I go at it again. But I am nervous--these things get me into such a state that I simply can not do anything. It was not merely yesterday--I have it constantly. The dirty chambermaid singing, or yelling down to the landlady; the drunken man swearing at his wife; the boys screaming in the street and kicking a tomato-can about. When I think of how much beauty and power has been shattered in my life by such things as these, it brings tears of impotent rage into my eyes. I must be free--oh, I must be free! * * * * * It comes strangely from the author of The Captive, does it not? I give all my life to my work, and sometimes, when I am broken like this, I wonder if I do not give too much. Once I climbed to a dizzy height, and I cried out a dizzy truth: “O God, how as nothing in Thy sight are my writings!” I do not know if I shall ever reach that height again. * * * * * May 3d. I have not one single beautiful memory in my life. I have nothing in my life that, when I think of it, does not make me _writhe_. To all that I have lived, and known, and seen, I have but one word, one cry--Away! Away! Let me get away from it! Let me get away from cities, let me get away from men, let me out of my cage! Let me go with my God, let me forget it all--put it away forever and ever! Let me no longer have to plot and plan, to cringe and whimper, to barter my vision and my hours for bread! Who knows what I suffer--who has any idea of it? To have a soul like a burning fire, to be hungry and swift as the Autumn wind, to have a heart as hot as the wild bird's, and wings as eager--and to be chained here in this seething hell of selfishness, this orgy of folly. * * * * * Ah, and then I shut my hands together. No, I am not weak, I do not spend my time chafing thus! I have fought it out so far-- “I was ever a fighter, so one fight more!” I will go back, and I will hammer and hammer again--grimly--savagely--day by day. And out of the furnace of my soul I will forge a weapon that will set me free in the end--I think. * * * * * May 4th. I wrote a little poem once. I remembered two lines of it--a nature description; they were not great lines, but there flashed over me to-day an application of them that was a stroke of genius, I believe. I was passing the Stock Exchange. It was a very busy day. I climbed one of the pillars, in spirit, and wrote high above the portals: Where savage beasts through forest midnight roam, Seeking in sorrow for each other's joy. * * * * * May 5th. A dreadful thing is unbelief! A dreadful thing it is to be an infidel! --That is what all men cry nowadays--there is so much infidelity in the world--it is the curse of our modern society--it is everywhere--it is all-prevailing!