I have told all of this in flashes, described the most important images and feelings, but I avoided so many other possible earthly events which happened in my life because they had nothing to do with this.

I was only concerned with my inner feelings and the powers which forced themselves upon me and which I could not withdraw from.

I only want to describe material things which are necessary to make it clear to you, so that you can follow my story.

Dear reader, I am only concerned with the effect of invisible powers and forces as a result of which I lived, worked and acted, as you will also meet and perhaps experience in life on earth.

Whatever the case, everyone experiences something, because you are on earth to experience something.

One person is aware of the influence, feels that guidance, another person is asleep and experiences other happenings.

Yet all these life problems have a deep meaning.

We will follow this path together.

I will now continue.

I was brought to another environment, as I already said, in order to be educated.

My educators had to teach me and many others.

One tried to make the many characteristics conscious, another taught us to use different weapons and many more things.

We went from one teacher to the other, but however much effort I made, I was not interested and I could not master any of this.

Months passed, but I learnt nothing.

I did not feel any love for all these things, it clashed with me.

My parents were asked for information since my educators thought that they could solve this mystery, but I understood that this message must be terrible for my parents.

A few years passed in this way.

I was about to turn fifteen but I felt older than twenty.

I saw through my educators and felt the meaning of their strict reprimands.

They did not come straight from them, but I felt a familiar force behind them, namely that of my parents.

It was my mother’s will which spoke through them.

My aversion towards everything and everyone which was influenced by my parents grew by the day, especially after every reprimand which they thought they had to give me.

My character began to develop, my aversion and hate became more severe and I became further and further removed from their surroundings.

Certain qualities became more conscious, but all my feelings were in rebellion, severely resisting the things concerned with my descent.

I could now clearly understand what I felt as fear in my childhood and which I had kept hidden, but which I did not understand, even if it remained impossible for me to be able to see the whole picture and to understand its meaning.

It now worked like a poison in me, showed itself as contempt and changed to hatred with every stab I was given.

All that provoking and ruling took me, as I already said, further and further away from home and from those who loved me.

In my thoughts I saw my ancestors passing by my spirit and I also hated them.

I could no longer be reached, rejected everyone and everything which was connected to them.

As a result of my sad demeanour I attracted few friends and continued to live in loneliness.

None of that did our relationship any good.

I receded deeper and deeper into myself.

The more strictly I was treated, the deeper I shut myself off, until they tried to do it with violence.

I also put those severe measures down to my parents.

Like others who had given themselves in complete love, I could just not learn.

I did not feel any love for this material, it repelled me, it was impossible for me to be any different, however much I wanted it.

However, I did not know what I really felt.

I was sent from one teacher to another, but all of them gave up on being able to teach me anything.

I was not good enough at anything, except if it concerned art, I was one of the best at that.

During my childhood I was interested in history, but now it was only art, namely the art of sculpture.

These qualities were attributed to a bad past.

It was a mystery to me where the academics got these ideas from.

However, my feelings for it appeared to be of a changeable nature.

Sometimes it was very profound within me, then other times I did not think about it for days and I was indifferent to everything.

People tried to divulge my true character, but they did not manage it.

The more kindly they approached me, the easier I was to reach.

However, they were all blind to this method of approach.

Instead of that they used methods of force, but I remained unshakeable.

My character could not be fathomed out, could not be felt, I myself could not be found, so they were faced with a mystery.

Only I knew the mystery, could have solved it for them, but I did not.

I did not wish for a moment the trust in happiness for my parents.

I was disgusted by everything, also by myself.

The more trouble people took to reach me, the deeper I sunk away into all that secrecy.

A thick layer of mist lay around my true personality.

I was unwilling and could not be handled.

I understood that my descent protected me, otherwise the knot would have shattered my body.

Then my parents came and conferred.

Again they thought of illness, but this was considered entirely ruled out.

I was put through the mill in different ways and questioned by academics.

Nothing helped.

I remained unrelenting, could not be reached nor changed.

I felt empty, could not think about anything.

I could feel and answer them, could answer them in one direction, and that was art, at that I could understand everything.

However, they did not go into that, because I had been born for other more useful things.

They wanted to make a ruler out of me, my origins and gender demanded this.

