'_July 1_.--Life against life--and his, the young, the stalwart, rather
than mine, the mouldering, the sere. I love life. Not _yet_ am I ready
to weigh anchor, and reeve halliard, and turn my prow over the watery
paths of the wine-brown Deeps. Oh no. Not yet. Let _him_ die. Many and
many are the days in which I shall yet see the light, walk, think. I am
averse to end the number of my years: there is even a feeling in me at
times that this worn body shall never, never taste of death. The
chalice predicts indeed that I and my house shall end when the stone is
lost--a mere fiction _at first_, an idler's dream _then_, but
now--now--that the prophecy has stood so long a part of the reality of
things, and a fact among facts--no longer fiction, but Adamant, stern
as the very word of God. Do I not feel hourly since it has gone how the
surges of life ebb, ebb ever lower in my heart? Nay, nay, but there is
hope. I have here beside me an Arab blade of subtle Damascene steel,
insinuous to pierce and to hew, with which in a street of Bethlehem I
saw a Syrian's head cleft open--a gallant stroke! The edges of this I
have made bright and white for a nuptial of blood.

'_July 2_.--I spent the whole of the last night in searching every nook
and crack of the house, using a powerful magnifying lens. At times I
thought Ul-Jabal was watching me, and would pounce out and murder me.
Convulsive tremors shook my frame like earthquake. Ah me, I fear I am
all too frail for this work. Yet dear is the love of life.

'_July 7_.--The last days I have passed in carefully searching the
grounds, with the lens as before. Ul-Jabal constantly found pretexts
for following me, and I am confident that every step I took was known
to him. No sign anywhere of the grass having been disturbed. Yet my
lands are wide, and I cannot be sure. The burden of this mighty task is