The tea was a comfort - and by that time I more than needed comfort.

I found it quite easy to carry on a casual conversation it was as if my real feelings were down fathoms deep in my mind and what we said was just a feathery surface spray.

My hand is very tired but I want to go on writing. I keep resting and thinking. All day I have been two people - the me imprisoned in yesterday and the me out here on the mound; and now there is a third me trying to get in - the me in what is going to happen next.

It is rather exciting to write by moonlight.

I have really sinned. I am going to pause now, and sit here on the mound repenting in deepest shame.

There was a wonderful atmosphere of gentle age, a smell of flowers and beeswax, sweet yet faintly sour and musty; a smell that makes you feel very tender towards the past.

Well, my paper has asked me to do a series: Lives of the Great Musicians, reading time 2 minutes.