CHAPTER XII.
DAILY, as I continued my attendance at the seminary of Mdlle. Reuter,did I find fresh occasions to compare the ideal with the real. Whathad I known of female character previously to my arrival at Brussels?Precious little. And what was my notion of it? Something vague, slight,gauzy, glittering; now when I came in contact with it I found it to bea palpable substance enough; very hard too sometimes, and often heavy;there was metal in it, both lead and iron.
Let the idealists, the dreamers about earthly angel and human flowers,just look here while I open my portfolio and show them a sketch ortwo, pencilled after nature. I took these sketches in the second-classschoolroom of Mdlle. Reuter's establishment, where about a hundredspecimens of the genus "jeune fille" collected together offered afertile variety of subject. A miscellaneous assortment they were,differing both in caste and country; as I sat on my estrade and glancedover the long range of desks, I had under my eye French, English,Belgians, Austrians, and Prussians. The majority belonged to the classbourgeois; but there were many countesses, there were the daughters oftwo generals and of several colonels, captains, and government EMPLOYES;these ladies sat side by side with young females destined to bedemoiselles de magasins, and with some Flamandes, genuine aborigines ofthe country. In dress all were nearly similar, and in manners there wassmall difference; exceptions there were to the general rule, but themajority gave the tone to the establishment, and that tone was rough,boisterous, masked by a point-blank disregard of all forbearance towardseach other or their teachers; an eager pursuit by each individual of herown interest and convenience; and a coarse indifference to the interestand convenience of every one else. Most of them could lie with audacitywhen it appeared advantageous to do so. All understood the art ofspeaking fair when a point was to be gained, and could with consummateskill and at a moment's notice turn the cold shoulder the instantcivility ceased to be profitable. Very little open quarrelling ever tookplace amongst them; but backbiting and talebearing were universal. Closefriendships were forbidden by the rules of the school, and no one girlseemed to cultivate more regard for another than was just necessary tosecure a companion when solitude would have been irksome. They were eachand all supposed to have been reared in utter unconsciousness of vice.The precautions used to keep them ignorant, if not innocent, wereinnumerable. How was it, then, that scarcely one of those girls havingattained the age of fourteen could look a man in the face with modestyand propriety? An air of bold, impudent flirtation, or a loose, sillyleer, was sure to answer the most ordinary glance from a masculine eye.I know nothing of the arcana of the Roman Catholic religion, and Iam not a bigot in matters of theology, but I suspect the root of thisprecocious impurity, so obvious, so general in Popish countries, is tobe found in the discipline, if not the doctrines of the Church of Rome.I record what I have seen: these girls belonged to what are called therespectable ranks of society; they had all been carefully brought up,yet was the mass of them mentally depraved. So much for the generalview: now for one or two selected specimens.
The first picture is a full length of Aurelia Koslow, a German fraulein,or rather a half-breed between German and Russian. She is eighteen yearsof age, and has been sent to Brussels to finish her education she isof middle size, stiffly made, body long, legs short, bust much developedbut not compactly moulded, waist disproportionately compressed by aninhumanly braced corset, dress carefully arranged, large feet torturedinto small bottines, head small, hair smoothed, braided, oiled, andgummed to perfection very low forehead, very diminutive and vindictivegrey eyes, somewhat Tartar features, rather flat nose, rather high-cheekbones, yet the ensemble not positively ugly; tolerably good complexion.So much for person. As to mind, deplorably ignorant and ill-informed:incapable of writing or speaking correctly even German, her nativetongue, a dunce in French, and her attempts at learning English a merefarce, yet she has been at school twelve years; but as she invariablygets her exercises, of every description, done by a fellow pupil, andreads her lessons off a book concealed in her lap, it is not wonderfulthat her progress has been so snail-like. I do not know what Aurelia'sdaily habits of life are, because I have not the opportunity ofobserving her at all times; but from what I see of the state of herdesk, books, and papers, I should say she is slovenly and even dirty;her outward dress, as I have said, is well attended to, but in passingbehind her bench, I have remarked that her neck is gray for want ofwashing, and her hair, so glossy with gum and grease, is not such asone feels tempted to pass the hand over, much less to run the fingersthrough. Aurelia's conduct in class, at least when I am present, issomething extraordinary, considered as an index of girlish innocence.The moment I enter the room, she nudges her next neighbour and indulgesin a half-suppressed laugh. As I take my seat on the estrade, shefixes her eye on me; she seems resolved to attract, and, if possible,monopolize my notice: to this end she launches at me all sorts of looks,languishing, provoking, leering, laughing. As I am found quite proofagainst this sort of artillery--for we scorn what, unasked, is lavishlyoffered--she has recourse to the expedient of making noises; sometimesshe sighs, sometimes groans, sometimes utters inarticulate sounds, forwhich language has no name. If, in walking up the schoolroom, I passnear her, she puts out her foot that it may touch mine; if I do nothappen to observe the manoeuvre, and my boot comes in contact with herbrodequin, she affects to fall into convulsions of suppressed laughter;if I notice the snare and avoid it, she expresses her mortification insullen muttering, where I hear myself abused in bad French, pronouncedwith an intolerable Low German accent.
