_Vailima_, _August_ 7, 1894.
DEAR DR. BAKEWELL,—I am not more than human. I am more human than is
wholly convenient, and your anecdote was welcome. What you say about
_unwilling work_, my dear sir, is a consideration always present with me,
and yet not easy to give its due weight to. You grow gradually into a
certain income; without spending a penny more, with the same sense of
restriction as before when you painfully scraped two hundred a year
together, you find you have spent, and you cannot well stop spending, a
far larger sum; and this expense can only be supported by a certain
production. However, I am off work this month, and occupy myself instead
in weeding my cacao, paper chases, and the like. I may tell you, my
average of work in favourable circumstances is far greater than you
suppose: from six o’clock till eleven at latest, {350} and often till
twelve, and again in the afternoon from two to four. My hand is quite
destroyed, as you may perceive, to-day to a really unusual extent. I can
sometimes write a decent fist still; but I have just returned with my
arms all stung from three hours’ work in the cacao.—Yours, etc.,