stand him."

Then he woke her up, and I took out a pocket-book and said: "Here is
what you asked me for this morning, my dear cousin." But she was so
surprised, that I did not venture to persist; nevertheless, I tried to
recall the circumstance to her, but she denied it vigorously, thought
that I was making fun of her, and in the end, very nearly lost her
temper.

There! I have just come back, and I have not been able to eat any
lunch, for this experiment has altogether upset me.

July 19. Many people to whom I have told the adventure have laughed at
me. I no longer know what to think. The wise man says: Perhaps?

July 21. I dined at Bougival, and then I spent the evening at a
boatmen's ball. Decidedly everything depends on place and surroundings.
It would be the height of folly to believe in the supernatural on the
Ile de la Grenouilliere.[1] But on the top of Mont Saint-Michel or in
India, we are terribly under the influence of our surroundings. I shall
return home next week.

July 30. I came back to my own house yesterday. Everything is going on
well.

August 2. Nothing fresh; it is splendid weather, and I spend my days in
watching the Seine flow past.

August 4. Quarrels among my servants. They declare that the glasses are
broken in the cupboards at night. The footman accuses the cook, she
accuses the needlewoman, and the latter accuses the other two. Who is
the culprit? It would take a clever person to tell.

August 6. This time, I am not mad. I have seen--I have seen--I have
seen!--I can doubt no longer--I have seen it!

I was walking at two o'clock among my rose-trees, in the full
sunlight--in the walk bordered by autumn roses which are beginning to
fall. As I stopped to look at a Geant de Bataille, which had three
splendid blooms, I distinctly saw the stalk of one of the roses bend
close to me, as if an invisible hand had bent it, and then break, as if
that hand had picked it! Then the flower raised itself, following the
curve which a hand would have described in carrying it toward a mouth,
and remained suspended in the transparent air, alone and motionless, a
terrible red spot, three yards from my eyes. In desperation I rushed at
it to take it! I found nothing; it had disappeared. Then I was seized
with furious rage against myself, for it is not wholesome for a
reasonable and serious man to have such hallucinations.

But was it a hallucination? I turned to look for the stalk, and I found
it immedia