Thank Heaven! Paris still holds out, and is likely to do so. I had a delightful proof of this. This morning I was by the cloister well when I heard quick firing in the direction of Draveil. Almost immediately a peculiar sound, like the flapping of a sail at sea and the straining of the stretched rigging, passed through the air above me. It was a balloon, a fine yellow balloon, very apparent against the darkness of the clouds. From where I stood it seemed to float over the tree-tops, although in reality it was far above. I cannot describe how the slender texture of this silken balloon, whose netting I could distinctly see, stirred and filled me with enthusiasm. I remembered that above all this conquered France, the soul of Paris still soared, a living strength more powerful than all the Krupp cannons together, and I, a Parisian, felt proud of it. I felt inclined to cry, to shout, to call out. I threw my arms out towards the black, motionless specks at the edge of the car, two human lives, tossed about by all the currents of heaven, far above the rivers that may drown them, the precipices where they may be dashed to pieces, and the Prussian armies, which must look from that height like immense overrunning ant-heaps on the surface of the earth . . . A light powdery line became visible under the balloon. I heard the sound of scattered sand among the branches, and the vision was lost among the clouds. [Picture: Man looking up] * * * * * [Picture: A roadside cross] _December_ 9_th_. What am I doing here? I am really becoming ashamed of my useless life . . . I had to bake some bread to-day, and could not summon up courage to do it. All the little details in which I used to take pleasure, like those egotists in disguise—recluses and hermits—I now find despicable. I am completely cured, only an occasional pain on very cold days. My duty is on the ramparts with the others . . . But how can I manage to rejoin them? It appears that the investment is very close, and the sentinels are placed within rifle-shot of each other. If I had only a companion, some countryman who knows the roads well. My thoughts fly to Goudeloup. I ought not to have allowed him to leave me. Who knows where he may be now? Perhaps strung up to some roadside cross, or dead from cold at the bottom of a quarry. However, the other evening, towards the Meillottes, I heard a cry—nothing but a cry, but a terrible cry, long and despairing, like a wail; and it flashed across me, “Goudeloup is there!” . . . Ah, yes! that man is a murderer; but at any rate he acts; he satisfies brutally the thirst for vengeance and justice which is in him. As for me, I warm myself and sleep. Which of us two is the most contemptible? [Picture: Body in the snow] * * * * *