His intellectual and physical faculties, his imagination, his senses seek to resume their old power.  If the forces with which he is endowed, if the abundant grasp of his mind are paralyzed in their motion, these forces weigh on him like a useless burden.  Soon in consequence of the internal contest he has undergone, the constant desires he has given vent to, from the very exuberance of life, which finding no outlet, recoils on itself, he becomes a victim of the demon of satiety.  To escape from its rude grasp, air and space are required.  The victim must be borne from the narrow circle within which he is riveted as by a chain, which clasps his frame.  He must shake from himself every chimera, and to enable him to forget himself, the aspect of strange lands, of scenes and pictures which one after the other exhibit themselves before him, all that forcibly attracts the attention, all that occupies the mind in a new land, material cares, unexpected incidents, the surprises of travel, and yet more the magical influence of nature, are required to restore tone to the sick soul.

Ireneus had really experienced the effect of this moral remedy.  In his journey across Germany and the North, he had not recovered his early impetus, his natural ardor, but he at least felt himself master of himself.  He reached his uncle’s house in the happiest possible disposition of mind.

When he arose on the next day, he took occasion to remark the delicate Precaution taken to render his sojourn pleasant as possible.  The furniture of maple or birch was plain, but wonderfully neat; the bed linen was of snowy whiteness and purity; and perfumed by aromatic plants with which in the drawers it had been strewed.  Here and there were a few choice engravings, and on the floor was a carpet woven by his two cousins.

At the very dawn of day a servant came to open the earthen stove, which stood on the hearth like a vast column, and placed in it an armfull of the pitch pine, which sent out jets of flame and a perfume which filled the whole room.  Double windows protected this room also against the severity of the weather.  Between them was a bed of flocks of wool on which the young girls had placed artificial flowers, as if to preserve in the nudity of winter the smiling image of spring.  Here windows looked out on a landscape which in the summer time must have presented a charming aspect.  The house of M. Vermondans stood on a hill, on the brow of which was a breast of pines.  In front of the principal facade was a garden with a proclivity toward the lake, which was surrounded and sheltered by a belt of trees.  In the distance the peasants’ houses were seen, the tall clock spire of Aland, and far in the distance the chimneys of the furnace belonging to M. de Vermondans.  At this moment, the plain, the snow-covered woods, the frozen lake presented one uniform color.  Any one, however, might see they would present beautiful landscapes, when the sun called forth the field-flowers, made the forests lifeful, and gilded the water.