The chamber was an octagon, with five windows in as many of the faces, a fireplace and two doors occupying the other three. One of the doors--that by which I entered,--opened from the stairs; the other led into a granary, or something of that nature,--at least, so I conjectured, from a heap of sacks which littered the floor, and filled one corner completely. As I could not discover any corn, I resolved on sharing my loaf with my horse,--a meal every campaigning steed is well accustomed to make. And now, returning to my little chamber, I resumed my supper with all the satisfaction of one who felt he had made his rounds of duty, and might enjoy repose. As I knew the Château de Holitsch, where the Emperor Francis held his quarters, was some six leagues distant, I guessed that General Savary was not likely to return from his mission before morning at very soonest; and so it behooved me to make my arrangements for passing the night where I was. Having, then, looked to my horse, for whose bedding I made free with some dozen of the corn-sacks in the granary, I brought up to my own quarters a supply of wood; and having fastened the door, and secured the windows as well as I was able, I lit my meerschaum, and lay down before the fire in as happy a frame of mind as need be. Indeed, I began to fancy that fortune had done tormenting, and was now about to treat me more kindly. The notice of the Emperor had relieved my heart of a load which never ceased to press on it, and I could not help feeling that a fairer prospect was opening before me. It is true, time and misfortune had both blunted the ardor of enthusiasm with which I started in life; the daring aspirations after liberty, the high-souled desire for personal distinction, had subsided into calmer hopes and less ambitious yearnings. Young as I yet was, I experienced in myself that change of sentiment and feeling which comes upon other men later on in life; and I was gradually reconciling myself to that sense of duty which teaches a man well to play his part, in whatever station he may be called to act, rather than indulge in those overweening wishes for pre-eminence, which in their accomplishment are so often disappointing, and in their failure a source of regret and unhappiness. These feelings were impressed on me more by the force of events than by any process of my own reasoning. The career in which I first started as a boy had led to nothing but misfortune. The affection I conceived for one,--the only one I ever loved,--was destined equally to end unhappily. The passion for liberty, in which all my first aspirations were centred, had met the rude shocks which my own convictions suggested; and now I perceived that I must begin life anew, endeavoring to forget the influences whose shadows darkened my early days, and carve out my destiny in a very different path from what I once intended.