“Having had breakfast, he—by habit—went to the alley of Old Doves, and when it was just past noon, he entered house No. 31, where Nicholas Bricolet, the tailor, traded in antique furniture, was a book-seller, and in his spare time restored ancient shoes—i.e., a cobbler. As if driven by inspiration, the doctor immediately climbed up to the attic, thrust his hand into the third shelf of a cabinet from the time of ‘Louis XIII’ and pulled out a bulky manuscript on parchment, titled:
My Eighteen Reincarnations.
The Story of My Existences, Beginning with Year 184.
So-called the Christian Era.”