My husband had taken with him, as material for the winter’s work, his notes for the Greek Backgrounds, and the finished drafts of two dramas. One, by W. S., was to be called Persephonæia, or the Drama of the House of Ætna, and of it one act and one scene had been written at Maniace two years before. It was to have been dedicated to The Duke of Bronte. The other drama was Fiona’s projected play The Enchanted Valleys, of which one scene only was written. But he felt unable for steady work, as the following letter to the same friend, shows:
... A single long letter means no work for me that day, and the need of work terribly presses, and in every way, alas. My hope that I might be able for some writing in the late afternoon, and especially from 5 to 7.30 is at present futile. I simply can’t. Yesterday I felt better and more mentally alert than I’ve done since I came, and immediately after afternoon tea, I came to my study and tried to work, but could not, though I had one of my nature articles begun and beside me: nor had I spirit to take up my reviews: then I thought I could at least get some of that wearisome accumulated correspondence worked off, but a mental nausea seized me, so that even a written chat to a friend seemed to me too exhausting. C’est cette maladie poignante, ce “degoût de la plume,” que Tourgenieff (ou Flaubert?) parlait de son cœur frappé. So I collapsed, and dreamed over a strange and fascinating ancient-world book by Lichtenberger, and then dreamed idly, watching the flaming oak-logs.”
In William’s Diary for December there are the following entries:
1st. Friday. Wrote the short poem “When greenness comes again.” Read Zola’s wearisome “His Excellency Eugène Rougon,” and in the evening the “Jupiter” and “Saturn” chapters in Proctor’s “Otherworlds Than Ours.”
2d. Saty. Read and took notes and thought out my Country Life article on “At the Turn of the Year.” Also incidentally “The Clans of the Rush, the Reed, and the Fern,” and one to be called “White Weather” (snow, the wild goose and the wild swan). Alec and I walked to the Boschetto. Began (about 1300 words) “At the Turn of the Year.”
3rd. Sunday. A stormy and disagreeable day. Wrote long letters. In afternoon felt too tired and too sleepy to work or even to write letters: so sat before the fire in my study and partly over that fascinating book I love often to recur to for a few pages, Lichtenberger’s Centaures, and partly in old dreams of my own, it was 7.30 and time to dress before I knew it. Heard today from Ernest Rhys about the production of his and Vincent Thomas’ Opera Guinevere. Thought over an old world book to be called Beyond the Foam.
Dec. 4th. In the forenoon began again and wrote first thousand words of “At the Turn of the Year.” At 3 went to drive with Elizabeth along the Balzo to near the Lake of Garrida.
Dec. 5. Tuesday. In forenoon wrote the remaining and large half of “At the Turn of the Year”: revised the whole of it and posted it to Mary, with long letter.
In afternoon a drive, despite the wet and inclement weather, up to Maletto. I walked back. A lovely, if unsettled sunset of blue and gold, purple brown, amethyst, and delicate cinnamon. A marvellous light on the hills. Luminous mist instead of cloud as of late. For the first time have seen the Sicilian Highlands with the beauty of Scotland.