“This looks very little like a party of pleasure,” said she. “I could weep at the melancholy aspect of the place. Nevertheless, here we have fine trees, stupendous rocks, and a roaring torrent—there is no doubt a degree of beauty in all this, but it is all too serious for me,” she added, smiling. “Let us enter and look at the interior.” “Yes, yes,” replied the hungry guests, “let us see if the cook, who left yesterday to prepare for us, has arrived more successfully than ourselves.” They were soon made aware of the joyful fact that a plentiful breakfast would be served in all haste, and meanwhile set about reconnoitering the castle. The antiquated furniture, with well-worn linen covers, chairs with only three feet, rickety tables, and the discordant sounds of a piano which had lain neglected for twenty years, furnished a thousand subjects for pleasant jokes. Their gayety returned, and it was agreed that instead of fretting at the inconveniences of their uncomfortable abode, they would laugh and joke at every thing. Besides, for this young and thoughtless company, this day was an event, a campaign, almost a perilous one, the originality of which began to appeal to the imagination. A fagot had been lighted in the large hall chimney, but puffs of smoke filling every nook, they made their escape into the garden. Here, too, the aspect was strange: the stone seats were covered with moss, the walls of the terraces in many places crumbling in, had left space between the ill-joined stones, where a thousand wild plants were growing, now shooting up straight and tall, now bending over to the ground like flexible vines; the walks were hidden beneath the green turf, and the parterres reserved for cultivated flowers had been invaded by wild ones, which spring up wherever the skies let fall one drop of rain or the sun sheds a ray. The white convolvulus twined round and choked up the monthly rose, the wild mulberry mingled with the red fruit of the currant, and the long fern, the sweet-scented mint, and the prickly thistle grew by the side of some long forgotten lilies. The minute the party entered the garden, innumerable little insects, frightened at the unusual noise, took refuge under the grass, and birds quitting their nests flew from branch to branch. The silence which had reigned for so many years in this peaceful spot gave place to the hum of voices and merry bursts of laughter. None of them appreciated this solitude, none even meditated on it, it was disturbed, profaned without respect. Numerous anecdotes were related of the different episodes of the most pleasant of their winter _soirées_, anecdotes mingled with agreeable allusions, expressive glances, hidden compliments; in fine, with all those thousand nothings that accompany the conversation of such as seek to be pleased, not yet claiming the right to be serious.