I do not
wish to grow old, to outlive my illusions. Only a short respite from
cares and sorrow, a brief time of flowers, and music, and love, and
laughter, and ecstatic tears, and intense emotion. I can so well
understand the slave in the glorious "_Un nuit de Cleopatre_," who
resolved a life-time into twelve hours, and having no more left to
desire, drank death as calmly as it were a draught of wine.
_January_, 9, 18--.
"Elsie, my poor little sister, is ill. Only a childish ailment, but I
have not written for three days, and she has lain, feeble and languid,
in my arms, and I have told her stories. We have moved again, and here,
thank God! the furniture, and the carpets and the paper do not swear at
each other so violently. I say, thank God! with due reverence. I am
truly and devoutly grateful for the release from that sense of unrest
caused by the twisted red and green arabesques on the floor. Here all is
sombre. The walls are a dull shade, the carpet neutral, the furniture
the faded brocatelle dedicate to boarding-houses; but it is not so bad.
The golden light lies along the floor, and is reflected on my 'Birth of
Venus' on the wall. Above my desk is a small shelf of my best-loved
books,--loved now; perhaps I shall destroy them next year, having
absorbed all their nutriment, even as now, 'I burn all I used to
worship.
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