Journal of Esme Wellington

 June 19^th, 1922

 My governess, Rosamund, was quite vexed with me today.  It was all her fault, naturally.  It was she who left me unsupervised while I was plunged in my French studies, the lax woman taking the liberty of a walk about the garden with her favourite servant of the house, Clifford.  While she was thus engaged I neglected my French in favour of the article concerning the Cottingley Fairies.  It is ever a dear subject beloved in my heart—Fairies, I mean to say, not French—and I maintain that it must hold in its strange murk some glittering kernel of truth, as a nugget of gold amidst a vast coal mine of shadows.  That is why I keep secret my copy of The Strand, though two years have passed since its publication.  I am more inclined to read it than anything else published by Arthur Conan Doyle, particularly his stifling adventures of Sherlock Holmes.  Indeed, I am astounded that Doyle could have entertained the Cottingley Fairies with any seriousness.  When I consider his famously logical detective and his vacuous rationalism, one would never think Doyle of an inclination toward the phantastical.  And yet, I hold within my hands evidence to the contrary.

 Father attempted to dispossess me of the magazine because he believed that it fueled my fancies.  What he had failed to understand, however, was that I am a keen observer of things, and so when he ordered Clifford to throw it out, I knew precisely where the magazine would find itself.  That is to say, in Clifford’s bedroom. Rosamund is not the only person to search Clifford’s bare furnishings for an incriminating item.

 Father has many times reprimanded Rosamund for being lax with her attentions to my studies.  Therefore, when she returned from her walk she administered the French crucible in earnest, testing my poorly cultivated powers of the French tongue.  I failed decidedly to follow her conversation and therefore confirmed her fears concerning my capacity for that quarrelsome language.  It was an utterly hopeless cause.  I would sooner master the magic of flight than master that tongue.

 C’est la vie.

 Of course, that is not to say I am deficient in mental acuity to master the language.  Only, I rather prefer my native tongue, having honed its edge and multiplied its vocabulary with thirteen years of practice and study.  I am ever collecting words for it, as fervently as any lepidopterist his beautiful specimens, whereas my French tongue withers and wanes without sufficient nourishment.  And quite by design.  I confine French to the basement, like a lowly urchin, and let it die slowly of starvation.  My aim is to be a celebrated novelist of the phantastical variety.  Not Gothic, understand, nor of the Romances, but such as Lord Dunsany and George MacDonald, the poetess Christina Rossetti and poet Alfred Tennyson.  This aim is at dire odds with Father’s intentions for me.  He claims a man of good breeding and better fortune would never condescend to marry a young woman of frivolous ambition, and that I should abandon my fanciful daydreams lest they interfere with more pragmatic aspirations.  But I cannot help my mold and manner, anymore than his humorless austerity.  Austen was apt to remind us that no man worthy of his estate wishes to link his life to a silly wife, but that is of no consequence to me.  To the contrary, to marry would be the greatest consequence of all.

 I persist in my ambitions, adamant that a capable mind may accommodate both pragmatism and phantasia.  I intend, in short, to win financial independence as Jane Austen had, whereby I will thereupon claim freedom to be as stoic or as silly as my inclination should dictate.

 June 21^st, 1922

 I saw a Fairy today!  A real, honest-to-God Fairy!  I am all aquiver at the recollection, scarcely able to write with a steady hand.  Oh, but what a day!  How shall I recall this otherworldly encounter?  I suppose I should begin with banal descriptions of the Fairy himself.

 Outwardly, he seemed but an unremarkable boy such as would be drawn from any common stock in England.  He was a young boy and was of a young boy’s height.  His hair was dark brown and his skin so pale that he seemed a deathly ill person.  I was sitting beneath the gazebo when he alighted on the railing.  I quickly put aside Voltaire’s Candide and stared in astonishment at his boldness.  He crouched upon the railing like a crow and said nothing.  He was utterly naked, which should have embarrassed me; only, he was a Fairy and, so, why would I fault him his heathen manner and means?  He moved so strangely, his head lolling loosely and his limbs somewhat slack as if he might, at any moment, swoon and tumble to the ground.  His eyes stared unblinkingly and his mouth hung open, nor did his blue lips move smoothly.  His otherworldliness was confirmed in every bizarre respect.