However, I could not be changed, although my parents had a different opinion and therefore other academics were consulted.

One of them felt for art and I remained with him for one and a half years and learned various necessities in order to complete my education.

When I was almost eighteen years of age I went back home.

My reception was as wretched as could be.

Neither of my parents allowed me to say a word to them.

They felt nothing for me and so I sought sanctuary within myself again.

Many things had changed.

My educators had been sent away, also Marianne’s parents.

They suspected all of them of having contributed to my fall and they were sacked.

They had treated my carer, whom I loved very much, in an inhuman way.

I heard all of this in the neighbourhood, because there were still people who gave me their trust.

My father’s old servant also gave me his trust, but I had to promise to keep everything secret since his end would come otherwise.

A servant who committed a betrayal would have to pay for this with his life.

We still had a torture chamber to fish their secrets out of them and since I understood this, I swore to him that not a hair on his old grey head would be touched because of me.

There was a terrible atmosphere at home, something would have to happen, but what?

I avoided my parents as much as possible.

I did not dare to appear for meals and was not invited to do so either.

I had no idea myself what I would do.

I did not have enough knowledge to take control and to introduce myself as heir and to present myself to all that other nobility, that would be a failure.

They would not survive that scandal.

I heard all of this from my father’s servant, he was my only connection.

Through him I learned how to act, if I wanted to save myself in this conflict.

They were capable of anything, there was a surplus of hirelings and tyrants.

However, in reality I recoiled from this, my body was too dear to me.

Was this cowardice on my part?

Was I not good for anything?

I started to ask myself questions, but did not get an answer to them.

I wandered around the neighbourhood for whole days, alone and abandoned and thought about the beautiful times which were gone.

The place where I played with Marianne was now my favourite spot.

Sometimes tears flowed down my cheeks and I felt the most unhappy person in the world.

Yet I was rich, possessed everything, but only what could mean earthly happiness.

However, to me such happiness was of no value, I despised and hated that happiness.

That hatred was strengthened the past few days, I started to see this as a curse.

Was there a curse upon me?

Why was I not as people wished me to be?

Where did that empty, incomprehensible feeling in me come from?

Why was I not like my ancestors, a real Dumonché?

Why was I different from them, from all those others who had borne this name before me?

Many questions arose in me, but not one was answered, so that I felt very sad.

When that sadness overcame me and I descended deep into myself, it appeared as if I was not alone.

Yet that thought only lasted a moment, others thoughts pushed it aside again.

The feelings of my parents followed me.

They pushed me forwards from early morning until late at night.

At night I dreamt and was delirious and could not get to sleep.

I felt restless and anxious and kept trying to get to the bottom of this mystery.

It concerned myself, I was convinced of that.

Weeks passed, but there was no result, on the contrary, a strained atmosphere reigned.

This could not continue in the long run, something would have to happen.

I therefore started to think about my future.

If I was to do my best and speak to my parents in order to reach an agreement?

However, then I fell back into my own world and was not able to think, because I was not normal.

But how did I get to know myself?

From where did those forces come to me?

How could I exploit them to change myself and be able to learn better?

A haze of secrecy lay around and in me.

I had to speak to them, I wanted to know what they now wished for me, then I would see further what I had to do.

I asked for a consultation, but they would not speak to me.

They refused to receive me for the second time.

I felt my hatred igniting in me again and this did not do our relationship any good.

Now I started to think again and tried to compare their situation to mine.

I started at the time of my birth.

I felt their love for me, their happiness, and for what they lived on earth.

I tried to work out their intentions, considered everything carefully, seen from their viewpoint.

Yet I rebelled.

They did not have the right, that was my conclusion, to withhold their parental love from me.

Since I did not possess any feelings, any will to rule, missed all those qualities which my ancestors possessed, did they have to treat me like this?

They should accept me as I was, but they thought it was unwillingness on my part.

One problem was clear to me and I would talk about this with them when they would let me.

Now I had to try and work out those other feelings which concerned myself.

However, I already stumbled with the first thought which arose in me.

Because why did I despise them and everything which was a part of their possessions?

Those feelings had already arisen in me at a young age.

They had not changed, on the contrary, they had strengthened.

Why?

For what purpose?

It marred my life and theirs.

