When it rained, Constantinople was my ever-present refuge. It was a land of penumbra and mystery, a realm of perpetual wonderment, a mine of inexhaustible surprises. I never visited it without finding something new, without getting a sensation. One day, when André was there with me, we both saw a ghost—yes, as plainly as at this moment I see the paper I’m writing on; but I won’t turn aside now to speak of that. And as for my finds, on two or three occasions, at least, they had more than a subjective metaphysical importance. The first was a chest filled with jewellery and trinkets, an iron chest, studded with nails, in size and shape like a small trunk, with a rounded lid. I dragged it out of a dark corner, from amidst a quantity of rubbish, and (it wasn’t even locked!) fancy the eyes I made when I beheld its contents: half-a-dozen elaborately carved, high-back tortoise-shell combs, ranged in a morocco case; a beautiful old-fashioned watch, in the form of a miniature guitar; an enamelled snuff-box; and then no end of rings, brooches, buckles, seals, and watch-keys, set with precious stones—not very precious stones, perhaps—only garnets, amethysts, carnelians; but mercy, how they glittered! I ran off in great excitement to call my grandmother; and she called my uncle Edmond; and he, alas, applied the laws of seigniory to the transaction, and I saw my trover appropriated. My other important finds were appropriated also, but about them I did not care so much—they were only papers. One was a certificate, dated in the Year III, and attesting that my grandfather’s father had taken the oath of allegiance to the Republic. As I was a fierce Legitimist, this document afforded me but moderate satisfaction. The other was a Map of the World, covering a sheet of cardboard nearly a yard square, executed in pen-and-ink, but with such a complexity of hair-lines, delicate shading, and ornate lettering, that, until you had examined it closely, you would have thought it a carefully finished steel-engraving. It was signed “Herminie de Pontacq, 1818”; that is to say, by my grandmother herself, who in 1818 had been twelve years old; dear me, only twelve years old! It was delightful and marvellous to think that my own grandmother, in 1818, had been so industrious, and painstaking, and accomplished a little girl. I assure you, I felt almost as proud as if I had done it myself.