« The sun is setting down behind the mountain and the wind is getting up. I know the wind of the forests in Alaska. It smells of boxtrees, of firtrees, of wild flowers. We can hear it, we can follow it, we can understand it. We know it is the wind and that it can only be the wind.
Nobody wonder or ask what it is. Here it begins in the mountains. First it is a murmuring that fills the silence. In the middle of the night this silence gives way to another silence, the real one. The wind comes towards us. It comes, it slowly comes. The forest is already dark grey. It only remains a clear ribbon, it is the road. The dark grey gradually gains on the pearl grey of the snow. It is very near us, nearly on us, but nothing stirs. A pennant on a neighbouring house begins to live. The wind is here. It is on us. My dog, Folko, smells it, it lifts its nose. From far away it brings new perfumes of snow and without doubt very good news. Soon, everything calms down again. The forest becomes black, the snow grey, the mountains colourless. It is night. A pack of wolves goes slowly past the hut. The chief calls out to us, « today, he says, I am happy, simply happy. I am free and happy, but happy to be with real friends. Nothing is worse than the proximity of Men. The worse are those who take themselves seriously … »
Under the trembling candlelight I have just written