This time I am going to talk about myself, to tell you something that really happened to me. If you do not believe this you must not listen. I can only tell this story to children who are quite sure that I speak the truth.
I was between six and seven years old and still learning my letters at school. One fine Sunday afternoon in September I went with six of my schoolfellows into the Aulnes wood.
It was the nut season, and we knew there were a number of nut-trees in the wood.
After gathering nuts for some time on the edge of the wood, it happened that in going from tree to tree we gradually separated from each other. Before I became aware of it, I was deep in the wood. There I discovered a sort of hedge where the nuts grew so plentifully that I could hardly believe my eyes.
The spreading branches were weighed down with nuts in bunches of four, five, or even six ripe nuts in their yellow cups, hanging so temptingly.
At first I ate a good many and had a regular feast. I had never eaten such nuts! There were no bad ones and no empty shells. When I had eaten as many as I wanted, I filled my pockets. I then filled my cap and tied some up in my handkerchief. Just as I was thinking that I could put in a few more I noticed that it was very still and lonely in the wood.
High above my head the last rays of the sunset shone among the branches of the huge elms, oaks, and poplars. Here and there a bird chirped on its nest, and far away towards the sunset I heard the sound of wheels on the road.
I could not hear my companions, but no doubt they were within call, they could not be far off. I put my hands to my mouth and shouted: "Hallo! John! Peter! George!"
I called them all and shouted their names one after the other, shouting louder and louder in all directions. But only the echo answered me. When I shouted John, the echo mockingly replied "Ohn," and when I shouted George, it replied "Orge."
Suddenly my heart sank within me, the last rays of light disappeared above my head and with startling rapidity darkness fell among the trees and bushes. The darkness seemed to grow out of the ground. The birds were silent. A cold breeze shook the branches, and far, far away a little bell rang out the Angelus.
I recognized the bell, it was our village bell. I knew that the carriage I had heard was the post-cart which was returning from Ternath to Lennick.
It was in the direction of these two sounds that I had to find a road. I could not imagine how far I was from the edge of the wood, and it was imperative that I should reach the fields before darkness overtook me.
I started off with my cap full of nuts in one hand and my handkerchief full in the other.
After going a few steps, I shouted again, "John! Peter! but this time even the echo made no reply and my voice sounded so strangely in my ears that I did not recognize it.
I ran for about an hour and a half, when all at once I felt as though I was bound with ropes and I fell. I was held fast by the long tendrils of a blackberry-bush which I had not noticed in the gathering darkness.
