Prudence is giving her New Year’s presents with those I have received.
There is a thaw, and the doctor says that I may go out in a few days if the fine weather continues.
January 8.
I went out yesterday in my carriage. The weather was lovely. The Champs-Elysées was full of people. It was like the first smile of spring. Everything about me had a festal air. I never knew before that a ray of sunshine could contain so much joy, sweetness, and consolation.
I met almost all the people I knew, all happy, all absorbed in their pleasures. How many happy people don’t even know that they are happy! Olympe passed me in an elegant carriage that M. de N. has given her. She tried to insult me by her look. She little knows how far I am from such things now. A nice fellow, whom I have known for a long time, asked me if I would have supper with him and one of his friends, who, he said, was very anxious to make my acquaintance. I smiled sadly and gave him my hand, burning with fever. I never saw such an astonished countenance.
I came in at four, and had quite an appetite for my dinner. Going out has done me good. If I were only going to get well! How the sight of the life and happiness of others gives a desire of life to those who, only the night before, in the solitude of their soul and in the shadow of their sick-room, only wanted to die soon!
January 10.
The hope of getting better was only a dream. I am back in bed again, covered with plasters which burn me. If I were to offer the body that people paid so dear for once, how much would they give, I wonder, to-day?
We must have done something very wicked before we were born, or else we must be going to be very happy indeed when we are dead, for God to let this life have all the tortures of expiation and all the sorrows of an ordeal.
January 12.