The next day he awakened too late for making the descent to Brieg. The monks, learning of his voyage on foot, kept him for a day, and regaled him with the best they had. He declined to take the stage-coach, though his pride prevented him from revealing his reasons. He was making a journey of rest, distraction, almost of forgetfulness, he said. In his Thebaid, lost at an altitude of two thousand yards, he exhibited the gaiety of a child, interrupted from time to time, though rather rarely, by sudden fits of sadness. He ate like an ogre, took walks round the approaches of the hospice to stretch his stiffened legs, petted the long-coated, shaggy dogs in their kennels, admired the effects of the sunlight on the glaciers and the variety of the little snow crystals, expressed more than once his desire to stay a longer time in the mountains, and went to bed early. No one would have guessed that he had just left the most beloved of mistresses, and was going back to France to give himself up as a prisoner. In the midst of the greatest sorrows there are unexpected oases like these, to keep our feeble nature from dwelling upon the idea of sorrow, even if there were not that brute instinct of self-preservation to keep us up despite ourselves. Tuesday, at four in the morning, after having breakfasted on a little bread and cheese, which the father whose duty it was to look out for travellers had insisted upon his taking away from the table the evening before, he set out from the hospice. He saved half the food, and took it with him in case he should need it on his journey; for he was not sure that he should have more than the price of his ticket after the additional meal that he must take in the village of Simplon. No one was up yet in the hospice. He left as he had come, in secret. The door was wide open, as it had been on the night of his arrival. Outside he stepped into complete darkness, instead of the moonlight for whose friendly company he had hoped. He could feel snow even before he had descended the steps. He must make haste, for the descent would be less easy if it snowed. In the road he turned to take a farewell look at the dark building in the shadow. He stepped fearlessly forth now toward the future, and with more strength. The peace of the mountain, the quiet of the monks, had soothed his heart without his being conscious of it. He was going forth deliberately to recapture that place in his home which the accident of his great passion had lost for him. The stroke of luck to which he owed his safety had at the same time restored him to himself. He was going back to normal life as boldly and romantically as one usually leaves it, and he savoured his sacrifice with an almost amorous warmth of appreciation.