Same glory of weather.
Gennetà ― 12£ dogana.
Wrote to Ellen ― C.F. ― Mrs. Bell ― & Ellis Ashton. Staid in all day. ―
Woolff & Sargent called: the latter the most disagreable of the two ― by far.
At 6. went to De Veres ― taking little Mary her “numeral.” She sate with me an hour ― a wonderfully nice darling child ― but impulsive & sensitive to a degree. ―
Then to D. Woolffs ― where Fizzi is a child of another sort.
Lady W. has a wondrous charm of intelligence & melancholy. Later, came, Rodostamo ― Grasset, & Ventura. Some horrid masks also came in ― & I was bored. But Lady W.’s playing made me forget this. ― All speak at times of the “Annexation to Greece.” The W.’s do not like it. It is however a subject not to be spoken out about in “mixed company.” ――
Home by 11.45.
[Transcribed by Marco Graziosi from Houghton Library, Harvard University, MS Eng. 797.3. Image.]
As a diarist Lear has sat in on the launching of two new European nations, after Italy, Greece. Not bad for a roving landscape painter.