My hut, perched on the verge of the crater, at the very summit of the mountain, commanded a view of all the surrounding country. The rock upon which it was built projected over a precipice, whose abysses were concealed by creeping plants, cactus, and bamboos. The species of table-rock thus formed had been encircled with a railing and transformed into a terrace, on a level with the sleeping-room, by my predecessor in this hermitage. His last wish had been to be buried there; and from my bed I could see his white tombstone gleaming in the moonlight, a few steps from my window. Every evening I rolled my piano out upon the terrace, and there, facing the most incomparably beautiful landscape, all bathed in the soft and limpid atmosphere of the tropics, I poured forth on the instrument, and for myself alone, the thoughts with which that scene inspired me. And what a scene! Picture to yourself a gigantic amphitheatre hewn out of the mountains by an army of Titans: right and left, immense virgin forests, full of those subdued and distant harmonies which are, as it were, the voices of Silence; before me, a prospect of twenty leagues, marvellously enhanced by the extreme transparency of the air; above, the azure of the sky; beneath, the creviced sides of the mountain sweeping down to the plain; afar, the waving savannas; beyond them, a grayish speck (the distant city); and encompassing them all, the immensity of the ocean, closing the horizon with its deep blue line. Behind me was a rock on which a torrent of melted snow dashes its white foam, and there, diverted from its course, rushes with a mad leap and plunges headlong into the gulf that yawns beneath my window. Amid such scenes I composed "Réponds-moi la Marche des Gibaros," "Polonia," "Columbia," "Pastorella e Cavaliere," "Jeunesse," and many other unpublished works. I allowed my fingers to run over the keys, wrapped up in the contemplation of these wonders, while my poor friend, whom I heeded but little, revealed to me, with a childish loquacity, the lofty destiny he held in reserve for humanity. Can you conceive the contrast produced by this shattered intellect, expressing at random its disjointed thoughts, as a disordered clock strikes by chance any hour, and the majestic serenity of the scene around me? I felt it instinctively. My misanthropy gave way; I became indulgent towards myself and mankind, and the wounds of my heart closed once more. My despair was soothed, and soon the sun of the tropics, which tinges all things with gold, dreams as well as fruits, restored me with new confidence and vigor to my wanderings.