“Well, do as you like, I shall not leave without my box!” With the help of Charles Haas and of Arthur Meyer, we put my grandmother on Sohège’s back, in spite of herself. He was of medium height, and she was extremely tall, so that her long legs touched the ground, and I was afraid she might get them injured. Sohège, therefore, took her in his arms, and Charles Haas carried her legs. We then set off, but the smoke stifled us, and after descending about ten stairs I fell down in a faint. When I came to myself, I was in my mother’s bed. My little boy was asleep in my sister’s room, and my grandmother was installed in a large armchair. She sat bolt upright, frowning, and with an angry expression on her lips. She did not trouble about anything but her box, until at last my mother was angry, and reproached her severely in Dutch with only caring for herself. She answered excitedly, and her neck craned forward, as though to help her head to peer through the perpetual darkness which surrounded her. Her thin body wrapped in an Indian shawl of many colors, the hissing of her strident words, which flowed freely, all contributed to make her resemble a serpent in some terrible nightmare. My mother did not like this woman, who had married my grandfather when he had six big children, the eldest of whom was sixteen and the youngest, my uncle, five years. This second wife had never had any children of her own, and she had been indifferent and even hard toward those of her husband, and consequently she was not liked in the family. I had taken her in because smallpox had broken out in the family with whom she had been boarding. She had then wished to stay with me, and I had not had courage enough to oppose her. On the occasion of the fire, though, I considered she behaved so badly that a strong dislike to her came over me, and I resolved not to have her any longer in my house. News of the fire was brought to us. It continued to rage, and burned everything in my flat, absolutely everything, even to the very last book in my library. My greatest trouble was that I lost a magnificent portrait of my mother by Bassompierre Severin, a pastelist very much in vogue under the Empire; an oil portrait of my father, and a very pretty pastel of my sister Jeanne. I had not much jewelry, and all that was found of the bracelet given to me by the Emperor was a huge shapeless mass which I still have. I had a very pretty diadem, set with diamonds and pearls, given to me by Kabil Bey, after a performance at his house. The ashes of this had to be riddled in order to find the stones. The diamonds were there, but the pearls had melted.