 Yet, I cannot refrain from noting with great disappointment that he did not possess butterfly wings.  Rather, there extended from his back the translucent wings of a dragonfly: long and elliptical and diaphanous.  It was a pity.  Perhaps the females of the species are possessed of butterfly wings.  I should hope so or it seems a dreadful waste of feminine conceit.

 “Hello,” I said to him.  “How do you do?”

 The poor creature must have been malnourished, like a hummingbird that has been famished for too long a time, for he swayed as if he might fall.  But he did not collapse.  His mouth gaped open, and his throat undulated, the vocal cords producing something akin to human speech, and that speech was, surprisingly, a disordered form of English.

 “Girl, pretty,” he said.  “Fairy, I.  Fairy, I.  Pretty girl.  Wings like Fairy?  Wings like I?”

 “I haven’t any wings, no,” I said.

 The Fairy’s head tossed left and right ungracefully.  “No.  Wings, want?  Like I?”

 I understood him, then, to mean that if I should want wings I should have them. But I did not care for his wings or the prospect of having such.  Being ever direct and thoughtless in my address, I said, “I would rather have butterfly wings.”

 He grew agitated at this, vibrating like a locust in Summer, so I apologized.

 “Please forgive me,” I said, “for I have always been very forthright.  A novelist must be so when concerning the facts.  Your wings are quite becoming for your being a boy.  It is only that a young lady should prefer wings more ornate to hold her aloft.  Though I am confused how I might procure wings of my own, having not been born a Fairy.  Or have I misunderstood you?”

 “Wings, pretty girl,” he said, though his lax mouth did not conform to the words, nor did the strangely buzzing voice seem quite his own as it issued from his bulging throat.  “Pretty wings.  Pretty girl.  Pretty, pretty, pretty.”

 Nothing of his speech struck me as particularly pretty, but I suppose that is the manner of all boys, whether born of Adam or of Avalon.

 “Pretty, pretty, pretty,” he continued to say in his buzzing voice.

 “Very so,” I agreed, “or I should like to think.  I have been told my mother was a beauty in her time, God rest her soul.  My name is Esme.  I am French by name, as well as by mother, but British by way of breeding and upbringing.  And by way of Father.  And who might you be?”

 “Who?” he said.

 “You, my silly fellow,” I said.  “What is your name?  What do I call you?”

 “Name?” the Fairy said, his countenance lax.  “No names.  One in many.  Not one at all.”

 Such a voice!  Like the buzzing of insects.  Yet I understood him well enough.

 “So you have no name,” I said.  “Then I should like—with your permission—to name you.”

 “Name?” he said again, and I took it to mean his consent.

 I considered him for a moment as he crouched upon the railing.  Sunlight sparkled upon his diaphanous wings, and he swayed like a drunkard straight from the wine cellar.  Perhaps it was my imagination getting the better of me in this wondrous moment, but I fancied I saw something strange upon his back, glimpsed only edgewise and briefly.  But I could not discern what it could have been.  Likely it was a shadow and his disheveled hair behind his ears and down his neck.

 “I believe your name should be…”  I paused, letting the thought come of its own accord.  Suddenly, it struck me like lightning.  “Ariel!  Yes, of course.  That is who you are, my confused Fairy friend.  It is perfect for you.  Ariel.  How do you do, Ariel?”

