orning to
bringing up to date this trivial record, for I have a premonition that
the time is rapidly approaching when I shall no longer have the strength
of will or body to continue it. The little pain has increased in
intensity and frequency the last few days, and though I try to delude
myself into the belief that otherwise I am as strong as ever, I know in
my heart that I am daily growing weaker, daily losing vitality. I shall
soon have to call in a doctor to give me some temporary relief, and
doubtless he will put me to bed, feed me on slops, cut off alcohol,
forbid noise and excitement, and keep me in a drugged, stupefied
condition until I fall asleep, to wake up in the Garden of Prosperpine.
Death is nothing; it is the dying that is such a nuisance. It is going
through so much for so little. It is as bad as the campaign before
a parliamentary election. It offends one's sense of proportion. In a
well-regulated universe there would be no tedious process of decay,
either before or after death. You would go about your daily avocation
unconcerned and unwarned, and then at the moment appointed by an
inscrutable Providence for your dissolution--phew!--and your clothes
would remain standing for a surprised second, and then fall down in
a heap without a particle of you inside them. If we have to die, why
doesn't Providence employ this simple and sensible method? It would
save such a lot of trouble. It would be so clean, so painless, so
picturesque. It would add to the interest of our walks abroad. Fancy
a stout, important policeman vanishing from his uniform--the helmet
falling over the collar, the tunic doubling in at the belt, the knees
giving way, and the unheard, merry laughter of the disenuniformed spirit
winging its way truncheonless into the Empyrean.

But if you think you are going to get any fun out of dying in the
present inconvenient manner, you are mistaken. Believe one who is
trying.

I will remain on my feet, however, as long as my will holds out. In this
way I may continue to be of service to my fellow creatures, and procure
for myself a happy lot or portion. Even this morning I have been able to
feel the throb of eumoiriety. A piteous letter came from Latimer, and
a substantial cheque lies on my table ready to be posted. I wonder how
much I have left? So long as it is enough to pay my doctor's bills and
funeral expenses, what does it matter?

The last line of the above was written on December 21st. It