I had seen burn and go out regularly at the
same hour? It might be doubted; but I did not doubt it for a moment,
because I took pleasure in believing it. I felt less isolated and gained
confidence, now that my star had not deserted me. I called it my martyr
when I spoke to it: "Whence comest thou? Hast thou too suffered? Hast
thou mourned my absence a little?" And, as before, I thought it answered
me in the silence of the night. Towards morning I slept, and in a dream,
I saw, as through a glass, Louise watching and working in a room as poor
as mine, by the light of the well-beloved ray. She looked pale and sad,
and from time to time stopped her work to gaze at the gleam of my lamp.
When I awoke, it was broad day; and I went out to kill time.

On the boulevard I met an old friend of my father's; he was refined,
cultivated and affectionate. He had come from our mountains, to which he
was already anxious to return, for in their valleys he had buried
himself. My dejected air and sorrowful countenance struck him. He gained
my confidence, and immediately guessed at my complaint. "What are you
doing here?" he asked; "it is an unwholesome place for grief. Return to
our mountains. Your native air will do you good. Come with me; I promise
you that your unhappiness will not hold out against the perfume of broom
and heather." Then he spoke with tender earnestness of my duties. He did
not conceal from me the obligations my fortune and the position left me
by my father, laid me under to the land where I was born; I had
neglected it too long, and the time had now come when I ought to occupy
myself seriously with its needs and interests. In short, he made me
blush for my useless days, and led me, gently and firmly, back to
reality. At night-fall I returned to my little chamber, not consoled but
stronger, and decided to set out on the morrow for the banks of the
Creuse. I did not expect to be cured, but it pleased me to mingle the
thought of Louise with the benefits that I could bestow, and to bring
down blessings upon the name which I had longed to offer her.

I immediately remarked on entering, that my little beacon shone with
unaccustomed brilliancy. It was no longer a thread of light gleaming
timidly through the foliage, but a whole window brightly illuminated,
and standing out against the surrounding darkness. Investigating the
cause of this phenomenon, I discovered that, during the day, the trees
had been felled in the garden, and