the furniture downstairs.

All the morning I sit indoors writing--articles; verses for the comic
papers; a novel I've been "at" for three years, and concerning which I
have dreams; a children's book, in which the imagination has free rein;
and another book which is to last as long as myself, since it is an
honest record of my soul's advance or retreat in the struggle of life.
Besides these, I keep a book of poems which I use as a safety valve, and
concerning which I have no dreams whatsoever. Between the lot I am
always occupied. In the afternoons I generally try to take a walk for my
health's sake, through Regent's Park, into Kensington Gardens, or
farther afield to Hampstead Heath.

* * * * *

Oct. 10.--Everything went wrong to-day. I have two eggs for breakfast.
This morning one of them was bad. I rang the bell for Emily. When she
came in I was reading the paper, and, without looking up, I said, "Egg's
bad." "Oh, is it, sir?" she said; "I'll get another one," and went out,
taking the egg with her. I waited my breakfast for her return, which was
in five minutes. She put the new egg on the table and went away. But,
when I looked down, I saw that she had taken away the good egg and left
the bad one--all green and yellow--in the slop basin. I rang again.

"You've taken the wrong egg," I said.

"Oh!" she exclaimed; "I thought the one I took down didn't smell so
_very_ bad." In due time she returned with the good egg, and I resumed
my breakfast with two eggs, but less appetite. It was all very trivial,
to be sure, but so stupid that I felt annoyed. The character of that egg
influenced everything I did. I wrote a bad article, and tore it up. I
got a bad headache. I used bad words--to myself. Everything was bad, so
I "chucked" work and went for a long walk.

I dined at a cheap chop-house on my way back, and reached home about
nine o'clock.

Rain was just beginning to fall as I came in, and the wind was rising.
It promised an ugly night. The alley looked dismal and dreary, and the
hall of the house, as I passed through it, felt chilly as a tomb. It was
the first stormy night I had experienced in my new quarters. The
draughts were awful. They came criss-cross, met in the middle of the
room, and formed eddies and whirlpools and cold silent currents that
almost lifted the hair of my head. I stuffed up the sashes of the
windows with neckties and odd socks, and sat over the smoky fire to kee