Not far from Mdlle. Koslow sits another young lady by name AdeleDronsart: this is a Belgian, rather low of stature, in form heavy,with broad waist, short neck and limbs, good red and white complexion,features well chiselled and regular, well-cut eyes of a clear browncolour, light brown hair, good teeth, age not much above fifteen, but asfull-grown as a stout young Englishwoman of twenty. This portrait givesthe idea of a somewhat dumpy but good-looking damsel, does it not? Well,when I looked along the row of young heads, my eye generally stopped atthis of Adele's; her gaze was ever waiting for mine, and it frequentlysucceeded in arresting it. She was an unnatural-looking being--so young,fresh, blooming, yet so Gorgon-like. Suspicion, sullen ill-temper wereon her forehead, vicious propensities in her eye, envy and panther-likedeceit about her mouth. In general she sat very still; her massive shapelooked as if it could not bend much, nor did her large head--so broadat the base, so narrow towards the top--seem made to turn readily on hershort neck. She had but two varieties of expression the prevalent onea forbidding, dissatisfied scowl, varied sometimes by a most perniciousand perfidious smile. She was shunned by her fellow-pupils, for, bad asmany of them were, few were as bad as she.
Aurelia and Adele were in the first division of the second class; thesecond division was headed by a pensionnaire named Juanna Trista. Thisgirl was of mixed Belgian and Spanish origin; her Flemish mother wasdead, her Catalonian father was a merchant residing in the ---- Isles,where Juanna had been born and whence she was sent to Europe to beeducated. I wonder that any one, looking at that girl's head andcountenance, would have received her under their roof. She had preciselythe same shape of skull as Pope Alexander the Sixth; her organsof benevolence, veneration, conscientiousness, adhesiveness, weresingularly small, those of self-esteem, firmness, destructiveness,combativeness, preposterously large; her head sloped up in the penthouseshape, was contracted about the forehead, and prominent behind; shehad rather good, though large and marked features; her temperament wasfibrous and bilious, her complexion pale and dark, hair and eyes black,form angular and rigid but proportionate, age fifteen.
Juanna was not very thin, but she had a gaunt visage, and her "regard"was fierce and hungry; narrow as was her brow, it presented space enoughfor the legible graving of two words, Mutiny and Hate; in some one ofher other lineaments I think the eye--cowardice had also its distinctcipher. Mdlle. Trista thought fit to trouble my first lessons with acoarse work-day sort of turbulence; she made noises wi
th her mouth likea horse, she ejected her saliva, she uttered brutal expressions; behindand below her were seated a band of very vulgar, inferior-lookingFlamandes, including two or three examples of that deformity of personand imbecility of intellect whose frequency in the Low Countries wouldseem to furnish proof that the climate is such as to induce degeneracyof the human mind and body; these, I soon found, were completely underher influence, and with their aid she got up and sustained a swinishtumult, which I was constrained at last to quell by ordering her and twoof her tools to rise from their seats, and, having kept them standingfive minutes, turning them bodily out of the schoolroom: the accomplicesinto a large place adjoining called the grands salle; the principalinto a cabinet, of which I closed the door and pocketed the key. Thisjudgment I executed in the presence of Mdlle. Reuter, who looked muchaghast at beholding so decided a proceeding--the most severe that hadever been ventured on in her establishment. Her look of affright Ianswered with one of composure, and finally with a smile, which perhapsflattered, and certainly soothed her. Juanna Trista remained in Europelong enough to repay, by malevolence and ingratitude, all who had everdone her a good turn; and she then went to join her father in the----Isles, exulting in the thought that she should there have slaves, whom,as she said, she could kick and strike at will.
