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CONCLUSION--THE FALL.
CHAPTER I.
I was coming back from my fourth exile--an exile in Belgium, a small
matter. It was one of the last days of September, 1871. I was
re-entering France by the Luxembourg frontier. I had fallen asleep in
the carriage. Suddenly the jolt of the train coming to a standstill
awoke me. I opened my eyes.
The train had stopped in the middle of a charming landscape.
I was in the half-consciousness of an interrupted sleep; and ideas, as
yet half-dreams, hazy and diffuse, hovered between myself and reality. I
experienced the undefinable and confused sensation of awakening.
A river flowed by the side of the railway, clear, around a bright and
verdant island. This vegetation was so thick that the moor-hens, on
reaching it, plunged beneath it and disappeared. The river wound through
a valley, which appeared like a huge garden. Apple-trees were there,
which reminded one of Eve, and willows, which made one think of Galatea.
It was, as I have said, in one of those equinoctial months when may be
felt the peculiar charm of a season drawing to a close. If it be winter
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