gnac resigned the
position of War Minister and was succeeded by Zurlinden; Du Paty de Clam
was turned out of the army; Esterhazy, who had likewise been 'retired,'
fled from France, Mme. Dreyfus addressed to the Minister of Justice a
formal application for the revision of her unfortunate husband's case;
and that application was in the first instance referred to a Commission
of judges and functionaries. Then General Zurlinden resigned his
Ministerial office, and again becoming Governor of Paris, apprehended the
gallant Picquart on a ridiculous charge of forgery, and cast him into
close confinement in a military prison. There was talk, too, of a
military plot in Paris, and again and again were attempts made to prevent
the granting of Revision.

Throughout those days of alternate hope and fear M. Zola suffered keenly.
It was, too, about this time that he heard of the death of his favourite
dog--an incident to which I have previously referred as coming like a
blow of fate in the midst of all his anxiety.

When he rallied he spoke to me of his desire to familiarise himself in
some degree with the English language, with the object principally of
arriving at a more accurate understanding of the telegrams from Paris
which he found in the London newspapers. A dictionary, a conversation
manual, and an English grammar for French students were then obtained;
and whenever he felt that he needed a little relaxation, he took up one
or another of these books and read them, as he put it to me, 'from a
philosophical point of view.'

Later I procured him a set of Messrs. Nelson's 'Royal Readers' for
children, when he greatly praised, declaring them to be much superior to
the similar class of work current in France. Afterwards he himself
purchased a prettily illustrated edition of the classic 'Vicar of
Wakefield' (the work to which all French young ladies are put when
learning our language), but he found portions difficult to understand,
and a French friend then procured him an edition in which the text is
printed in French and English on alternate pages.

One day when he had been dipping into English papers and books he tackled
me on rather a curious point. 'Why is it,' said he, 'that the Englishman
when he writes of himself should invariably use a capital letter? That
tall "I" which recurs so often in a personal narrative strikes me as
being very arrogant. A Frenchman, referring to himself, writes _je_ with
a small _j_; a German, thou