oken by the timid lapping of the water in the sedge, or the
rustling of swift lizards across the heated sand, while the Bernese
snow giants line a distant horizon with mysterious solitary shapes, it
is easy to know what solace life in such a scene might bring to a man
distracted by pain of body and pain and weariness of soul. Rousseau
has commemorated his too short sojourn here in the most perfect of all
his compositions.[169]

"I found my existence so charming, and led a life so
agreeable to my humour, that I resolved here to end my days.
My only source of disquiet was whether I should be allowed
to carry my project out. In the midst of the presentiments
that disturbed me, I would fain have had them make a
perpetual prison of my refuge, to confine me in it for all
the rest of my life. I longed for them to cut off all chance
and all hope of leaving it; to forbid me holding any
communication with the mainland, so that, knowing nothing
of what was going on in the world, I might have forgotten
the world's existence, and people might have forgotten mine
too. They only suffered me to pass two months in the island,
but I could have passed two years, two centuries, and all
eternity, without a moment's weariness, though I had not,
with my companion, any other society than that of the
steward, his wife, and their servants. They were in truth
honest souls and nothing more, but that was just what I
wanted.... Carried thither in a violent hurry, alone and
without a thing, I afterwards sent for my housekeeper, my
books, and my scanty possessions, of which I had the delight
of unpacking nothing, leaving my boxes and chests just as
they had come, and dwelling in the house where I counted on
ending my days, exactly as if it were an inn whence I must
needs set forth on the morrow. All things went so well, just
as they were, that to think of ordering them better were to
spoil them. One of my greatest joys was to leave my books
safely fastened up in their boxes, and to be without even a
case for writing. When any luckless letter forced me to take
up a pen for an answer, I grumblingly borrowed the steward's
inkstand, and hurried to give it back to him with all the
haste I could, in the vain hope that I should never have
need of the loan any more. Instead of meddling with those