"I must have already seen this place. I was here several times…... This fields, this valley, this horizon – I recognize them!"
The narrator recalls his past life. About thirty years ago, he was at this place that seemed new, but his memories are still apparent despite the current changes. The narrator can see the fields, valleys, and the horizon, which refresh his memories. Having countryside trips is one way in which the narrator is recollecting his past life. The memoir is full of past experiences and the activities that the narrator undertook when he was young.
I knew him at the University of ----- when he was studying theology there; he was guillotined on the Place de la Greve, and his family was destroyed by the revolution, it must be forty years ago now…not one of theme survived …... How strange!"
The narrator's father utters this statement after getting an old dusty paper detailing his family's information from the first generations. The narrator's father remembers giving that manuscript about his family to a young man that he cannot remember at this moment. The document contains the family traditions and other aspects that are critical to the family. The script dates back 40 years ago when the father met a young man at the University, which he cannot remember its name.
“Do you not remember? We were together in the castle. But they are terrible memories! Let us not recall them.”
This statement is quoted from the castle lady when she is conversing with the narrator about their past. After the old blind man gives the narrator a bloody handkerchief to deliver it to the lady of the castle, the narrator finds himself seated with her. The two are alone, and the lady of the castle reminds the narrator of their past. She says that they once sat there together three hundred years ago. However, this is ironic to the narrator because he does not remember living for over three hundred years. When the narrator refuses that he does not remember anything about the past, the castle's lady tells him that he will remember everything after he dies.
