After the storm the bird flies home to its nest, no matter how ragged and torn it may be.

It was the only refuge open to him, and in the midst of his despondency he felt a sort of sad pleasure at the thought of returning to his ancestral home--desolate and forlorn as it was--where it would have been better, perhaps, for him to have quietly remained--for his fortunes were not improved, and this last crowning disaster had been ruinous to all his hopes and prospects of happiness.
"Ah, well!" said he to himself, sorrowfully, as he jogged slowly on, "it was predestined that I should die of hunger and ennui within those crumbling walls, and under my poor, dilapidated, old roof, that lets the rain run through it like a huge sieve.

No one can escape his destiny, and I shall accomplish mine.

I am doomed to be the last de Sigognac." Then came visions of what might have been, that made the sad present seem even darker by contrast; and his burden was well-nigh too heavy for him to bear, when he remembered all Isabelle's goodness and loveliness--now lost to him forever.

No wonder that his eyes were often wet with tears, and that there was no brightness even in the sunshine for him.
It is needless to describe in detail a journey that lasted twenty days, and was not marked by any remarkable incidents or adventures.