- Alas, Bacle's not as interesting to Rousseau as Mme de Warens. Remember her? She's the pretty lady who's sponsoring Rousseau.
- Mme de Warens welcomes Rousseau back to her house. The guy is over the moon with happiness.
- As the Mme de Warens and Rousseau get—ahem—reacquainted, they give each other nicknames.
- Mme de Warens is "Mama" and Rousseau is "Little One." Rousseau is nineteen (no comment).
- Rousseau begins to imagine their lives together. He's definitely getting attached.
- He gets some reading done during this time period, too. The Spectator is of particular interest to this literary teenager.
- A friend of Mme de Warens's, M. d'Aubonne, basically runs Rousseau through a mock job interview.
- Rousseau flunks the test. M. d'Aubonne thinks he's not a total idiot, but he's not smart enough to do anything worthwhile.
- Rousseau admits that he has a tough time developing ideas. It takes a long time for him to develop anything worthwhile while he's writing. (Rousseau, we feel you.)
- He's also more awkward than the Silicon Valley guys when trying to make conversation.
- Mme de Warens has a plan. She thinks Rousseau should study at seminary with a priest named M. Gros.
- Rousseau doesn't have the best time at seminary, especially because he hates his Latin teacher.
- Luckily, M. Gros puts Rousseau in the care of a much nicer teacher—a guy named M. Gatier.
- Even though Rousseau likes Gatier, he doesn't make much progress in Latin. It's a tough subject.
- Rousseau recounts that, after he left seminary, Gatier got himself into quite a scandal. Rousseau's old teacher got a girl pregnant and was imprisoned for breaking his vows.
- One dramatic day, the building next to Mme de Warens's house catches on fire.
- Her house nearly goes up in flames, but the wind blows the fire in the other direction. Phew!
- Years later, Rousseau writes an account of a priest praying for the wind to blow the fire in the opposite direction. In Rousseau's eyes, the event is a miracle.
- Mme de Warens loves to throw weekly musical parties. Rousseau meets a choirmaster named M. le Maitre at one of these parties and moves to his house for the winter.
- One chilly evening in February, M. le Maitre invites in a poor musician in raggedy clothes. The guy's name is M. Venture.
- M. Venture sings beautifully for the company, moving Rousseau deeply. After this, M. Venture and Rousseau start a bromance. Venture's a bit of a rake (a hellion, nogoodnik, or otherwise morally loose dude), but Rousseau admires him nonetheless.
- Mme de Warens decides Venture's too much of a bad influence. She sends Rousseau to Lyons as M. Maitre's travel buddy.
- While in Lyons, M. Maitre is overtaken by a fit.
- Rousseau rushes for help while his friend lies in the street, foaming at the mouth.
- Rousseau misses "Mama" (Mme de Warens) too much. He heads back to Annecy to see her again.
- Too bad she's taken off for Paris. Rousseau never figures out the secret reason for her journey.
- M. d'Aubonne guesses that she wanted to secure a place at the French court.