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Thursday Oct. 18. 1883. The day dawned most auspiciously for the Newburg Centennial. I put up all our flags the first thing after I went down stairs. I would like to have gone just to see the spectacle but Sara was invited down to Nannies and so I stand with my mother. Spent the forenoon trimming the four Newton Pippin Apple trees between here and my house. The wind blew from the S.E. this afternoon. Wrote to Eastman, a letter from Jamie and an order for my picture at Chicago which I am going to send to Indianapolis which I signed.

Friday 19. A gray day with a promise of a storm which so far has not come. I picked the pears down by the garden below the road and spent the forenoon trimming the pear trees and the cherry tree down by the barn. I enjoy this out of door work after my close application to sketching. A letter from Downing saying he would not return until Monday or Tuesday. He sent my list of Booths things and I wrote a long letter to Booth telling him about our camp and sending him a list of the things still in my possession. Told him I expected to have a carpenter in Monday and would have them all packed and send them whenever he was ready to receive them. My Art Journal came today. An article on American Art in the Salon by Brownell showed me how utterly out of sympathy I am with certain modes of art now prevailing. How such stuff as this will sound in the future I can well imagine. There is only one thing to do and that is not to be influenced by these foolish and noisy writers but to be faithful to ones own deep convictions. He cannot despise my work half as much as I do his wordy gabble.

Saturday 20" It was raining this morning when I awoke and has rained gently all day clearing towards evening with a wind from the N. - Just the day to be in the studio. I went over there after breakfast and built a fire and after painting a little while on a picture of roses I made this summer. I began to arrange my picture "Telling the bees" for which I made a study of Marvin last summer: I need my study of the Van Akers house and the hollyhocks I did this summer; Drew it all in on a mill board 20 x 24 and painted the head of the figure although I had not time to complete it. I am greatly interested in it and have a feeling that I can do it better than I ever could have done it before. It is so comfortable to have my nice studio to go to on days like this and when I want to do any special work, that I wonder how I ever got along without it. There were some very grand and solemn effects of sunset as the storm cleared away. I feel impressionable and happy and see pictures readily now. A man must be happy to be able to receive certain impressions from nature, not that some of the grandest achievements have not come from great unhappiness. A letter from Eastman and a note from [[Master Stitch?]] saying he would send the Carpenter on Monday.

Sunday 21. I have done today what I have long wanted to do, make a sketch in color of my mother. Sara dressed her in

Transcription Notes:
I am not sure I got any of this right, but I tried ---------- Reopened for Editing 2023-04-24 04:00:26 ---------- Reopened for Editing 2023-04-24 14:12:40 - Far from completed. Only part of the first paragraph was transcribed. Don't mark for review until complete or with minimal [[?]]. ---------- Reopened for editing 2023-04-24 9:53 I cannot read this, I'm sorry. ---------- Reopened for Editing 2023-04-24 20:25:09 ---------- Reopened for Editing 2023-04-25 14:26:58 ---------- Reopened for Editing 2023-04-25 17:32:29