our giddiness in having
forgotten that our clothes and shoes would wear out, or trusting to
renew them by the play of our fountain. We continued our journey as
merrily as we had begun it, only drawing faster towards that termination
where our drained purses made it necessary for us to arrive.

At Chambery I became pensive; not for the folly I had committed, for
never did any one think less of the past, but on account of the reception
I should meet with from Madam de Warrens; for I looked on her house as my
paternal home. I had written her an account of my reception at the Count
de Gauvon's; she knew my expectancies, and, in congratulating me on my
good fortune, had added some wise lessons on the return I ought to make
for the kindness with which they treated me. She looked on my fortune as
already made, if not destroyed by my own negligence; what then would she
say on my arrival? for it never entered my mind that she might shut the
door against me, but I dreaded the uneasiness I might give her; I dreaded
her reproaches, to me more wounding than want; I resolved to bear all in
silence, and, if possible to appease her. I now saw nothing but Madam de
Warrens in the whole universe, and to live in disgrace with her was
impossible.

I was most concerned about my companion, whom I did not wish to offend,
and feared I should not easily get rid of. I prefaced this separation by
an affected coldness during the last day's journey. The drole understood
me perfectly; in fact, he was rather giddy than deficient in point of
sense--I expected he would have been hurt at my inconstancy, but I was
quite mistaken; nothing affected my friend Bacle, for hardly had we set
foot in town, on our arrival in Annecy, before he said, "You are now at
home,"--embraced--bade me adieu--turned on his heel, and disappeared; nor
have I ever heard of him since.

How did my heart beat as I approached the habitation of Madam de Warrens!
my legs trembled under me, my eyes were clouded with a mist, I neither
saw, heard, nor recollected any one, and was obliged frequently to stop
that I might draw breath, and recall my bewildered senses. Was it fear
of not obtaining that succor I stood in need of, which agitated me to
this degree? At the age I then was, does the fear of perishing with
hunger give such alarms? No: I declare with as much truth as pride, that
it was not in the power of interest or indigence, at any period of my
life, to expand or contra