It made me rebel as a child, it ate at their hearts and darkened their happiness.

I wanted rid of this, but could I put an end to it myself?

I thought about this incomprehensible thing for hours on end.

Yet my feelings of becoming different were suffocated, my will to act broken.

I felt that I could not come out above myself.

My powers and will were calculated to a certain degree, I could act and think, but to change my feelings, that was not possible, then my will weakened.

I continued to feel, think and love in one direction.

Yet I kept on trying to see their family and possessions from a different viewpoint, but I failed completely.

I felt like a stranger and yet I was walking on my own grounds.

This was our property, I had to feel happy here, but how did I now feel, and already in my childhood?

I resisted this feeling, wanted to become different, wanted to be happy and change myself completely, as a Dumonché should be.

My health left nothing to be desired.

I felt strong and powerful.

For days I remained in this condition.

Yet my despise returned, my hate for everything grew and I cursed the moment that I was born here.

I was not able to cope with that feeling, it was stronger than I was, it destroyed my will to become as they wanted me to be.

One morning, very unexpectedly, I was called for.

This was a surprise to me.

My reception was cool and reserved.

I found two academics with them, at least I felt that they were academics.

My father said the following to me: ‘We want a last test, make yourself available.’

I bowed my head and went towards them.

My mother gave me a piercing look, I did not feel the least bit of love for me in it.

I did not find either of them changed in any way.

To them I was an inferior subject, a problem, an individual who had destroyed their future, their happiness and trust.

I asked another higher power for forgiveness when I had felt wrong.

I myself felt in a strange situation and not in the least attracted to them.

When I soon established this, my good intentions, which I had felt towards them for the past few days, were beaten to a pulp.

My despise came back and my hatred killed my good intentions.

A wall stood between them and me and we were more removed from each other than before.

They were strangers, people without feeling or love.

The academics went into the room next door.

I had to lie down on a couch, but first get undressed.

My parents had followed us.

I did what was required of me and was very humble, an unfamiliar peace lay within me.

I was given something, after which I felt myself becoming dizzy.

That dizziness changed to tiredness and I felt sleep overcoming me, so that I knew nothing more about anything.

I awoke during the night.

I was aware that I had wakened and remembered what had happened to me.

Next to my bed I saw a shadow and that shadow was holding my hand.

I saw that it was a person, but shrouded in a haze.

I was aware of everything which I observed.

Then I fell asleep again and started to dream.

I dreamt that I was living in another town and that I was an artist.

Honour and fame lay at my feet.

I lived in a building and was working on a large statue which I idolised.

I felt a great love for the creation, because a great happiness flowed into me.

I could clearly recognise myself, but I had become much older.

I felt that I loved, but did not possess the object of that love.

Now I saw a person who radiated a greenish light, and that figure made me afraid, so that I shivered.

He was not well disposed towards me and appeared to be my enemy.

I also hated him and yet he remained near me.

He was a handsome young man, an Adonis.

We were expecting someone.

He would put me in connection with a person but I did not know who it would be.

Suddenly I felt a terrible hatred entering me, I jumped him completely unexpectedly and knocked him down.

I had killed and was a murderer.

At that same moment I awoke.

My forehead was dripping with the sweat of fear.

I knew what I had dreamed about, I remembered everything, but dismissed it and put it down to the new tests.

I was still so clearly aware of everything that scene after scene passed by my spirit without me wanting it.

Then I fell asleep again.

The sun had reached its highest point when I awoke again.

Next to my bed I saw the academics who had carried out these tests.

They asked how I felt.

I said that I felt wonderfully rested, but I also asked what their findings were.

‘We are satisfied’, they said.

I thanked them, but immediately thought of other rebellious things, because I felt that they were not allowed or did not want to tell me the truth.

I had to stay in bed for a few days, then I could move about freely.

Those days passed and nothing special happened.

The following day I was summoned to them.

I understood by this that these tests had turned out in my favour.

When I entered my parents asked me how I felt which greatly surprised me.

My mother’s stern face showed some amiability and I thought she was in a milder mood.

I answered them how I felt, further there was not a word spoken and they left.

I was left to myself again and wandered about the neighbourhood in order to build up new strength.

My father had gone hunting, my mother passed her time with other things.

How disgusted I was by both their lives.