It was night in the cabin. I was puzzled to imagine how our sleeping was to be arranged within the narrow limits. But that was soon managed. My blanket was spread for me on the ground, and I stretched myself on it, beside the innermost wall; I was at a loss, however, for something on which to rest my head. I looked at Angelo. "Divine and wise Angelo," I said, "give ear. I have never, I swear to you, been a Sybarite, yet am I accustomed to pillows. Could not your hospitality provide me with some such convenience?" Angelo pondered; then he handed me his zaïno or shepherd's bag of goatskin, and spoke the winged words—"Now sleep, and _felicissima notte_!" Gradually the others laid themselves down, wife and children, on the naked earth, leaning their heads on the wall. Angelo lay nearest the threshold; beside him the youngest child Maria; then Santa his wife, Lily-flower, Paola Maria, and myself. So we all lay peaceably together, our feet turned towards the fire. It was not long till they were all asleep, and I lay contemplating with satisfaction this happily slumbering family of Gymnosophists, and mused on the words of the wise Sancho, when he praised the inventor of sleep, "the mantle that covers all human care, the food that appeases hunger, the water that extinguishes thirst, the fire that warms the cold, the cold that alleviates the heat—in short, the universal money for which all things may be bought, the beam and scale that equalizes king and shepherd." The fire shed a red glow over the singular group. I lamented that I was not a painter. But the intolerable heat and smoke of the pitch-pine would not let me sleep. I rose from time to time and stepped over the sleepers into the free air. I may say this was stepping from hell into heaven—for I walked straight into a cloud that had descended on the hill, and enveloped the cabins.