way has Billy travelled since he was a merry young player. I shall say
more about him presently.




THE PINK TOM CAT.


My friend the publisher calls the Loafer's narratives "thrilling," but
I, as editor of the Diaries, would prefer another adjective. The Loafer
was a man who only cared for gloom and squalor after he had given up the
world of gaiety and refinement. Men of his stamp, when they receive a
crushing mental blow, always shrink away like wounded animals and
forsake their companions. A very distinguished man, who is now living,
disappeared for fifteen years, and chose on his return to be regarded as
an utter stranger. His former self had died, and he was strengthened and
embittered by suffering. The Loafer was of that breed.

Two locked volumes of the Loafer's Diary were delivered to me, and I
found that the man had once been joyous to the last degree, ambitious,
successful, and full of generous thoughts and fine aspirations. Some of
his songs breathe the very spirit of delight, and he wrote his glad
thoughts at night when he could not sleep for the keen pleasure of
living. Then comes a sudden cloud, and from that time onward the Diary
is bitter, brutal, and baldly descriptive of life's abominations. It
would not become me to speak with certainty, but I fancy that a woman
had something to do with the Loafer's wild and reckless change. He is
reticent, but his poems all point in one direction. Here is a grave note
of passion:--