her. My grateful compliments to the
peacock. And little (but warm) loves to all your little birds. And
best of little loves to the squirrels, only you must send _them_ in
dream-words, I suppose, up to their nests.

[Footnote 22: An Oxford Lecture. _Nineteenth Century_, January, 1878.]

[Footnote 23: Decorative art of his plumage.--J. R.]

* * * * *

HERNE HILL,
_Sunday, 16th December_ (1877).

It is a long while since I've felt so good for nothing as I do this
morning. My very wristbands curl up in a dog's-eared and disconsolate
manner; my little room is all a heap of disorder. I've got a
hoarseness and wheezing and sneezing and coughing and choking. I can't
speak and I can't think, I'm miserable in bed and useless out of it;
and it seems to me as if I could never venture to open a window or go
out of a door any more. I have the dimmest sort of diabolical pleasure
in thinking how miserable I shall make Susie by telling her all this;
but in other respects I seem entirely devoid of all moral sentiments.
I have arrived at this state of things, first by catching cold, and
since by trying to "amuse myself" for three days. I tried to read
"Pickwick," but found that vulgar,[24] and, besides, I know it all by
heart. I sent from town for some chivalric romances, but found them
immeasurably stupid. I made Baxter read me the _Daily Telegraph_, and
found that the Home Secretary had been making an absurd speech about
art, without any consciousness that such a person as I had ever
existed. I read a lot of games of chess out of Mr. Staunton's
handbook, and couldn't understand any of them. I analyzed the Dock
Company's bill of charges on a box from Venice, and sent them an
examination paper on it. I think _that_ did amuse me a little, but the
account doesn't. _L1 8s. 6d._ for bringing a box two feet square from
the Tower Wharf to here! But the worst of all is, that the doctor
keeps me shut up here, and I can't get my business done; and now there
isn't the least chance of my getting down to Brantwood for Christmas,
nor, as far as I can see, for a fortnight after it. There's perhaps a
little of the diabolical enjoyment again in that estimate; but really
the days _do_ go, more like dew shaken off branches than real
sunrisings and settings. But I'll send you word every day now for a
little while how things are going on.

[Footnote 24: "May I ask you to co