I walked by the side of the water. The sun was
shining brightly on the river and made earth delightful, while it
filled me with love for life, for the swallows, whose swift agility is
always delightful in my eyes, for the plants by the riverside, whose
rustling is a pleasure to my ears.

By degrees, however, an inexplicable feeling of discomfort seized me.
It seemed to me as if some unknown force were numbing and stopping me,
were preventing me from going further and were calling me back. I felt
that painful wish to return which comes on you when you have left a
beloved invalid at home, and are seized by a presentiment that he is
worse.

I, therefore, returned despite of myself, feeling certain that I should
find some bad news awaiting me, a letter or a telegram. There was
nothing, however, and I was surprised and uneasy, more so than if I had
had another fantastic vision.

August 8. I spent a terrible evening, yesterday. He does not show
himself any more, but I feel that He is near me, watching me, looking
at me, penetrating me, dominating me, and more terrible to me when He
hides himself thus than if He were to manifest his constant and
invisible presence by supernatural phenomena. However, I slept.

August 9. Nothing, but I am afraid.

August 10. Nothing; but what will happen to-morrow?

August 11. Still nothing. I cannot stop at home with this fear hanging
over me and these thoughts in my mind; I shall go away.

August 12. Ten o'clock at night. All day long I have been trying to get
away, and have not been able. I contemplated a simple and easy act of
liberty, a carriage ride to Rouen--and I have not been able to do it.
What is the reason?

August 13. When one is attacked by certain maladies, the springs of our
physical being seem broken, our energies destroyed, our muscles
relaxed, our bones to be as soft as our flesh, and our blood as liquid
as water. I am experiencing the same in my moral being, in a strange
and distressing manner. I have no longer any strength, any courage, any
self-control, nor even any power to set my own will in motion. I have
no power left to WILL anything, but some one does it for me and I obey.

August 14. I am lost! Somebody possesses my soul and governs it!
Somebody orders all my acts, all my movements, all my thoughts. I am no
longer master of myself, nothing except an enslaved and terrified
spectator of the things which I do. I wish to go out; I cannot. HE does
not wish to;