Here I pause to reflect a moment.  How is this thing possible?  Can I love to members of the Other Sex?  And if such is the Case, how can I go on with my Life?  Better far to end it now, than to perchance marry one, and find the other still in my heart.  The terrable thought has come to me that I am fickel.

Fickel or polygamus—­which?

Dear Dairy, I have not been a good girl.  My New Year’s Resolutions have gone to airey nothing.

The way they went was this:  I had settled down to a quiet evening, spent with his beloved picture which I had clipped from a newspaper.  (Adrian’s.  I had not as yet met the other.) And, as I sat in my chamber, I grew more and more desolate.  I love Life, although pessamistic at times.  And it seemed hard that I should be there, in exile, while my Sister, only 20 months older, was jumping at her chance below.

At last I decided to try on one of Sis’s frocks and see how I looked in it.  I though, if it looked all right, I might hang over the stairs and see what I then scornfully termed “His Nibs.”  Never again shall I so call him.

I got an evening gown from Sis’s closet, and it fitted me quite well, although tight at the waste for me, owing to Basket Ball.  It was also to low, so that when I had got it all hooked about four inches of my lingerie showed.  As it had been hard as anything to hook, I was obliged to take the scizzors and cut off the said lingerie.  The result was good, although very DECOLLTE.  I have no bones in my neck, or practicaly so.

And now came my moment of temptation.  How easy to put my hair up on my head, and then, by the servant’s staircase, make my way to the seen below!

I, however, considered that I looked pale, although Mature.  I looked at least nineteen.  So I went into Sis’s room, which was full of evening wraps but emty, and put on a touch of rouge.  With that and my eyebrows blackend, I would not have known myself, had I not been certain it was I and no other.

I then made my way down the Back Stairs.

Ah me, Dear Dairy, was that but a few hours ago?  Is it but a short time since Mr. Beresford was sitting at my feet, thinking me a debutante, and staring soulfully into my very heart?  Is it but a matter of minutes since Leila found us there, and in a manner which revealed the true feeling she has for me, ordered me to go upstairs and take off Maidie Mackenzie’s gown?

(Yes, it was not Leila’s after all.  I had forgotten that Maidie had taken her room.  And except for pulling it somewhat at the waste, I am sure I did not hurt the old thing.)

I shall now go to bed and dream.  Of which one I know not.  My heart is full.  Romanse has come at last into my dull and dreary life.  Below, the revelers have gone.  The flowers hang their herbacious heads.  The music has flowed away into the river of the past.  I am alone with my Heart.

January 14th.  How complacated my Life grows, Dear Dairy!  How full and yet how incomplete!  How everything begins and nothing ends!