classifications, it is imperfect, but 'twill serve.

G. G.




SPRING


I.


For more than a week my pen has lain untouched. I have written nothing
for seven whole days, not even a letter. Except during one or two bouts
of illness, such a thing never happened in my life before. In my life;
the life, that is, which had to be supported by anxious toil; the life
which was not lived for living's sake, as all life should be, but under
the goad of fear. The earning of money should be a means to an end; for
more than thirty years--I began to support myself at sixteen--I had to
regard it as the end itself.

I could imagine that my old penholder feels reproachfully towards me. Has
it not served me well? Why do I, in my happiness, let it lie there
neglected, gathering dust? The same penholder that has lain against my
forefinger day after day, for--how many years? Twenty, at least; I
remember buying it at a shop in Tottenham Court Road. By the same token
I bought that day a paper-weight, which cost me a whole shilling--an
extravagance which made me tremble. The penholder shone with its new
varnish, now it is plain brown wood from end to end. On my forefinger it