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Wolf's Rest"
M'ch 21st --'75--
Sunday morning! Fair and almost balmy --it is the first hint we've had of spring's approach!
Two months ago I got flowers -- fair spring flowers -- from my southern home! And today the air is heavy with the perfume of magnolia blooms, and the mocking bird is singing her sweetest song around the old home!
I believe I am lonely today -- home sick, or heart sick ---- ---- Mamie says they miss me --- that Spring Hill only needs the presence of its "Blue-eyed Mistress" to make it the most charming as well as the most beautiful place on earth!
I wish I was there -- just for today -- but to go back to live, never! -- -- They would crowd around and flatter and fawn as of yore -- yet eager to see the bitterness of some regret show itself that they might triumph over my fallen pride. I have turned from them all with all they could offer, to make a life for myself -- and if I fail -- at least one of my friends shall enjoy the knowledge! --- Yet why am I writing this stuff. -- Is it that I want to talk?
I have been sitting here for an hour -- I did not want to think -- but, ah, ma chere journal! Thought is a persistent companion -- whether he bears on his swift wings the light breath of Hope's sweet flowers; or the heavy shades of the deadly Upas -- broken dreams and dead ambitions, that stretch out their skeleton fingers across the hushed waste of a sorrowful Past! ----- But what is this? Sentiment, morbid or mawkish? Did I dream that someone said I had not sentiment? -- "No Sentiment" -- which means, I suppose, no impulse, heart or passion!
Happy State! ---and good evidence of the presence of brain -- eh?
Monday
22nd M'ch --'75
I feel like a bankrupt who has lost his reckoning by going to sleep at the wrong time. ------
Afternoon
I have been walking in the warm sunshine -- the quiet warmth and serene brightness has acted like a charm.
--My head is better, and my heart too, I expect! I feel like thanking God for making the world -- and less like anathematizing its bipedal inhabitants! The "Blues" are "bad medicine" -- why are we not above the weakness! (gr.)
I've been out to our "Sugar-plantation!!! What would the negroes at home say to it? Ha! Ha! I can see them -- holding up their hands and exclaiming "Well! Well! Bless de Lod!" And then lay down and roll and laugh at the absurdity!
24th March -- '75
I believe today is Wednesday.
Why have I opened this journal? I have nothing to write. I am sick today -- in mind and body. My head is hot and my heart is cold -- Paste! What of that, since I've Learned to live, and ask no more!
I went up The Curtis yesterday to hunt ducks -- we had a dinner in camp -- it 'minded me of old times -- when I lived in a tent and cooked by a log heap -- sitting on the ground to eat my "grub" -- viz. A "flap-jack", buffalo, and a pint-cup of strong coffee. --
And today -- what have I done today? -- Nothing! Came near fainting in the heat this morning. --went to carry "sap" in the sugar-camp --- but it was too much for me. --
We freeze one day and roast the next at this season. I certainly should write some letters to send tomorrow -- but, the strange lethargy of a painful indifference is upon me again -- and what a dumb, odd pain it is to feel that one's life is scarcely worth the living -- and that the so-called duties and requirements of life are but pitiful attempts to complete the farce!
Ah, well -- these dark hours will come -- so will the sunshine, such as it is, after a time.
Night - about 11, I suppose
I open my journal to say it is not Wed., but Thursday ---- one day poorer (or richer) than I deemed myself! --- I wonder if I have made a fool of myself here lately? (I know I have, in times not lately!) But, this is out of the common order. --On the whole, it is pleasant -- pleasant to believe in something --
What a fearful night! --The wind howls and moans like some stricken thing -- full of pain and rage! -- And the prairie is afire -- South-east and west! The red glare burns luridly enough against the sullen skies -- I like the storm -- and yet, as I closed my door just now, and turned to the solitude of this little cabin, the passionate desire arose in my heart for something human -- something kind -- some warm hand that mine could grasp and feel a fellowship of souls or heads or hearts -- I did'nt care which!
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