These three pictures are from the life. I possess others, as marked andas little agreeable, but I will spare my reader the exhibition of them.
Doubtless it will be thought that I ought now, by way of contrast, toshow something charming; some gentle virgin head, circled with a halo,some sweet personification of innocence, clasping the dove of peace toher bosom. No: I saw nothing of the sort, and therefore cannot portrayit. The pupil in the school possessing the happiest disposition wasa young girl from the country, Louise Path; she was sufficientlybenevolent and obliging, but not well taught nor well mannered;moreover, the plague-spot of dissimulation was in her also; honour andprinciple were unknown to her, she had scarcely heard their names. Theleast exceptionable pupil was the poor little Sylvie I have mentionedonce before. Sylvie was gentle in manners, intelligent in mind; she waseven sincere, as far as her religion would permit her to be so, but herphysical organization was defective; weak health stunted her growth andchilled her spirits, and then, destined as she was for the cloister,her whole soul was warped to a conventual bias, and in the tame, trainedsubjection of her manner, one read that she had already prepared herselffor her future course of life, by giving up her independence of thoughtand action into the hands of some despotic confessor. She permittedherself no original opinion, no preference of companion or employment;in everything she was guided by another. With a pale, passive, automatonair, she went about all day long doing what she was bid; never what sheliked, or what, from innate conviction, she thought it right to do. Thepoor little future religieuse had been early taught to make the dictatesof her own reason and conscience quite subordinate to the will ofher spiritual director. She was the model pupil of Mdlle. Reuter'sestablishment; pale, blighted image, where life lingered feebly, butwhence the soul had been conjured by Romish wizard-craft!
A few English pupils there were in this school, and these might bedivided into two classes. 1st. The continental English--the daughterschiefly of broken adventurers, whom debt or dishonour had driven fromtheir own country. These poor girls had never known the advantagesof settled homes, decorous example, or honest Protestant educationresident a few months now in one Catholic school, now in another, astheir parents wandered from land to land--from France to Germany, fromGermany to Belgium--they had picked up some scanty instruction, many badhabits, losing every notion even of the first elements of religion andmorals, and acquiring an imbecile indifference to every sentiment thatcan elevate humanity; they were distinguishable by an habitual lookof sullen dejection, the result of crushed self-respect and constantbrowbeating from their Popish fellow-pupils, who hated them as English,and scorned them as heretics.
The second class were British English. Of these I did not encounter halfa dozen during the whole time of my attendance at the seminary; theircharacteristics were clean but careless dress, ill-arranged hair(compared with the tight and trim foreigners), erect carriage, flexiblefigures, white and taper hands, features more irregular, but also moreintellectual than those of the Belgians, grave and modest countenances,a general air of native propriety and decency; by this last circumstancealone I could at a glance distinguish the daughter of Albion andnursling of Protestantism from the foster-child of Rome, the PROTEGEEof Jesuistry: proud, too, was the aspect of these British girls; at onceenvied and ridiculed by their continental associates, they warded offinsult with austere civility, and met hate with mute disdain; theyeschewed company-keeping, and in the midst of numbers seemed to dwellisolated.
The teachers presiding over this mixed multitude were three in number,all French--their names Mdlles. Zephyrine, Pelagie, and Suzette; the twolast were commonplace personages enough; their look was ordinary,their manner was ordinary, their temper was ordinary, their thoughts,feelings, and views were all ordinary--were I to write a chapter on thesubject I could not elucidate it further. Zephyrine was somewhat moredistinguished in appearance and deportment than Pelagie and Suzette,but in character genuine Parisian coquette, perfidious, mercenary, anddry-hearted. A fourth maitresse I sometimes saw who seemed to come dailyto teach needlework, or netting, or lace-mending, or some such flimsyart; but of her I never had more than a passing glimpse, as she sat inthe CARRE, with her frames and some dozen of the elder pupils about her,consequently I had no opportunity of studying her character, or even ofobserving her person much; the latter, I remarked, had a very Englishair for a maitresse, otherwise it was not striking; of character Ishould think she possessed but little, as her pupils seemed constantly"en revolte" against her authority. She did not reside in the house; hername, I think, was Mdlle. Henri.