 He did not seem impressed, or perhaps he was simply indifferent.  Fairies do not conform to human pretenses in many ways, it seems, and names are just one of many customs they forego.  He watched me with his unblinking eyes and, though I was still enchanted by his presence, I began to feel peculiar.  The gaze of his eyes seemed so faraway, and yet keen, and it quite unnerved me in their contrary nature.  I could not deduce why.  Perhaps it was the faint luminosity in his eyes, such as that of a somnambulist astir in the middle of the night.  The shadow at his back again disturbed me, nor could I distinguish it, even as the sunlight draped him over his shoulders with its radiance.

 At length, there came two voices from down the garden walkway—two figures engaged in private conversation peppered with giggles and chuckles and cooing sighs.  At the sound, Ariel fluttered his wings and took flight, flitting swiftly away into the air.  I left the gazebo, hoping to catch a glimpse of him in a higher altitude, but he had vanished before I had emerged from under the rounded roof.

 Rosamund and Clifford approached, their voices quieting conspiratorially as they neared me, though their spiteful grins remained.

 “Hello, Esme,” Clifford said, quite too familiar for a mere servant in Father’s household.  “How go the daydreams?”

 “Better than my French,” I confessed, which was much to great folly, for it invited Rosamund’s scrutiny at once.

 “Are you studying French?” she asked, as if all that mattered in the world between us was my fluency.

 “No,” I said.  “I was reading and then the most unbelievable thing happened.”

 “Indeed?” Clifford said, exchanging a dubious glance with Rosamund.  “And what was that?”

 I opened my mouth to disclose the encounter with the Fairy, but faltered before the utterance of a single word, realizing the ridicule that should follow.

 “Yes?” Clifford said, patiently.

 When I faltered, yet again, Rosamund scoffed.  “I should say it was that she applied the proper conjugations to her French verbs.  But that is too unbelievable, even for a believer in miracles, such as myself.”

 I scowled at the vexing crumpet, but turned away so she did not observe it.

 “I saw…I saw a wondrous dragonfly,” I said.  “Inordinately large.  Strange.  Unlike any other I have ever seen.”

 Rosamund and Clifford exchanged another look—this look being one of disappointment and disinterest.

 “Dear,” Clifford said to Rosamund, “perhaps you ought to allow her to indulge her fancies a little more, or else she will be grow ever duller until she is fascinated by account ledgers, and so ruin her leisure.”

 “If only she would!” Rosamund remarked, shaking her ugly brown curls.  “She would be so much more manageable, in any case.  And to think she might read account ledgers in French!  Her father would be impressed greatly.  He might even raise my wages!”

 Rosamund laughed heartily and went along her way.  Clifford dutifully followed, accompanying her.  I remained near the gazebo.  I would have been greatly injured by their insolence, but I was too delighted with my newfound Fairy friend to begrudge my petty governess and a lowly servant for paltry slights.  Their comeuppance would come in due time.  The universe is a just place, after all, and the Scales of Justice mete out their punishments eventually, even if only incrementally.

 June 22^nd, 1922

 I am all melancholy!  Ariel did not visit me today. I am afraid that I offended him by refusing the wings he had offered me.  But, honestly, how might a human girl be granted wings?  I am not a Fairy.  Perhaps Fairies may, by magic, confer wings upon one such as myself.  If so, I should like that very much.  Only, I should want butterfly wings, not his meager dragonfly wings.  That being said, with any such wings I should aspire to the very sun itself.  None could keep me grounded, either by order or obligation.  And to think of the look upon Rosamund’s quarrelsome face!  Just to think of her potential expression as I fly away from her, and from Father’s estate itself, would be a daydream made manifest.  I would be irreproachable, for I would be faraway from anyone disposed to be captious.  Such liberty!  Perhaps tomorrow Ariel will return and offer me again his gift, but on better terms.

 I should so very much prefer butterfly wings!

