And finally we opened the little old gate, and traversed the first grassy courtyard which the shadowing trees, a century old, plunged into almost total darkness.
The house lay between this courtyard and a large uncultivated garden that extended to the edge of the oak forest.

As we entered the ancient dwelling, with its whitewashed walls and old-fashioned wainscoting, I always looked eagerly for my butterfly-net that was usually to be found hanging in the place where I had left it, ready for the next day's chase.
After dinner it was our custom to go to the foot of the garden, and there we sat in an arbor that was built against the old wall encircling the yard,--this bower faced away from the unfriendly darkness of the woods where the owls hooted.

And while we were seated in the beautiful, mild, star-bespangled night, suddenly upon the air, musical with the chirping of myriad crickets, there was heard the tolling of a bell,--heard very clearly by us although it came from afar off,--it was the church bell in the village announcing the evening service.
Oh! the vesper bell of Enchillais heard in that beautiful garden long ago! Oh! the sound of that bell, a little cracked but still silvery, like the once beautiful voices of very old people which still retain something of their sweetness.

What charm of past times, and half sad meditations of peaceful death, were awakened by that music which spread itself into the limpid darkness of the surrounding country! And we heard the bell chiming for a long time, but its sound reached us fitfully; one while it seemed to be near, and then again it seemed far away, as it obeyed the will of the soft night wind that was stirring.

I bethought me of all those who, on their lonely farms, were listening to it; I bethought me, too, of all the unpeopled places round about where it would be heard by no one, and a shudder passed through me at the thought of the near-by forest, where the sweet vibrations of the bell would die.
The municipal council, composed of very superior spirits, after having first put its everlasting tri-colored flag upon the steeple of the little Roman Catholic Church, then suppressed its vesper bell.