Amidst this assemblage of all that was insignificant and defective, muchthat was vicious and repulsive (by that last epithet many would havedescribed the two or three stiff, silent, decently behaved, ill-dressedBritish girls), the sensible, sagacious, affable directress shone like asteady star over a marsh full of Jack-o'-lanthorns; profoundly awareof her superiority, she derived an inward bliss from that consciousnesswhich sustained her under all the care and responsibility inseparablefrom her position it kept her temper calm, her brow smooth, her mannertranquil. She liked--as who would not?--on entering the school-room,to feel that her sole presence sufficed to diffuse that order andquiet which all the remonstrances, and even commands, of her underlingsfrequently failed to enforce; she liked to stand in comparison, orrather--contrast, with those who surrounded her, and to know that inpersonal as well as mental advantages, she bore away the undisputedpalm of preference--(the three teachers were all plain.) Her pupils shemanaged with such indulgence and address, taking always on herself theoffice of recompenser and eulogist, and abandoning to her subalternsevery invidious task of blame and punishment, that they all regarded herwith deference, if not with affection her teachers did not love her,but they submitted because they were her inferiors in everything; thevarious masters who attended her school were each and all in some wayor other under her influence; over one she had acquired power by herskilful management of his bad temper; over another by little attentionsto his petty caprices; a third she had subdued by flattery; a fourth--atimid man--she kept in awe by a sort of austere decision of mien; me,she still watched, still tried by the most ingenious tests--she rovedround me, baffled, yet persevering; I believe she thought I was likea smooth and bare precipice, which offered neither jutting stone nortree-root, nor tuft of grass to aid the climber. Now she flatteredwith exquisite tact, now she moralized, now she tried how far I wasaccessible to mercenary motives, then she disported on the brink ofaffection--knowing that some men are won by weakness--anon, she talkedexcellent sense, aware that others have the folly to admire judgment.I found it at once pleasant and easy to evade all these efforts; it wassweet, when she thought me nearly won
, to turn round and to smile inher very eyes, half scornfully, and then to witness her scarcely veiled,though mute mortification. Still she persevered, and at last, I am boundto confess it, her finger, essaying, proving every atom of the casket,touched its secret spring, and for a moment the lid sprung open; shelaid her hand on the jewel within; whether she stole and broke it, orwhether the lid shut again with a snap on her fingers, read on, and youshall know.
It happened that I came one day to give a lesson when I was indisposed;I had a bad cold and a cough; two hours' incessant talking left me veryhoarse and tired; as I quitted the schoolroom, and was passing along thecorridor, I met Mdlle. Reuter; she remarked, with an anxious air, thatI looked very pale and tired. "Yes," I said, "I was fatigued;" and then,with increased interest, she rejoined, "You shall not go away till youhave had some refreshment." She persuaded me to step into the parlour,and was very kind and gentle while I stayed. The next day she was kinderstill; she came herself into the class to see that the windows wereclosed, and that there was no draught; she exhorted me with friendlyearnestness not to over-exert myself; when I went away, she gave meher hand unasked, and I could not but mark, by a respectful and gentlepressure, that I was sensible of the favour, and grateful for it. Mymodest demonstration kindled a little merry smile on her countenance;I thought her almost charming. During the remainder of the evening, mymind was full of impatience for the afternoon of the next day to arrive,that I might see her again.
I was not disappointed, for she sat in the class during the whole of mysubsequent lesson, and often looked at me almost with affection. At fouro'clock she accompanied me out of the schoolroom, asking with solicitudeafter my health, then scolding me sweetly because I spoke too loud andgave myself too much trouble; I stopped at the glass-door which led intothe garden, to hear her lecture to the end; the door was open, it was avery fine day, and while I listened to the soothing reprimand, I lookedat the sunshine and flowers, and felt very happy. The day-scholars beganto pour from the schoolrooms into the passage.
"Will you go into the garden a minute or two," asked she, "till they aregone?"
I descended the steps without answering, but I looked back as much as tosay--
"You will come with me?"
