th her. They belong to the
half smart set, eager to conceal beneath a show of raffishness
their plentiful lack of intellect and their fundamental bourgeois
respectability. In spite of Pasquale's brilliance and Carlotta's
rapturous enjoyment I sat mumchance and depressed, out of my element.

My work is at a standstill, and Carlotta is my life. I fear I am
deteriorating.

On Judith, whom I have seen once or twice since Carlotta's return, I
called this afternoon. She is unhappy. Although I have not confessed to
my thraldom, her woman's wit, I feel sure, has penetrated to the heart
of my mystery. There has been no deep emotion in our intercourse.
Its foundation has been real friendship sweetened with pleasant
sentimentality. And yet jealousy of Carlotta consumes her. Her _amour
propre_ is deeply wounded. She makes me feel as if I had played the part
of a brute. But O Judith, my dear, I have only been a man. "The same
thing," I fancy I hear her answer. But no. I have never loved a woman,
my dear, in all my life before, and as I made no secret of it, I am
guiltless of anything like betrayal. In due season I will tell you
frankly of the new love; but how can I tell you now? How could I tell
any human being?

I imagine myself as Panurge, taking counsel with a Pantagruelian friend.
"I am in love with Carlotta and desire to marry her." "Then marry her,"
says Pantagruel. "But she does not love me." "Then don't marry," says
Pantagruel. "But nay," urges poor Panurge, "she would marry me according
to any rite, civil or ecclesiastical, to-morrow." _"Mariez-vous doncques
de par dieu,"_ replies Pantagruel. "But I should be a villain to take
advantage of her innocence and submission." "Then don't marry." "But
I can't live without her," says Panurge, desperately. "I am as a man
bewitched. If I don't marry her I shall waste away with longing." "Then
marry her in God's name!" says Pantagruel. And I am no wiser by his
counsel, and I have paraded the complication of my folly before mocking
eyes.

October 23d.

I perceive that the young man of the idiot metaphor was gifted with
piercing acumen. Beneath the Jaquesian melancholy of my temperament he
diagnosed the potentiality of canine rabidness. No rational being is
afflicted with this grotesque concentration of idea, this fierce hot
fury waxing in intensity day by day.

I must consult a brain specialist.

October 25th.

I went to Judith this afternoon, more to prove the loyalty