MS-WU-MSS008-3-49

[1353] with loathing. [1354] Homo mensura can't do without staffage. [1355] There I am then
in my turn alone, in the doorway. [1356] I could not hope for anyone to come
and stand beside me, and yet I did not ^exclude that possibⁱlity. [1357] That's
a fairly good caricature of my state of mind at that instant. [1358] Net result,
I stayed where I was.

[1359] I had stolen from Lousse a little silver, ah
nothing much, massive teaspoons for the most part, and other tiny objects
whose utility I did not grasp but which seemed as if they ought to be
worth something. [1360] Among these latter there was one which haunts me still,
from time to time.

[1361] It consisted of two crosses joined, at their points
of intersection, by a bar, and resembled a tiny sawing-horse, with this
difference however, that the crosses of the true sawing-horse are not
perfect crosses, but truncated at the to^p, whereas the crosses of the
little object I am referring to were perfect, that is to say composed each

[1361] of two identical V's, one upper with its opening above, like all V's for
that matter, and the other lower with its opening below, or more precisely
of four rigorously identical V's, the two I have just named and then
two more, one on the right hand, the other on the left, having their
openings on the right and the left respectively.

[1362] But perhaps it is out
of place to speak here of right and left, of upper and lower. [1363] For this
little object did not seem to have any base properly so-called, but
stood with equal stability on any one of its four bases, and without
any change of appearance, which is not true of the sawing-horse.

[1364] This
strange instrument I think I still have somewhere, for I could never
bring myself to sell it, even in my worst need, for I could never
understand what on earth it could be for, nor even contrive the faintest
hypothesis on the subject. [1365] And from time to time I took it from my
pocket and gazed upon it, with an astonished and affectionate gaze,
if I had not been incapable of affection. [1366] But for a certain time I
think it inspired me with a kind of veⁿeration, for there was no doubt