Came across the following arresting sentence: “Pale, anaemic, cadaverous, bad teeth and disordered digestion and a morbid egotism.” Yes, but my teeth are not bad.
found myself taking tea in Kew Gardens. I enjoyed the wind in my face and hair. Otherwise there is nothing to be said—a colourless day.
On the N. Downs
Under the oak where I sat the ground was covered with dead leaves. I kicked them, and I beat them with my stick, because I was angry that they were dead. In the coppice, leaves were quietly and majestically floating earthwards in the pomp of death. It was very thrilling to observe them.
It was a curious sensation to realise that since the last time I sat under the old oak I had been right up to the N. of England, then right down to the S.W., and back once more to London town. I bragged about my kinetic activity to the stationary oak and I scoffed at the old hill for having to remain always in the same place.
It gave me a pleasing sense of infinite superiority to come back and see everything the same as before, to sit on the same old seat under the same old oak. Even that same old hurdle was lying in the same position among the bracken. How sorry I was for it! Poor wretch—unable to move—to go to Whitby, to go to C⸺, to be totally ignorant of the great country of London. …
Day dreamed. My own life as it unrolls day by day is a source of constant amazement, delight, and pain. I can think of no more interesting volume than a detailed, intimate, psychological history of my own life. I want a perfect comprehension at least of myself. …
We are all such egotists that a sorrow or hardship—provided it is great enough—flatters our self-importance. We feel that a calamity by overtaking us has distinguished us above our fellows. A man likes not to be ignored even by a railway accident. A man with a grievance is always happy.
Over to see E⸺. Came away disillusioned.
Met her in Smith’s book shop looking quite bewitching. Hang it all, I thought I had finished. Went home with her, watched her make a pudding in the kitchen, then we sat by the firelight in the drawing-room and had supper. Scrumptious (not the supper).
Quarrelled with D⸺! The atmosphere is changed at the flat—my character is ruined. D⸺ has told them I’m a loose fellow. I’ve always contrived to give him that impression—I liked to be cutting my throat—and now it’s cut!
D⸺ came and carried me off to the flat, where they asked why I hadn’t been over—which, of course, pleased me immensely.
Doctor M⸺ is very gloomy about my health and talks of S. Africa, Labrador, and so on. I’m not responding to his treatment as I should.
Met her this evening in Kensington Road. “I timed this well,” said she, “I thought I should meet you.” Good Heavens, I am getting embroiled. Returned to the flat with her and after supper called her “The Lady of Shalott.”
“I don’t think you know what you’re talking about”—this stiffly.
“Perhaps not,” I answered. “I leave it to you.”
“Oh! but it rests with you,” she said.
Am I in love? God knows—but I don’t suppose God cares.
On M⸺’s advice went to see a stomach specialist—Dr. Hawkins. As I got there a little too early walked up the street—Portland Place—on the opposite side (from shyness) past an interminable and nauseating series of night bells and brass plates, then down again on the right side till I got to No. 66 which made me flutter—for ten doors ahead I mused is the house I must call at. It made me shiver a little.
The specialist took copious notes of my evidence and after examining me retired to consult with M⸺. What a parade of ceremony! On coming back, the jury returned a verdict of “Not proven.” I was told I ought to go out and live on the prairies—and in two years I should be a giant! But where are the prairies? What bus? If I get worse, I must take several months’ leave. I think it will come to this.
Arthur came down for the weekend. He likes the Lady of Shalott. She is “not handsome, but arresting, striking” and “capable of tragedy.” That I believe she has achieved already. … If she were a bit more gloomy and a bit more beautiful, she’d be irresistible.
He: “Have a cigarette? I enjoy lighting your cigarettes.”
She: “I don’t know how to smoke properly.”
He: “You smoke only as you could.”
She: “How’s that?”
H.: “Gracefully, of course.”
S.: “Do you think I like pretty things being said to me?”
H.: “Why not, if they are true. Flattery is when you tell an ugly woman she is beautiful. Have you so poor an opinion of yourself to think all I say of you is flattery?”
S.: “Yes. I am only four bare walls—with nothing inside.”
H.: “What a deliciously empty feeling that must be. … But I don’t think you’re so simple as all that. You bewilder me sometimes.”
S.: “Why?”
H.: “I feel like Sindbad the Sailor.”
S.: “Why?”
H.: “Because I’m not George Meredith.” The title of “husband” frightens me.
It’s a fearful strain to go on endeavouring to live up to time with a carefully laid-out timetable of future achievements. I am hurrying on with my study of Italian in order to read the Life of Spallanzani in order to include him in my book—to be finished by the end of next year; I am also subsidising Jenkinson’s embryological lectures at University College with the more detailed account of practical and experimental work in his textbook; I have also started a
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