 June 23^rd, 1922

 The Devil take that bovine busybody!  Betty overheard me speaking with Ariel through my window last night.  Why she should be in the family wing, and so late at night, I do not know, but I believe it testifies poorly to a scullery maid’s character that she should be skulking about so late and where she is not wanted.  She forthwith informed Father that I—his one and only daughter—was talking to myself like a lunatic.  What infuriated me more, however, was Father’s credence to the portly spinster in contradiction to my own account of the facts.  Of course, my account was false, and I readily admit it here, but the substance of the catastrophe is that Father does not trust me more than a ridiculous woman who has no business passing by my bedchamber so late in the night.  Or ever!  Were it the morning, I might abide it.  I have sometimes caught her passing my door early in the morning, before the rest of the household had roused itself.  Presumably to wake Father—though Father always wakes later than even myself, despite Betty’s early presumption to rouse him—but that is amiss of the point!  I am too upset to concentrate my powers of reasoning.  Enough for today!  I will write more at a later time.

 June 24^th, 1922

 Having reread the article concerning the Cottingley Fairies—with a greatly expanded personal knowledge concerning Fairy kin—I can only conclude that the Fairies therein photographed are but flat, fabricated artifice meant to swindle credence from the idiotic public.  Indeed, the whole affair is either an absurd fabrication or, less likely, the Fairies photographed are a different breed than that of Ariel, for they are of utterly disparate sizes and dimensions from the friend whom I know so well.  Ariel is as veritable as the very hand which writes this, and though I have never seen his back, there is no doubt of the authenticity of his wings.  They carry him aloft, clearly before my uninhibited eyes.  But what of the Cottingley Fairies?  Never do I see a photograph wherein the dainty creatures suspend themselves freely in the air.  Rather, they are as stiffly aground as any doll within a dollhouse.

 I cannot help but be vexed at the idiocy of the Cottingley phenomenon.  It is a ruse, unless, of course, it is not and there do happen to exist Fairies of diminutive size with wings more pleasing to my sensibilities.  But I simply cannot abide the idea that there would be Fairies with pretty little butterfly wings, and that they should neglect my acquaintance!  Perhaps there are other such Fairies, and perhaps I shall meet them in due time and be invited to dance with them.

 Ariel seems disinclined to dance, and disinclined to mirth generally.  Were he invited to dance in a roundel to the piping of flutes, he would only crouch—as he ever does—and stare imbecilically at the other dancers enjoying themselves.  Is this a common trait of all of his people or is it his own unique predilection?  Perhaps other Fairies bear themselves not so clumsily as Ariel and, so, can keep time enough with music to enjoy moonlit revelries.  At times I think Ariel is soft in the head, like an imbecile, and doleful.  Perhaps he seeks me to enliven his own dolorous life, having been born of a temperament unbecoming of livelier pursuits.

 In my experience the stranger personages known have been of the human variety.  Father’s household, for example, consists of too many bizarre characters.  Jasper, the new gardener, eyed me too familiarly today.  This seems a great feat in and of itself when one realizes that Jasper is a gangly lowbred fool with a wayward eye.  Even so, he eyed me and continues to eye me when he thinks I am not looking.  I abide the impertinence for now— if only for the sake of his widowed mother, for whom he labours to afford a livelihood—but should he persist in this unwelcome presumption, I will have a word with Father and have Jasper spirited away.

 This is not to say that I did not have an otherwise splendid evening.  I read The Goblin Market once again today while Ariel crouched at my window, listening.  There did not appear any transition of emotions across his countenance during the whole reading, but I think he listened quite attentively.  He always does.  Occasionally he interrupted me to ask if I wanted wings, but I steadfastly stuck to the reading.  Even Fairies must be cultivated in the finer Arts that humans have made in their honour.  Someday I will read to him the play The Tempest so he may understand his namesake.  I do not wish to read to him A Midsummer Night’s Dream, lest the bard’s flippancy be misunderstood and a war be declared between humanity and Fairy folk.  There is too much war in the world in the present age as it is.

