Page:The Galaxy, Volume 5.djvu/766

736 and butter. The other night I met a day-laborer coming home, with his kettle in his hand, and I fell a-thinking wherein my life was really superior to his. We both toil for our dinners; mine is a better one than his, but that seems the only difference. Perhaps, even, he is utterly beyond me, in having something to love and live for. As I think of it, I am ready to hold up my right hand and swear that such mere existence shall not long run on. Ah, this dull, wearing harness of business would seem strangely different to me, if, by its means, I could feed my heart and soul as well as my body; my day-laborer life, which is now so paltry and irksome, would have a wondrous charm if my real payment met me as I crossed my threshold at eventide, as I see John Conway's come to him.

February 13th.—I have seen her again. I was going into my office this morning, when, glancing down the street, I was conscious of a great rush of blood through my frame, and an intense, cowardly impulse to disappear instantly. The next moment I took my courage in both hands and turned to meet her. She was but a yard or two distant when I lifted my hat. For a second she looked at me rather wonderingly. Then I saw full recognition dawn in her face, and she bowed, with a slight slowness, which served to accentuate the perfect apprehension of my individuality which the salutation contained. She passed on, and I went into my office and sat down to write business letters. But there was a faint, void feeling round my heart, as from strong physical reaction, which made everything an effort, and rendered work with either brain or hand very difficult. The same sensation has clung to me all day—has sent me home at this early hour, feeling that I suited my usual associates as little as they suited me. I have done a very silly thing since I have been in this room; and yet it was certainly not a light motive which led me to it. I have deliberately gazed in the glass for full five minutes, and, perhaps for the first time for years, really looked at myself. I saw a man to whom, if it were any one else, I should apply the general term, medium, both in size and in coloring, with neither sufficient beauty nor ugliness to strike at first sight, with nothing peculiar about him except a certain squareness about the forehead and chin, and something which, for lack of a better term, I am forced to call womanliness, in the eyes. I have no recollection of my mother, and yet there are times when I know I am like her, both spiritually and physically; as again I can trace in myself such a strong resemblance to my stern-faced, well-remembered father. My hard, busy life has left little chance for the softer element to develop. But it has kept itself alive in many ways: by my almost silly devotion to every form of poetry, which—though I usually mentally diet on Shakespeare and Robert Browning—makes me keep the run of the latest rhymester as closely as some girlish frequenter of a circulating library; by the femininely delicate appointments with which I have kept myself surrounded in this room—the only place I can call home. To-night it seems to have taken possession of my entire being, and to melt and sway all the strong, rebellious nature which has hitherto held it in subjection. Thinking of that picture in the glass, there are at least two things which I believe I can say for myself: I do not look like a fool, and I do look like a gentleman. At least I feel like a gentleman, and I know that woman would never have so saluted the soul or body of a clown, however skilfully disguised.

February 20th.—It is well that I have been in the habit of dropping into John's so constantly; otherwise, I am afraid the way in which I have haunted his house for the past week would surprise him, and lead Mrs. Conway, at least, to suspect