The strength of my ambition at any given moment is the measure of my state of health. It must really be an extraordinarily tenacious thing to have hung on thro' all my recent experiences. Considerately enough this great Crab lets go of my big toe when I am sunk low in health, yet pinches devilishly hard as now when I am well.[3]
A Bad Listener
When I begin to speak, T—— will sometimes interrupt with his loud, rasping voice. I usually submit to this from sheer lack of lung power or I may have a sore throat. But occasionally after the fifth or sixth interruption I lose my equanimity and refuse to give him ground. I keep straight on with what I intended to say, only in a louder voice; he assumes a voice louder still, but not to be denied, I pile Pelion on Ossa and finally overwhelm him in a thunder of sound. For example:
"The other day"—I begin quietly collecting my thoughts to tell the story in detail, "I went to the——"
"Ah! you must come and see my pictures——" he breaks in; but I go on and he goes on and as I talk, I catch phrases: "St. Peters" or"Michael Angelo" or "Botticelli" in wondrous antiphon with my own "British Museum" and "I saw there," "two Syracusan," "tetradrachms," until very likely I reach the end of my sentence before he does his, or perhaps his rasp drives my remarks out of my head. But that makes no difference, for rather than give in I go on improvising in a louder and louder voice when suddenly, at length made aware of the fact that I am talking too, he stops! leaving me bellowing nonsense at the top of my voice, thus: "and I much admired these Syracusan tetradrachms, very charming indeed, I like them, the Syracusan tetradrachms I mean you know, and it will be good to go again and see them (louder) if possible and the weather keeps dry (louder) and the moon and the stars keep in their courses, if the slugs on the thorn (loudest)——" he stops, hears the last few words of my remarks, pretends to be appreciative but wonders what in Heaven's name I can have been talking about.
September 3.
This is the sort of remark I like to make: Someone says to me: "You are a pessimist."
"Ah! well," I say, looking infernally deep, "pessimism is a good policy; it's like having your cake and eating it at the same time."
Chorus: "Why?"
"Because if the future turns out badly you can say, 'I told you so,' to your own satisfaction, and if all is well, why you share everyone else's satisfaction."