In another minute I and the directress were walking side by side downthe alley bordered with fruit-trees, whose white blossoms were then infull blow as well as their tender green leaves. The sky was blue, theair still, the May afternoon was full of brightness and fragrance.Released from the stifling class, surrounded with flowers and foliage,with a pleasing, smiling, affable woman at my side--how did I feel? Why,very enviably. It seemed as if the romantic visions my imagination hadsuggested of this garden, while it was yet hidden from me by the jealousboards, were more than realized; and, when a turn in the alley shut outthe view of the house, and some tall shrubs excluded M. Pelet'smansion, and screened us momentarily from the other houses, risingamphitheatre-like round this green spot, I gave my arm to Mdlle. Reuter,and led her to a garden-chair, nestled under some lilacs near. She satdown; I took my place at her side. She went on talking to me with thatease which communicates ease, and, as I listened, a revelation dawnedin my mind that I was on the brink of falling in love. The dinner-bellrang, both at her house and M. Pelet's; we were obliged to part; Idetained her a moment as she was moving away.
"I want something," said I.
"What?" asked Zoraide naively.
"Only a flower."
"Gather it then--or two, or twenty, if you like."
"No--one will do--but you must gather it, and give it to me."
"What a caprice!" she exclaimed, but she raised herself on her tip-toes,and, plucking a beautiful branch of lilac, offered it to me with grace.I took it, and went away, satisfied for the present, and hopeful for thefuture.
Certainly that May day was a lovely one, and it closed in moonlightnight of summer warmth and serenity. I remember this well; for, havingsat up late that evening, correcting devoirs, and feeling weary anda little oppressed with the closeness of my small room, I opened theoften-mentioned boarded window, whose boards, however, I had persuadedold Madame Pelet to have removed since I had filled the post ofprofessor in the pensionnat de demoiselles, as, from that time, itwas no longer "inconvenient" for me to overlook my own pupils at theirsports. I sat down in the window-seat, rested my arm on the sill,and leaned out: above me was the clear-obscure of a cloudlessnight sky--splendid moonlight subdued the tremulous sparkle of thestars--below lay the garden, varied with silvery lustre and deep shade,and all fresh with dew--a grateful perfume exhaled from the closedblossoms of the fruit-trees--not a leaf stirred, the night wasbreezeless. My window looked directly down upon a certain walk of Mdlle.Reuter's garden, called "l'allee defendue," so named because the pupilswere forbidden to enter it on account of its proximity to the boys'school. It was here that the lilacs and laburnums grew especially thick;this was the most sheltered nook in the enclosure, its shrubs screenedthe garden-chair where that afternoon I had sat with the youngdirectress. I need not say that my thoughts were chiefly with her asI leaned from the lattice, and let my eye roam, now over the walks andborders of the garden, now along the many-windowed front of the housewhich rose white beyond the masses of foliage. I wondered in what partof the building was situated her apartment; and a single light, shiningthrough the persiennes of one croisee, seemed to direct me to it.
"She watches late," thought I, "for it must be now near midnight. Sheis a fascinating little woman," I continued in voiceless soliloquy; "herimage forms a pleasant picture in memory; I know she is not what theworld calls pretty--no matter, there is harmony in her aspect, and Ilike it; her brown hair, her blue eye, the freshness of her cheek, thewhiteness of her neck, all suit my taste. Then I respect her talent;the idea of marrying a doll or a fool was always abhorrent to me: I knowthat a pretty doll, a fair fool, might do well enough for the honeymoonbut when passion cooled, how dreadful to find a lump of wax and woodlaid in my bosom, a half idiot clasped in my arms, and to remember thatI had made of this my equal--nay, my idol--to know that I must pass therest of my dreary life with a creature incapable of understanding whatI said, of appreciating what I thought, or of sympathizing with what Ifelt! "Now, Zoraide Reuter," thought I, "has tact, CARACTERE, judgment,discretion has she heart? What a good, simple little smile playedabout her lips when she gave me the branch of lilacs! I have thought hercrafty, dissembling, interested sometimes, it is true; but may not muchthat looks like cunning and dissimulation in her conduct be onlythe efforts made by a bland temper to traverse quietly perplexingdifficulties? And as to interest, she wishes to make her way in theworld, no doubt, and who can blame her? Even if she be truly deficientin sound principle, is it not rather her misfortune than her fault? Shehas been brought up a Catholic: had she been born an Englishwoman, andreared a Protestant, might she not have added straight integrity toall her other excellences? Supposing she were to marry an English andProtestant husband, would she not, rational, sensible as she is, quicklyacknowledge the superiority of right over expediency, honesty overpolicy? It would be worth a man's while to try the experiment; to-morrowI will renew my observations. She knows that I watch her: how calm sheis under scrutiny! it seems rather to gratify than annoy her." Here astrain of music stole in upon my monologue, and suspended it; it wasa bugle, very skilfully played, in the neighbourhood of the park, Ithought, or on the Place Royale. So sweet were the tones, so subduingtheir effect at that hour, in the midst of silence and under thequiet reign of moonlight, I ceased to think, that I might listen moreintently. The strain retreated, its sound waxed fainter and was soongone; my ear prepared to repose on the absolute hush of midnight oncemore. No. What murmur was that which, low, and yet near and approachingnearer, frustrated the expectation of total silence? It was some oneconversing--yes, evidently, an audible, though subdued voice spoke inthe garden immediately below me. Another answered; the first voice wasthat of a man, the second that of a woman; and a man and a woman I sawcoming slowly down the alley.
