Some days after this visit of a 'spirit' to Farmer Mabeuf, one morning,—it was on a Monday, the day when Marius borrowed the hundred-sou piece from Courfeyrac for Thénardier—Marius had put this coin in his pocket, and before carrying it to the clerk’s office, he had gone 'to take a little stroll,' in the hope that this would make him work on his return.
It was always thus, however.
As soon as he rose, he seated himself before a book and a sheet of paper in order to scribble some translation; his task at that epoch consisted in turning into French a celebrated quarrel between Germans, the Gans and Savigny controversy; he took Savigny, he took Gans, read four lines, tried to write one, could not, saw a star between him and his paper, and rose from his chair, saying: 'I shall go out.
That will put me in spirits. ' And off he went to the Lark’s meadow. There he beheld more than ever the star, and less than ever Savigny and Gans.
He returned home, tried to take up his work again, and did not succeed; there was no means of re-knotting a single one of the threads which were broken in his brain; then he said to himself: 'I will not go out to-morrow. It prevents my working.
' And he went out every day. He lived in the Lark’s meadow more than in Courfeyrac’s lodgings. That was his real address: Boulevard de la Santé, at the seventh tree from the Rue Croulebarbe.
That morning he had quitted the seventh tree and had seated himself on the parapet of the River des Gobelins. A cheerful sunlight penetrated the freshly unfolded and luminous leaves. He was dreaming of 'Her. ' And his meditation turning to a reproach, fell back upon himself;