Gazing alternately at the dark stretch of sand and the blue expanse of the sky, the soldier dreamed of France. He smelt with a thrill of rapture the gutters of Paris, he recalled the towns through which he had marched, the faces of his comrades, the most trivial details of his life. In truth, his southern imagination soon brought before him the stones of his dear Provence, in the eddying waves of heat which shimmered above the vast sheet of the desert. Dreading all the perils of that cruel mirage, he descended the slope opposite that by which he had ascended the mound the night before. He was overjoyed to discover a sort of cave, hollowed out by nature in the huge fragments of granite which formed the base of that hillock. The remains of a mat indicated that the shelter had once been inhabited. Then, a few steps away, he saw some palm-trees laden with dates. At that sight the instinct which attaches us to life reawoke in his heart. He hoped to live long enough to await the passing of some Maugrabins; or perhaps he should soon hear the roar of cannon; for at that moment Bonaparte was marching through Egypt. Revived by that thought, the Frenchman shook down several clusters of ripe fruit, beneath the weight of which the trees seemed to bend, and he assured himself, on tasting that unlooked-for manna, that the previous occupant of the grotto had cultivated the palm-trees; in truth, the fresh and toothsome flesh of the dates demonstrated the care of his predecessor. The Provençal passed abruptly from the gloomiest despair to the most frantic joy. He returned to the top of the hill, and employed himself during the rest of the day cutting down one of the sterile palm-trees, which had served him for a roof the night before. A vague memory brought to his mind the beasts of the desert, and, anticipating that they might come to drink at the spring which gushed out of the sand at the foot of the bowlders, he determined to guard himself against their visits by placing a barrier against the door of his hermitage. Despite his zeal, despite the strength which the fear of being eaten up during his sleep gave him, it was impossible for him to cut the palm-tree into pieces during that day, but he succeeded in felling it. When, towards evening, that king of the desert fell, the noise of its fall echoed in the distance, and the solitude uttered a sort of moan; the soldier shuddered as if he had heard a voice predicting disaster. But like an heir who does not mourn long over the death of his parent, he stripped that noble tree of the great green leaves which are its poetic adornment, and used them to repair the mat, upon which he lay down to sleep. Fatigued by the heat and hard work, he fell asleep beneath the red vault of the grotto.