Every age had left on them its imprint; a bit of architecture with which was bound up the remembrance of some terrible event, some bloody adventure.

Such was the chateau in which science had taken refuge--a place seemingly designed to be the theatre of mysteries, terror, and death.
Having explained so far, I cannot refrain from making one further reflection.

If I have lingered a little over this description of the Glandier, it is not because I have reached the right moment for creating the necessary atmosphere for the unfolding of the tragedy before the eyes of the reader.

Indeed, in all this matter, my first care will be to be as simple as is possible.

I have no ambition to be an author.