gn to adjourn for coffee
in the company of some of these new friends; but I was no sooner on the
side-walk than I found myself unaccountably alone. The circumstance
scarce surprised me at the time, much less now; but I was somewhat
chagrined a little after to find I had walked into a kiosque. I began
to wonder if I were any the worse for my last bottle, and decided to
steady myself with coffee and brandy. In the Cafe de la Source, where I
went for this restorative, the fountain was playing, and (what greatly
surprised me) the mill and the various mechanical figures on the rockery
appeared to have been freshly repaired, and performed the most
enchanting antics. The cafe was extraordinarily hot and bright, with
every detail of a conspicuous clearness--from the faces of the guests,
to the type of the newspapers on the tables--and the whole apartment
swang to and fro like a hammock, with an exhilarating motion. For some
while I was so extremely pleased with these particulars that I thought I
could never be weary of beholding them: then dropped of a sudden into a
causeless sadness; and then, with the same swiftness and spontaneity,
arrived at the conclusion that I was drunk and had better get to bed.

It was but a step or two to my hotel, where I got my lighted candle from
the porter, and mounted the four flights to my own room. Although I
could not deny that I was drunk, I was at the same time lucidly rational
and practical. I had but one pre-occupation--to be up in time on the
morrow for my work; and when I observed the clock on my chimney-piece to
have stopped, I decided to go downstairs again and give directions to
the porter. Leaving the candle burning and my door open, to be a guide
to me on my return, I set forth accordingly. The house was quite dark;
but as there were only the three doors on each landing, it was
impossible to wander, and I had nothing to do but descend the stairs
until I saw the glimmer of the porter's night-light. I counted four
flights: no porter. It was possible, of course, that I had reckoned
incorrectly; so I went down another and another, and another, still
counting as I went, until I had reached the preposterous figure of nine
flights. It was now quite clear that I had somehow passed the porter's
lodge without remarking it; indeed, I was, at the lowest figure, five
pairs of stairs below the street, and plunged in the very bowels of the
earth. That my hotel should thus be founded upon catacombs