Sunday, 30 December 1883

A great undertaking — a visit from Mme Sapogenikoff. Marie and Olga are married, as you know, and mothers three or four times over. One of the little girls is very ill, and Nina — now a grandmother, with her mother in Nice. We laughed heartily together, but I remember it for all practical purposes no longer. As yesterday, many people come — it is tiring. Nina found me somewhat thinner (since seven years ago) and above all less robust, less assured... She is quite right. Émile Bastien came — back from Damvillers, where the other will remain until February. He does not say what Jules is doing; he says he has mostly rested and hunted. It is Jules who forbids anyone to mention the paintings he perpetuates in the shadows... of plein air... What a scoundrel. The young one tells me he has thought a great deal about my painting and was very tempted to write to me at length on the subject, but was afraid I would mock him too fiercely. I allow myself the pleasure of telling him that his brother is morally withered — and that if I have a pebble instead of a heart, Jules has an old paint tube, and an empty one at that... That he is old, that he is profoundly... disagreeable, and that thanks to my efforts at self-concentration I shall soon be as disagreeable as he is. I am not in love with Jules — I love only my glory; and if I say a few childish things to that excellent brother of his, it is... Oh! yes, Lord my God — let us concentrate. I have lost four or five days, and it is a source of frightful torment.