10 p.m.—As I write this I hear no sound but the deep murmur of the

distant traffic and the low sighing of the wind. The two sounds melt

into one another. Now and again a cat raises its shrill, uncanny cry

upon the darkness. The cats are always there under my windows when the

darkness falls. The wind is dropping into the funnel with a noise like

the sudden sweeping of immense distant wings. It is a dreary night. I

feel lost and forgotten.

Nov. 3—From my windows I can see arrivals. When anyone comes to

the door I can just see the hat and shoulders and the hand on the

bell. Only two fellows have been to see me since I came here two

months ago. Both of them I saw from the window before they came tip,

and heard their voices asking if I was in. Neither of them ever came

back.

I have finished the ponderous article. On reading it through,

however, I was dissatisfied with it, and drew my pencil through almost

every page. There were strange expressions and ideas in it.that 1 could

not explain, and viewed with amazement, not to say alarm. They did not

sound like my very own, and I could not remember having written them.

Can it be that my memory is beginning to be affected?p

My pens are never to be found. That stupid old woman puts them in a

different place each day. I must give her due credit for finding so

many new hiding places; such ingenuity is wonderful. I have told her

repeatedly, but she always says, “I’ll speak to Emily, sir.” Emily

always says, “I’ll tell Mrs. Monson, sir.” Their foolishness makes me

irritable and scatters all my thoughts. I should like to stick the

lost pens into them and turn them out, blind-eyed, to be scratched and

mauled by those thousand hungry cats. Whew! What a ghastly thought!

Where in the world did it come from? Such an idea is no more my own

than it is the policeman’s. Yet I felt I had to write it. It was like

a voice singing in my head, and my pen wouldn’t stop till the last

word was finished. What ridiculous nonsense! I must and will restrain

myself. I must take more regular exercise; my nerves and liver plague

me horribly.

Nov. 4.—I attended a curious lecture in the French quarter on

“Death”, but the room was so hot and I was so weary that I fell

asleep.