Unhappily, the notice came too late for me. Amongst all her many friends I certainly held her in the most affectionate remembrance, and I was denied the consolation either of seeing her before she died or of following her to her grave. The merry child, the beautiful young girl, the serious and intelligent wife, who should have died long after us, since we saw her grow up, has gone before us, and we still wait here!] [Footnote 2: TRANSLATOR'S NOTE.--Carrier compelled his victims to embark on boats, which were then scuttled.] [Footnote 3: TRANSLATOR'S NOTE.--See note 2.] CHAPTER XIII M. Villenave's house--The master's despotic rule--The savant's coquetry--Description of the sanctuary of the man of science--I am admitted, thanks to an autograph of _Buonaparte_--The crevice in the wall--The eight thousand folios--The pastel by Latour--Voyages of discovery for an Elzevir or a _Faust_--The fall of the portrait and the death of the original I meant to talk of M. Villenave, and behold I have been talking about Cathelineau, Stofflet, Sauveur and Carrier. What a strange thing imagination is! the wayward inhabitant of one's house, thought to be a slave therein, but in reality its queen! I left off saying that we were going to take tea at M. Villenave's house. Every bird makes its own nest, whether of twigs or of different kinds of feathers; and each man makes his own home--when he possesses one at all--indicative of his character, his temperament and his idiosyncrasy. And so M. Villenave's house had its own characteristics, reflecting the taste of its occupant. It was built of stones which had once been white, but which time had coloured grey, and which were fast turning into black. It did not open out on the road; it was a severe and gloomy-looking house which did not lend itself to any such frivolous doings; a wall, ten feet high, faced the street, like a kind of outwork, ornamented at the top by a formidable fringe of jagged glass. This wall had in it two gates, a large one and a small one. Unless carriages wanted to enter, the large one was always kept shut, its hinges rusty, its lock broken; the small door, next to the porter's lodge, opened upon and gave access to the garden--a garden trodden hard into paths without flower-borders, possessing vines without grapes, and leafless trees that did not afford any shade. If, by any chance, a flower pushed its way up in some corner, it was a wild flower that had mistaken that damp enclosure for waste ground and had sprung up there unawares--a bindweed, a daisy or a buttercup. One day the poor flower would hear a cry of surprise and see a pretty, rosy-cheeked child, with curly golden hair, running to it in breathless haste and with eager feet, her eyes fixed on it, and then furtively grasp it as carefully as though it were a butterfly; when she had picked it, she would run with joyful surprise to her mother, crying-- "See, mamma! a flower!..."