tterly unjustifiable action of Severance afterwards, as one wrong
step invariably leads to another, the contents of the little volume are
here given, so that the reader of this tragedy may the more fully
understand the situation.

II.--BESSIE'S CONFESSION.

"_Aug. 1st_.--The keeping of a diary is a silly fashion, and I am
sure I would not bother with one, if my memory were good, and if I had
not a great object in view. However, I do not intend this book to be
more than a collection of notes that will be useful to me when I begin
my novel. The novel is to be the work of my life, and I mean to use
every talent I may have to make it unique and true to life. I think the
New Woman novel is a thing of the past, and that the time has now come
for a story of the old sort, yet written with a fidelity to life such
as has never been attempted by the old novelists. A painter or a
sculptor uses a model while producing a great picture or a statue. Why
should not a writer use a model also? The motive of all great novels
must be love, and the culminating point of a love-story is the
proposal. In no novel that I have ever read is the proposal well done.
Men evidently do not talk to each other about the proposals they make,
therefore a man-writer has merely his own experience to go upon, so his
proposals have a sameness--his hero proposes just as he himself has
done or would do. Women-writers seem to have more imagination in this
matter, but they describe a proposal as they would like it to be, and
not as it actually is. I find that it is quite an easy thing to get a
man to propose. I suppose I have a gift that way, and, besides, there
is no denying the fact that I am handsome, and perhaps that is
something of an aid. I therefore intend to write down in this book all
my proposals, using the exact language the man employed, and thus I
shall have the proposals in my novel precisely as they occurred. I
shall also set down here any thoughts that may be of use to me when I
write my book.

"_Aug. 2nd._--I shall hereafter not date the notes in this book;
that will make it look less like a diary, which I detest. We are in
Thun, which is a lovely place. Humboldt, whoever he is or was, said it
is one of the three prettiest spots on earth. I wonder what the names
are of the other two. We intended to stay but one night at this hotel,
but I see it is full of young men, and as all the women seem to be
rather ugly and given to gossip, I thin