_September 14, morning_.--I have seen the portrait. The pale and green moon soared into my room. I had just awakened, and obscure and ophidian visions still haunted me. With feverish eyes I distrustfully gazed around me, while logical and absurd reasonings multiplied in my head, their fugacity leaving me with a doubt as to the precise place of my actual existence. Was I in the midst of the brambles and precipices of Roches-Noire? No. Was I in my room, and in my bed, far from the vipers and grimacing stones? Perhaps. See! above the mantlepiece the mirror slowly changes its tint: its lunar green, its green of transparent waters underneath beeches, brightens and grows golden. One would say that in the center of the glimmering, as on the moon's very face, shadows with human features project, while above the vague figure there winds a luminous undulation like loosened and floating blond hair. Without being able to analyze the rest of the sudden transformation, I see it, in the twinkling of an eye, completed. Clear and animate, the portrait gazes on me; it is, feature for feature, that of the woman with the reptile. For several moments, long and unforgettable moments, the vision grew resplendent, then it vanished, as though by a breath. _September 15, morning_.--I awoke at the same hour, but the mirror remained green and I did not see the portrait again. I think of nothing but this. All day yesterday, while Madame Sixtine Magne was with us, I looked at her; when she was no longer there, I evoked her. _September 15, evening_.--The countess quickly questioned me, while we were on the bank of the Orne: "By the way, did you see the portrait? No, for you would have said so. Besides, to see it one must now, it seems, be endowed with a certain mystery. It is a trick sometimes played upon easily troubled imaginations. There is a history. Monsieur de B----. tells it very well. Make him discuss this chapter after dinner." I could not find a word to answer. I have seen the portrait, but how proceed to boast of that privilege? The angling for crawfish continues; I am asked to take part in it. In a frame of leaves, under the silvered alders, the young woman, who henceforth has rights to interest me, seems passionately absorbed in a book whose pages she cuts with her finger. Monsieur de B----. could not remain for dinner and no one has spoken again of the portrait chamber. So much the better....