My heart swelled with uncontrollable delight.

The fact is I am growing old too fast, alas! I feel it, and yet work I will, and may God grant me life to see the last plate of my mammoth work finished.

I discover that my friends think only of my apparel, and those upon whom I have conferred acts of kindness prefer to remind me of my errors.

If only the bird with the loveliest song sang, the forest would be a lonely place.

To have been torn from the study would have been as death; my time was entirely occupied with art.

There is the morass, wherein you plunge up to your knees, or the walking over the stubborn, dwarfish shrubbery, whereby one treads down the forests of Labrador; and the unexpected bunting or sylvia which perchance, and indeed as if by chance alone, you now and then see flying before you, or hear singing from the ground creeping plant.

Mathematics was hard, dull work, I thought; geography pleased me more. For my other studies, as well as for dancing, I was quite enthusiastic.