April 26.—­But not a finger did I lay on the jacket of Anne.  Looking for something, I fell in with the little drama, long missing, called the Doom of Devorgoil.  I believe it was out of mere contradiction that I sat down to read and correct it, merely because I would not be bound to do aught that seemed compulsory.  So I scribbled at a piece of nonsense till two o’clock, and then walked to the lake.  At night I flung helve after hatchet, and spent the evening in reading the Doom of Devorgoil to the girls, who seemed considerably interested.  Anne objects to the mingling the goblinry, which is comic, with the serious, which is tragic.  After all, I could greatly improve it, and it would not be a bad composition of that odd kind to some picnic receptacle of all things.

April 27.—­This day must not be wasted.  I breakfast with the Fergusons, and dine with the Brewsters.  But, by Heaven, I will finish Anne of Geierstein this day betwixt the two engagements.  I don’t know why nor wherefore, but I hate Anne, I mean Anne of Geierstein; the other two Annes are good girls.  Accordingly I well nigh accomplished my work, but about three o’clock my story fell into a slough, and in getting it out I lost my way, and was forced to postpone the conclusion till to-morrow.  Wrote a good day’s work notwithstanding.

April 28.—­I have slept upon my puzzle, and will now finish it, Jove bless my pia mater, as I see not further impediment before me.  The story will end, and shall end, because it must end, and so here goes.  After this doughty resolution, I went doggedly to work, and finished five leaves by the time when they should meet the coach.  But the misfortune of writing fast is that one cannot at the same time write concisely.  I wrote two pages more in the evening.  Stayed at home all day.  Indeed, the weather—­sleety, rainy, stormy—­forms no tempting prospect.  Bogie, too, who sees his flourish going to wreck, is looking as spiteful as an angry fiend towards the unpropitious heavens.  So I made a day of work of it,

    “And yet the end was not.”

April 29.—­This morning I finished and sent off three pages more, and still there is something to write; but I will take the broad axe to it, and have it ended before noon.

This has proved impossible, and the task lasted me till nine, when it was finished, tant bien que mal.  Now, will people say this expresses very little respect for the public?  In fact, I have very little respect for that dear publicum whom I am doomed to amuse, like Goody Trash in Bartholomew Fair, with rattles and gingerbread; and I should deal very uncandidly with those who may read my confessions were I to say I knew a public worth caring for or capable of distinguishing the nicer beauties of composition.  They weigh good and evil qualities by the pound.  Get a good name and you may write trash.  Get a bad one and you may write like Homer, without pleasing a single reader.  I am, perhaps, l’enfant gate de succes, but I am brought to the stake,[305] and must perforce stand the course.