Their forms were at first in shade, Icould but discern a dusk outline of each, but a ray of moonlight metthem at the termination of the walk, when they were under my very nose,and revealed very plainly, very unequivocally, Mdlle. Zoraide Reuter,arm-in-arm, or hand-in-hand (I forget which) with my principal,confidant, and counsellor, M. Francois Pelet. And M. Pelet was saying--
"A quand donc le jour des noces, ma bien-aimee?"
And Mdlle. Reuter answered--
"Mais, Francois, tu sais bien qu'il me serait impossible de me marieravant les vacances."
"June, July, August, a whole quarter!" exclaimed the director. "How canI wait so long?--I who am ready, even now, to expire at your feet withimpatience!"
"Ah! if you die, the whole affair will be settled without any troubleabout notaries and contracts; I shall only have to order a slightmourning dress, which will be much sooner prepared than the nuptialtrousseau."
"Cruel Zoraide! you laugh at the distress of one who loves you sodevotedly as I do: my torment is your sport; you scruple not to stretchmy soul on the rack of jealousy; for, deny it as you will, I am certainyou have cast encouraging glances on that school-boy, Crimsworth; he haspresumed to fall in love, which he dared not have done unless you hadgiven him room to hope."
"What do you say, Francois? Do you say Crimsworth is in love with me?"
"Over head and ears."
"Has he told you so?"
"No--but I see it in his face: he blushes whenever your name ismentioned." A little laugh of exulting coquetry announced Mdlle.Reuter's gratification at this piece of intelligence (which was a lie,by-the-by--I had never been so far gone as that, after all). M. Peletproceeded to ask what she intended to do with me, intimating prettyplainly, and not very gallantly, that it was nonsense for her to thinkof taking such a "blanc-bec" as a husband, since she must be at leastten years older than I (was she then thirty-two? I should not havethought it). I heard her disclaim any intentions on the subject--thedirector, however, still pressed her to give a definite answer.
"Francois," said she, "you are jealous," and still she laughed; then, asif suddenly recollecting that this coquetry was not consistent with thecharacter for modest dignity she wished to establish, she proceeded,in a demure voice: "Truly, my dear Francois, I will not deny that thisyoung Englishman may have made some attempts to ingratiate himself withme; but, so far from giving him any encouragement, I have always treatedhim with as much reserve as it was possible to combine with civility;affianced as I am to you, I would give no man false hopes; believe me,dear friend." Still Pelet uttered murmurs of distrust--so I judged, atleast, from her reply.
"What folly! How could I prefer an unknown foreigner to you? Andthen--not to flatter your vanity--Crimsworth could not bear comparisonwith you either physically or mentally; he is not a handsome man at all;some may call him gentleman-like and intelligent-looking, but for mypart--"
The rest of the sentence was lost in the distance, as the pair, risingfrom the chair in which they had been seated, moved away. I waited theirreturn, but soon the opening and shutting of a door informed me thatthey had re-entered the house; I listened a little longer, all wasperfectly still; I listened more than an hour--at last I heard M. Peletcome in and ascend to his chamber. Glancing once more towards the longfront of the garden-house, I perceived that its solitary light wasat length extinguished; so, for a time, was my faith in love andfriendship. I went to bed, but something feverish and fiery had got intomy veins which prevented me from sleeping much that night.