A period of increased mental distress and uncertainty followed upon the explosion. The town was grey and dirty, and the chill of winter lay over the land. There was no stability in his soul--he felt as if it had been dissolved, and hovered as a sensitive smoke around him. A forcible new impression pulled him together. One day he found his friend, the naturalist, painting as a recreation. This was something that would condense and support an evaporating ego. To paint green landscape in the midst of dull winter, and to hang it on one's wall--that was something worth doing! "Is it difficult to paint?" he asked. "No, it is easier than drawing. Try it," was the reply. August borrowed an easel, brushes and paint, locked his door and gave himself up to colour-worship. When he saw the blue colour give the effect of a clear sky he was enraptured, and when he conjured up green bushes and a lawn on the canvas, "he was inexpressibly happy--as if he had eaten hashish." One day, when he had locked himself in, he heard a conversation between his friends outside the door. They talked as if they were discussing someone who was ill. "Now he is painting too!" said one of the friends in a tone of deep depression. August reflected and came to the conclusion that he was going mad. Fearing compulsory incarceration, he wrote to the manager of a private asylum in which the patients were allowed their liberty and to till the soil. He expressed his willingness to submit to the curative principles of the institution. The reply was kind and reassuring. The manager had made inquiries about the would-be patient and found that there was no need for extreme steps. Three months, passed and the second instalment of the royal stipend was not paid. A letter of humble inquiry brought the reply that His Majesty had never meant to give permanent support to Strindberg, and that it was only a question of temporary help. A further sum was enclosed, as His Majesty had graciously decided to help his protégé once more. The first sense of relief was followed by some anxiety as to the consequences. The King's promise was no mistake. The real explanation of the "disgrace" was not easy to find. Some thought the King had forgotten; others that his proverbial generosity had exceeded his means. Ten years later Strindberg heard that he had been wrongfully accused of writing defamatory verses about the King. He decided to leave Upsala and to seek work in Stockholm as a journalist. At a valedictory gathering of the old friends he thanked them for their contributions to his self, "for a personality is not developed out of itself; out of each soul with which it comes in contact it sucks a drop, like the bee collecting its honey from millions of flowers, transforming it and passing it on as its own." [1] In his autobiography he uses his first Christian name: Johan, and speaks of himself in the third person. CHAPTER IV THE DRAMA OF THE HERETIC