The wide bed was of the newest and horridest of _art nouveau_, and over it was a spread of many pieces of coffee-colored machine-made lace put together with colored wools. There was a writing-table near the window at which you couldn’t write, for all the writing space was taken up with little drawers or tiny jutting-out shelves, and an imitation bronze vase, holding some faded artificial roses, was built into it, where the hand would naturally slip along when writing. Over it, between the windows, hung an illuminated verse, “_Allein soll ich denn reisen? die Heimat ist so schön._” From the Oberforster’s album some one took and presented to me a photograph of Anna, which I couldn’t connect with that room, a rather sharp-nosed, mild-eyed woman whose head was leaning against her husband’s head. And the husband is one among millions of husbands who lie in their graves, for whom the pleasant habit of existence is no more. Downstairs on their upright piano, in the corner of the dining-room, are those high piles of music of the masters, and much of it is arranged for four hands. In the afternoon a great weariness came upon me, and the light of victory seemed to pale, but I knew that it was only within myself, because of the long vigil in which I had burned both oil and wick. I stood listening for a while to the military bands in the Halle aux Blés and the Place du Marché, but the gorgeous fanfare of the trumpets reached me only dully, as from a great distance. Then many little boys, after the eternal manner of little boys, began to set off firecrackers, and the sudden noises hurt my ears. I went to my room, but was too wearied to compose myself to rest, and soon came out, chilly and wandering. The sun had set upon the square and something cold had began to come up from the earth; I seemed to have finished both joy and mourning. I thought that perhaps forever I would be alone, unable to partake of the world’s gladness. I could not remember, in that afternoon ebb of vitality, that with the evening hours would come rushing in the tide of nervous strength, bringing again warmth to my heart, light to my spirit, and that buoyantly I would be treading the _Via Triumphalis_ of this borderland. A little later in a blue twilight, bluer close to the earth where those many Sons of Victory pressed, I walked out with Laferrière past the ancient, evocative Ringelstein, along the Doller, and we called on a very charming woman who had also seen the war of 1870—Madame Caillaux. She gave us a perfect cup of tea and was flanked by no veteran, and she, the portion of whose youth and age had been war, was calm with the pleasant calm of those who harmoniously have sewed together the ends of life.