October 5th.

We went with Paul to a secluded part of the garden to shoot. My
hands trembled a little when, for the first time in my life, I took
a loaded gun, especially because Mamma was so frightened. I chose a
pumpkin twenty paces away for a target, and shot capitally. The
whole charge was in the pumpkin. The second time I fired at a piece
of paper twenty centimetres square, again I hit, and a third time a
leaf. Then I grew very proud and smiling. All fear disappeared and
it seems as if I had courage enough to go to war.

I carried the pumpkin, the paper, and the leaf in triumph to show to
Mamma, who is very proud of me.

Really, what harm is there in shooting? I need not become on that
account one of those detestable men-women with spectacles, masculine
coats, and canes. To fire a gun will not prevent my being gentle,
lovable, graceful, slender, vaporous (if I may use the word), and
pretty.

While shooting I am a man; in the water a fish; on horseback a
jockey; in a carriage a young girl; at an evening entertainment a
charming woman; at a ball a dancer; at a concert a nightingale with
notes extra low and high like a violin. I have something in my
throat which penetrates the soul, and makes the heart leap.

Seeing me with the gun, no one would imagine I could be indolent
and languishing at home. Yet, sometimes, when I undress in the
evening, I put on a long black cloak which half covers me and sit