After that long fever, the very name of which has a sinister¹ sound, I recall the delight I felt when they allowed me to go out into the air, when I was permitted to go down into our beloved yard. The day chosen for my first airing was a radiantly beautiful and clear morning in April. Seated under the bower² of jasmine and honeysuckle I felt as if I were experiencing the enchantment³ of paradise, of another Eden. Everything was budding and blossoming; without my knowledge, during the time that I was confined to my bed, this wonderful drama of the spring had enacted⁴ itself upon the earth. I had not often seen this wonderful and magical renewal⁵ which has delighted man through all the ages, and to which only the very aged⁶ seem indifferent; it ravished me and I allowed my joy to take possession of me almost to the point of intoxication⁷.—Oh! that pure, warm, soft air; the glorious sunlight and the tender, fresh green of the young plants and the budding trees that already cast a little shade. And in myself there was an unwonted strength that bespoke⁸ recovery, and I rejoiced mightily⁹ when I breathed in the sweet air and felt the flood of new life.  
My brother was a tall fellow of twenty-one who had the freedom of the house and grounds in which to work out any of his fancies. During my convalescence¹⁰ I entertained myself greatly speculating about something he was busy with in the garden, which something I was dying of impatience¹¹ to see. At the end of the yard, in a lovely nook under an old plum tree, my brother was making a tiny lake; he had dug it out and cemented it like a cistern¹², and from the country round about he procured¹³ stones and quantities of moss¹⁴ with which to make the banks about the lake romantic looking; he also constructed rocky elevations¹⁵ and grottoes out of stones and mosses¹⁷.
 
And this work was finished the day that I went out for the first time; they had even put little gold fish into the water, and they turned on the tiny fountain and it played in my honor.
 
I approached it with ecstasy¹⁸, and I found that it greatly surpassed in beauty anything that my imagination had been able to conjure¹⁹ up. And when my brother told me it was mine, I felt a joy so intense that it seemed to me it must last forever. Oh! what unexpected joy to possess it for my very own! And what happiness to know that I could enjoy it every single day during the warm and beautiful months that were to come. And the thought of being able to live out of doors again, the prospect²⁰ of playing in every nook of that lovely garden, as I had done the previous summer, was rapture²¹ to me.
 
I remained at the edge of the pond a long time, looking at it and admiring it unceasingly, and I breathed in the sweet, mild spring air, and warmed myself in the radiant sunlight so long denied to me. The old plum tree above my head, planted so long ago by one of my ancestors, and now almost at the end of its usefulness, spread its lacy curtain of new leaves to the tender blue of the sky, and the tiny fountain in its shade continued its tuneful melody as if it were a little hurdy-gurdy celebrating my return to health.
 
To-day that old plum tree is dead and its trunk the only thing left of it, and spared out of respect, is covered, like a ruin, with ivy²² vines.
 
But the pond, with its grottoes and islets, still remains²³ intact; time has given it the appearance of genuine nature herself. Its greenish stones look old and decayed; the mosses, the delicate little plants brought from the river, and the rushes and wild iris²⁴ have acclimated²⁵ themselves, and dragon flies that stray through the town take refuge there—a bit of wild nature has established itself in that little corner and I hope it will never be disturbed.
 
I am more loyally attached to that spot than to any other, although I have loved many places; in no other one have I found so much peace; there I feel tranquil²⁶, there I refresh myself and acquire youth and new life. That little corner is my sacred Mecca, so much indeed is it to me that should any one destroy it I would feel as if some vital thing in my life had lost balance, would feel that I had missed my............