CHAPTER XXX

29_th_ _May_.

MY DEAR COLVIN,—Still grinding at Chap. XI. I began many days ago on p. 93, and am still on p. 93, which is exhilarating, but the thing takes shape all the same and should make a pretty lively chapter for an end of it. For XII. is only a footnote _ad explicandum_.

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_June the_ 1_st_.

Back on p. 93. I was on 100 yesterday, but read it over and condemned it.

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10 _a.m._

I have worked up again to 97, but how? The deuce fly away with literature, for the basest sport in creation. But it’s got to come straight! and if possible, so that I may finish _D. Balfour_ in time for the same mail. What a getting upstairs! This is Flaubert outdone. Belle, Graham, and Lloyd leave to-day on a malaga down the coast; to be absent a week or so: this leaves Fanny, me, and —, who seems a nice, kindly fellow.

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_June_ 2_nd_.

I am nearly dead with dyspepsia, over-smoking, and unremunerative overwork. Last night, I went to bed by seven; woke up again about ten for a minute to find myself light-headed and altogether off my legs; went to sleep again, and woke this morning fairly fit. I have crippled on to p. 101, but I haven’t read it yet, so do not boast. What kills me is the frame of mind of one of the characters; I cannot get it through. Of course that does not interfere with my total inability to write; so that yesterday I was a living half-hour upon a single clause and have a gallery of variants that would surprise you. And this sort of trouble (which I cannot avoid) unfortunately produces nothing when done but alembication and the far-fetched. Well, read it with mercy!

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8 _a.m._

Going to bed. Have read it, and believe the chapter practically done at last. But lord! it has been a business.

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_July_ 3_rd_, 8.15.

The draft is finished, the end of