four o’clock
With what pride , therefore , with what enjoyment did Astier-Réhu , during those hot August days , revise the fresh and trustworthy information displayed in his beloved pages , as a preparation for returning them to his publisher , with the heading on which , for the first time , appeared beneath his name the words ` Secretaire perpétuel de l'Académie Française . ' His eyes were not yet accustomed to the title , which dazzled him on each occasion , like the sun upon the white courtyard beneath his windows . It was the vast Second Court of the Institute , private and majestic , silent , but for sparrows or swallows passing rarely overhead , and consecrated by a bronze bust of Minerva with ten _ termini _ in a row against the back wall , over which rose the huge chimney of the adjoining Mint . Towards four o'clock , when the helmeted shadow of the bust was beginning to lengthen , the stiff mechanical step of old Jean Réhu woould be heard upon the flags . He lived over the Astiers , and went out regularly every day for a long walk , watched from a respectful distance by a servant , whose arm he persistently refused . Within the barrier of his increasing deafness his faculties , under the great heat of this summer , had begun to _ give _ way , and especially his memory , no longer effectually guided by the reminding pins upon the lappets of his coat . He mixed his stories , and lost himself , like old Livingstone in the marshes of Central Africa , among his recollections , where he scrambled and floundered till some one assisted him .