random
raindrops, spitting at me through the Japanese blinds. These are not
tears with which the page is spotted! Now the windows stream, the roof
reverberates. It is good; it answers something which is in my heart; I
know not what; old memories of the wet moorland belike.

Well, it has blown by again, and I am in my place once more, with an
accompaniment of perpetual dripping on the verandah--and very much
inclined for a chat. The exact subject I do not know! It will be bitter
at least, and that is strange, for my attitude is essentially _not_
bitter, but I have come into these days when a man sees above all the
seamy side, and I have dwelt some time in a small place where he has an
opportunity of reading little motives that he would miss in the great
world, and indeed, to-day, I am almost ready to call the world an error.
Because? Because I have not drugged myself with successful work, and
there are all kinds of trifles buzzing in my ear, unfriendly trifles,
from the least to the--well, to the pretty big. All these that touch me
are Pretty Big; and yet none touch me in the least, if rightly looked
at, except the one eternal burthen to go on making an income for my
family. That is rightly the root and ground of my ill. The jingling,
tingling, damned mint sauce is the trouble always; and if I could find a
place where I could lie down and give up for (say) two years, and allow
the sainted public to support me, if it were a lunatic asylum, wouldn't
I go, just! But we can't have both extremes at once, worse luck! I
should like to put my savings into a proprietarian investment, and
retire in the meanwhile into a communistic retreat, which is
double-dealing. But you men with aries don't know how alas family weighs
on a fellow's mind.

I hear the article in next week's _Herald_ is to be a great affair, and
all the officials who came to me the other day are to be attacked! This
is the unpleasant side of being (without a salary) in public life; I
will leave any one to judge if my speech was well intended, and
calculated to do good. It was even daring--I assure you one of the
chiefs looked like a fiend at my description of Samoan warfare. Your
warning was not needed; we are all determined to _keep the peace_ and to
_hold our peace_. I know, my dear fellow, how remote all this sounds!
Kindly pardon your friend. I have my life to live here; these interests
are for me immediate; and if I do not write of them, I might as soon not