When I saw the last curl of smoke from the Leonidas vanish behind the islands which the descriptions in Monte Cristo have made familiar to you, I was seized with a feeling of desolation and dejection, and felt as if I were an old fogy. I needed your presence, and thought how you would delight in this country which seems to me so dull. I would have you eat twenty different varieties of fruit that you have never tasted: for instance, yellow peaches, white and red melons, medlars, and ripe pistachio nuts. Moreover, you could spent an entire day in the Turkish bazaars and other curiosity shops, where there are many useless articles most fascinating to see and most disheartening to pay for.
I have asked myself often why you have never come to the south of France, and I can find no good reason. I am going to make a three days’ excursion through the mountains, with no companion, and without meeting with a French-speaking biped. I am not sure if, after all, this is not preferable to intercourse with the provincial townspeople, who seem every year to become more intolerable.
Here the mayor and the prefects have lost their heads over the proposed visit of the President. The prefectures are all being scraped and scrubbed, and eagles are set up in every spot where they can perch. There is no absurdity of which they do not think. What amusing people they are! In the midst of all this, I fear the proofs of Démétrius will be lost: I ought to correct them while I am away, and they have not yet arrived....
CLI
Moulins, September 27, 1852.
... I have been very ill, and am still suffering from languor, which is intensified from the fact that the remedy which brought me around, that is to say, the north wind, has given me a cold. It is excessively enervating, and with my sleepless nights and constant running about, it is not likely to mend. For forty-five hours I have had such a tendency to congestion of the brain that I thought I was soon to see the land of the shades. I was entirely alone, and treated myself, or rather I did not treat myself at all, being in a condition of physical and moral prostration which rendered extremely painful the least exertion. I felt, of course, some disquietude at the thought of going to an unknown world, but to make any resistance seemed to be still more disquieting. It is, I think, through such stolid resignation that one makes his exit from this world, not because illness gains the victory, but because one has become indifferent to everything, and makes no defence.
I am waiting here until a monsignore with whom I have business comes out of retreat. It is highly probable that I shall have to run around for two or three days to find him, after which I shall return to Paris. To-morrow will be my birthday, and I should like to spend it with you. It happens always that I am alone and horribly depressed on this day....
CLII
Carabanchel, September 11, 1853.
... Upon my arrival here I found every one occupied in preparations to celebrate the anniversary of the hostess. They were to play a comedy and to recite a Loa[15] in honour of herself and of her daughter. I was called upon to manufacture skies, mend decorations, design costumes, and so on, not to mention the rehearsals I conducted for five mythological divinities, only one of whom had ever taken part in private theatricals. My goddesses were very pretty yesterday, the eventful day, but they were dying with stage-fright; however, everything passed well. There was loud applause, although no one understood the absurd rigmarole of verses strung together by the poetic author of the Loa.