18th.--... _The Newcomes_ is done. The end, though a disappointment to me as construction, is, for pathos and delineation of the “human ’art,” beyond anything he has yet done. No end of kerchiefs might be wetted over it; but I read it dry, being used to misery in its actual state. But the _dénouement_ disappointed me, I own. Thackeray seems to have got them into a mess, and either to lack the skill or the courage to get them out of it. In my humble opinion, Ethel should have died just as Clive would have been enabled to marry her; after which he should have taken to art _seriatim_,[135] and have achieved a position, and so have learned the value of suffering. Clive should have wept her, and then turned serious and virtuous, and married some one just to take care of boy; or his wife should not have died, and they should at length have loved each other, and been happy in the end. This would have been far more moral, more probable, and more satisfactory to me. But he is the great word-artist of now.--I long to hear about Sveaborg; but oh how hard is the fate of these poor Russians! and what a horrid thing it is for fleets at a distance to destroy a town without the loss of a man! How cowardly, one might say. 19th.--To work about twelve, at the man’s head till seven--the woman is now quite right. 20th.--Breakfast in bed--lazy.--To work about one till half-past seven, at the woman’s hand, from Emma and baby and my own hand--Emma holding it in the back yard. Nothing but rain, wind, and sun, alternately. In despair brought it into front parlour. No good done to-day at all. 21st.--The same as yesterday, only from feeling--no good at all. 22nd.--The same again to-day, out in the yard, Emma holding my hand; and my mouth and moustache in glass. No good. 23rd.--To work by two till seven, at filling up places where the oval of the frame has been enlarged; then at the sea again, and if anything spoiled it.--The picture looks worth half as much money again now that the sight of the frame is made larger.... 27th.--To work by ten--worked at the man’s head, made it disgustingly bad; left off about four--quite ill. Shall not work to-morrow,--have been at it too close. Head bad.