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father so feeble I do not know what to do. I notice the carriage house roof is in a very bad condition and I have no money to put on a new one and wherever I go something is needed to be done. Six years ago tonight my dear Gertrude lay in this room, all lifes trials and anxieties done and I more lonely than I could ever express. What will the next year bring? I ask myself over and over. Legrand Abbey and his wife came and called on Janette and Emily. We had some music and the echoes of a life that is gone were awakened by the sound of dear Gertrudes piano. I am tired, unhappy, apprehensive and almost discouraged, and Girards entanglements add to all my alarms. I am glad to forget them all in my sleep and awake with regret in the morning.

Thursday Oct. 16" 1884. The morning dawned dark and threatening. I built a fire in the hall stove but the weather has grown milder. My father seems to grow stronger and dressed himself this morning almost entirely without my assistance. He walked down to the barn and about there and is more interested in our affairs. Advised me to press the payment of Turcks mortgage. Sara, Janette and Emily drove out to Hurley for a ride. I have been as busy as usual and my hands are growing hard and scarred with work. I talked with Girard and encouraged him as best I could. Janette and Emily are to go home on Saturday. It will be lonely after they are gone but I have to get to work in my studio.

Friday 17". Sara took my father, Janette and Emily for a ride this morning over to Capt. Andersons, where they stopped a while and home by Eddyville. The wind blew but it was not cold. Tom and Henry finished getting in the corn fodder and put up the upper kitchen stove. I spent hours picking and shelling a few quarts of Lima beans and did the various nameless trivialities of a man of all work. How absurd seems a plan of life which makes a man a slave to these mean but abundantly necessary trifles. Poor Taylor! How he had to work during his last years just to get the means to live. How idle to suppose this discipline is necessary. It is not. I never can do any good work under such conditions and I doubt if anyone can. The girls took tea with Mrs. Van Dussen to meet Lieut Chambers of the Navy who was one of the officers of the Greely relief Expedition. Mr. and Mrs. Ed. Tomkins called to see my father and he enjoyed their call. I think he is
stronger but I cannot hide from myself the fact that it is the beginning of the end.

Saturday 18" Janette and Emily went home today by the 11 oclock train. Sara and I drove them to the station taking Girard and Charlie with us. They have not been to the house since the day I dunked them in the water. The air was clear and brilliant and the mountains very fine. The autumn color is only now beginning to be general. The trees in front of the house have hardly changed at all and Gertrudes tree is still green. Wood was to pay the Turck claim today but I waited until half past two without his putting in an appearance when I went down to the bank and paid our school Tax $104 taking all the money I had in bank. Girard told me this evening Wood had been at his office (it must have been after bank hours for I called there just before 3.) and left word that Griffiths had some money for me. Now I shall foreclose the mortgage and bother with them no more. They do not keep their engagements and I cannot depend on what they promise. The fire

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