Some poison must have been
instilled into his veins; he could not recognize himself. But honor and
rectitude, clear-sightedness and trustfulness in life were fast
returning. Through the window, which had remained open, all the sounds of
the lovely spring night poured into the room. It was spring, the season
of love, and beneath the palpitating stars in the broad heavens, from
fields and forests and waters came the murmur of germinating life. And
never had Mathieu more fully realized that, whatever loss may result,
whatever difficulty may arise, whatever fate may be in store, all the
creative powers of the world, whether of the animal order, whether of the
order of the plants, for ever and ever wage life's great incessant battle
against death. Man alone, dissolute and diseased among all the other
denizens of the world, all the healthful forces of nature, seeks death
for death's sake, the annihilation of his species. Then Mathieu again
caught his wife in a close embrace, printing on her lips a long, ardent
kiss.
"Ah! dear heart, forgive me; I doubted both of us. It would be impossible
for either of us to sleep unless you forgive me.
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