m, and I am going to bed.

Thursday, January 13th, 1876.

Mamma and Dina are at church. It is our New Year's Day, and I have
stayed at home to sew. That is my whim at present, and I must do
what I wish. B---- called to offer his good wishes.

Not until four o'clock did they succeed in dragging me out of the
house and, at five o'clock. Mamma is going to the embassy. That is
the hour Baronne D----receives.

We had a telegram from Barnola. He congratulates us, and reminded me
of the promise I made to drink a glass of water at the Fountain of
Trevi at two o'clock on the Russian New Year's Day. He vowed
friendship, I did the same.

I received a letter from my aunt, in which she told me that A----
was paying attention to an English girl whom she has nicknamed
Olive. My aunt has so lively an imagination. At the end of three
days of our acquaintance with the Marvel, she told me that the poor
fool was in love with me. And she pitied him with eager kindness
while predicting for him the fate of the Polish count. Now she has
seen him at Monaco with the girl, and she is already marrying them.
Oh! it is really atrocious--always conjectures! Ah! if I could know
the truth. Have patience, that is easy to write. But to show it!
Patience is the virtue of sluggish--but gentle, foolish souls.

I don't think I love the Marvel, I don't find him in my heart; but
at any rate, the surface is very much occupied with him. If he loved
me, I shouldn't care very much, that is the truth.

Friday, January 14th, 1876.

We met on the Pincio Count B----, who started at seeing me, then
bowed to my mother.

At five o'clock we went to see Monseigneur F----, a thin, black,
agile old priest in a wig, a Jesuit, a hypocrite. He received us
very courteously in his remarkable drawing-rooms, filled with things
in the best taste. Gobelins, pictures, and all this in the dwelling
of a detestable Jesuit. Well, well!

We all went to walk in the Villa Borghese, which is more beautiful
than the Doria. There was a crowd of people, and the pretty Princess
M---- was walking like any ordinary mortal, followed by her
carriage, with the coachman and two footmen in red livery. This
quantity of carriages with coats of arms saddened me. We know
nobody, God help me! Perhaps I am ridiculous with my complaints,
and my eternal prayers! I am so miserable! This evening Mamma asked
the date of last year's carnival; I took out my journal and, without
noticing it, spent t