"We shall see," I retorted, and began to play at ball with a coolness which confounded him. We returned to the college; the prefect took me to his room and ordered me to prepare for punishment. My exalted sentiments gave place to floods of tears. I represented to the Abbé Égault that he had taught me Latin; that I was his scholar, his disciple, his child; that he could not wish to dishonor his pupil and make the sight of my schoolfellows unbearable to me; that he could lock me up on bread and water, stop my recreations, set me impositions; that I would thank him for his clemency and love him the more for it. I fell upon my knees, I folded my hands, I besought him in the name of Jesus Christ to spare me; he remained deaf to my entreaties. I rose in a fit of fury, and aimed at his legs a kick so violent that he yelled. He limped to the door of his room, locked it, and came back to me. I entrenched myself behind the bed; he struck out at me across the bed with a cane. I rolled myself in the bed-clothes and, heated with the fray, exclaimed: _Macte animo, generose puer!_[113] This brattish erudition made my enemy laugh in spite of himself; he suggested an armistice: we concluded a treaty; I agreed to refer the matter to the arbitration of the principal. Without giving his award in my favour, the principal consented to cancel the punishment which I had refused to take. When the excellent priest pronounced his acquittal, I pressed my lips to the sleeve of his gown with so great a display of heartfelt gratitude that he could not refrain from giving me his blessing. Thus ended the first combat which restored to me the honour which has been the idol of my life and which has so often cost me my repose, my pleasure, and my fortune. [Sidenote: Holidays at Combourg.] The holidays in the course of which I entered upon my twelfth year were sad ones. The Abbé Leprince accompanied me to Combourg. I went out only with my tutor; we took long rambles together. He was dying of consumption, and was silent and melancholy; I myself was not much livelier. We walked for hours without saying a word. One day we lost our way in the woods; M. Leprince turned to me and asked: "Which way shall we go?" I answered without hesitation: "The sun is setting; it is now striking the window in the big tower; let us go that way." M. Leprince the same evening told the incident to my father: the future traveller showed himself in that decision. Many a time, when I saw the sun set in the forests of America, have I recalled the woods of Combourg: my memories are echoes one of the other.