glass, uttered a cry and said, "I have just seen death entering." In the wilds of Scotland, she would have been such a gifted woman as is described by Walter Scott-endowed with second sight; in the fastnesses of Bretagne, she was only a female hermit, possessing beauty and genius, and afflicted by misfortune.

FIRST BREATH OF THE MUSE.

The life which was led by my sister and myself at Combourg promoted the advancement of our age and our characters. Our principal recreation consisted in walking, side by side, on the great Mall, in spring, on a carpet of primroses; in autumn, on beds of withered foliage; and in winter, on a covering of snow, ornamented by the tracks of birds, squirrels, and ermines. Young like the primroses, sad like the dry leaves, and pure as the new-fallen snow, there was a harmony between our recreations and ourselves.

During one of these walks, thusiasm of solitude, and said,

upon me.

Lucile heard me speak with en"You should describe all that."

This word revealed to me the muse; a divine breathing fell I began to lisp verses, as if poetry was my natural language. By day and by night, I sang about my pleasures; that is, my woods and my dales. I composed a multitude of short idylls, or pictures of nature.* I wrote a long time in verse, before I began to write in prose: M. de Fontanes maintained that I had received both gifts.

Has this talent, which friendship foresaw for me, been ever

See complete Works, Paris 1837.