When we returned I went to the wooden box to inspect our afternoon's work, and as I did so I inhaled the balsamic odor that had impregnated everything belonging to our theatre. For a long time after that, for a year or two, perhaps longer, the odor of the pine box containing the properties of the “Donkey's Skin” recalled vividly that May evening so filled with poignant sorrow, which was one of the most singular feelings of my childhood. Since I have come to man's estate I no longer suffer from anguish that has no known cause, doubly hard to endure because mysterious, I no longer feel as if my feet are treading unfathomable depths in search of a firm bottom. I no longer suffer without knowing why. No, such emotions belonged peculiarly to my childhood, and this book could properly bear the title (a dangerous one I well know): “A Journal of my extreme and inexplicable sorrows, and some of the boyish pranks by which I diverted my mind from them.” CHAPTER XXXVIII. It was about this time that I installed myself in my aunt Claire's room for the purpose of study, and there too I busied myself manufacturing wonders for the “Donkey's Skin.” I took possession of the place as entirely as an army occupies a conquered country--I would not admit the possibility of being in the way. My aunt Claire was the person who petted me most. And it was she who was always so careful of my little things. She always looked after my finery or anything uncommonly fragile, things that the least breath of air would have blown away--such exquisitely delicate trifles, for example, as the wings of a butterfly, or the bright scale of a beetle, intended for the costumes of our nymphs and fairies--when I said to her: “Will you please take care of this, dear auntie?” I felt that I could be easy about it, for I knew that no one would be allowed to touch it. One of the great attractions in her room was a bear that was used for holding burnt-almonds; and I often visited the place for the sole purpose of paying my respects to this animal. He was made of china and he sat upon his hind legs in the corner of the mantelpiece. According to a compact that I had with my aunt, every time that his head was turned to the side (and I found it so several times during a day) it meant that there was an almond or some other kind of candy for me. When I had eaten this I straightened his head to indicate that I had been there, and then I departed. Aunt Claire enjoyed helping us with the “Donkey's Skin”; she worked enthusiastically over the costumes and each day I gave her some task. She was especially skilful in devising hair for the fairies and nymphs; she managed to fix upon their tiny heads, about as big as the end of a little finger, blond wigs made of light silk thread, this thread she twined upon the finest wires and thus she was able to twist it into beautiful ringlets.