FROM THE FRENCH OF SAINT-GENEST.
It is near midnight. I am alone in my cell, awaiting the mysterious guide who brought me hither, and who will return to call me for the office of Matins.
I listen to every sound, seeking to understand its language. During the first hour I still heard steps from time to time in the distance; then I half opened my door and looked outside. At the end of the cloister a white figure appeared, carrying a small light in its hand. It approached at a slow pace, stopped near a pillar, and disappeared under the arches.
Sometimes I have seen other shadows pass along, and have heard a few low-spoken words, … bells which answered each other; then, little by little, everything is extinguished and silent.… There is not another sound, another breath; … but still I listen, and cannot cease to listen.
Is it indeed myself who am in this monastery? Was I, only to-day, yet in the midst of the living? Can one single day comprise so many things? This which is just ending has been so full, so strange, that I cannot well recount all that has happened in it.
And yet it was but this morning that I was at Aix, in the midst of light and noise and gayety.… The children were gambolling around me! All at once some one said: “Suppose we go to the Grande Chartreuse!” It was said just as one would say anything else. We set out, as if for an ordinary excursion, a party of pleasure. Mme. B—— had provisions in readiness, which were increased by the additions of other members of the party, and we start in the midst of lively speeches and merriment.
So long as we proceed along the valley this is all very well. The road rises and descends, running through the vineyards, skirting the rocks, while the warm breath of the south gently moves the surrounding verdure. Then, after piercing the flank of the mountain, it slopes down toward the plains of Dauphine, discovering a horizon all bathed in light.
It is after passing Saint Laurent, at the foot of the Desert, and in perceiving the entrance of the gorge, that one begins to understand something more; … it is then that jesting is silenced and gayety grows grave.
Then, on arriving at the Guiers-Mort, we become altogether dumb. Already we had ceased to laugh; we now ceased to speak, but regarded with a sort of stupefaction this road without issue, which seemed to end in chaos. The mountains rose defiantly before us, overlapping and mingling with each other, and here and there barring the way with huge masses of precipitous rock; the gigantic trees seem to rise to the clouds, and torrents from unknown heights fall as if from heaven, while the rocks crowd upon, before, around, and seem to say, “No farther shall you go.” As we come to a turn, it seems as if all progress were indeed at an end; two immense blocks fallen across each other completely close the horizon.… We approach them, however, and it opens again, the rocks forming a sort of Titanic vaulted roof overhead, and falling again in the form of three bridges, one above the other, the horses continuing to climb a road which the eye cannot take in.
And whilst one is lost in these abysses, what a perfect dream of splendor begins to break overhead! Meadows of the most exquisite green seem as if suspended far above us, silvery rocks jutting out from among their black firs, gigantic oaks grasping the heights of the precipices, their crowns of verdure glittering in the wind.… It is a fantastic apparition. One has visions in one’s childhood of unknown regions, of enchanted forests guarded by genii, but one never thought to contemplate these marvels in reality.