 June 25^th, 1922

 Once again I caught Betty passing my door early this morning, before the dawn mists had even gathered in their fullness.  She appeared in a disarrayed sort of state, and yet her corpulent smile was one of vast satisfaction, as if she had spent the predawn eating a grand feast when she should have been preparing breakfast for the rest of the household.

 Father did not rise until much later in the day.  Beneath his whiskers was an ever-fixed smile—a slight smile, for Father was never one to indulge overmuch on any conveyance of emotion—and he walked with an energy that bordered on mirth, insomuch as he was concerned.  Perhaps the Fairies had enchanted him and Betty.  I must ask Ariel upon his next visitation.

 June 26^th, 1922

 Having reread some of my earlier entries, I must sadly confess that I do not write as abundantly as I should.  Therefore, I am of the conviction that the only means by which to improve my capacities as an authoress is to write with renewed diligence.  Only discipline and perseverance conjoined together may manifest true genius, however strong one’s natural daemon might be.  Thus, I am inclined to exercise my daemon in pursuit of that subject which most infatuates me presently: Fairies.  Thus, this needful exercise necessitates that I write of my dearest bosom friend, Ariel.

 Ariel—as I have stated in a previous entry—is not one to make merry in a roundel, dancing like Puck beset with mirth.  Rather, he is more the toadstool around which the other Fairies prance and cavort.  Sometimes he is so silent and vacant of expression that I believe mushrooms shall sprout from his ears.  Thus, he is more a dead log than a flower in a playful breeze.  One would think Oberon banished him, so dour is Ariel’s countenance.  Or perhaps Titania hexed him for some unnamed naughtiness in regard to one among her maidens.  Men are wont to do as they do, regardless of race.  Maybe Ariel is Puck himself, discombobulated through magic until all that remains of his former mischief is the impertinence of his steadfast stare.  His eyes are dim lodestars leading to a chilly emptiness.  Sometimes I fear where they will lead me.

 June 27th, 1922

 Father, for all of his earnest endorsements of Reason as a guiding principle, has proven himself guided as much by fancy as ever I was.  He has bought a dog.  Nor is it any small specimen, but a large hellhound.  It is the largest among the breeds I have ever seen —a Great Dane, no less —and I cannot help but think it a terrible indulgence on behalf of someone else ’s whim.  Betty ’s, most likely.  No doubt she sees in its largess a certain kinship to her own breeding.  Large, cumbrous creatures adore other large creatures insomuch as they allay their own self-consciousness.  And so I have yet another proof of Betty ’s plot to ruin me.  The lumbering behemoth is named Caliban —that is what I have come to call him, anyway —and I loathe him so.  Why should I not?  He is ever barking roughly and abounding clumsily, smelling most disagreeably.  Were I inclined to dogs, I should like a sleek, graceful, and small dog of fine breeding and feature, not some cumbersome, dull-footed oaf scrambling in his overeager excitement to keep atop his ungainly legs.  What ’s more, he chases Ariel away, barking and growling whenever I attempt to sit alone with my Fairy friend.  Why, just this evening Ariel was at my window and the fatuous canine did not cease his barking until my friend had flown away.  The belligerent beast had wakened the whole household, yet Father forgave so readily the misbegotten creature that Father seemed not himself at all, but a changeling.  Betty apologized profusely, yet Father treated her tenderly — more tenderly than he should ever have his own daughter were her pet to rouse even half the household with its raucous barking.

 I was so upset about that monstrous hellhound that I have been hitherto compelled to write an account of my grievances in my journal ere I fell asleep.  If I may fall asleep.  My nerves are frayed even now by the continued presence of that brutish beast.  May the inferno reclaim him!  Preferably without delay!

 June 28th

 Father scolded me today.  And what was the offense?  I had barbed words with that corpulent imbecile, Betty.  She had prepared a cake, as per my request, yet had failed to make it as I instructed.  I am very fond of chocolate cakes —as are most people of elegant refinement —and, in this respect, the cake was successful, for it was, by and large, chocolate.  However, the fatal flaw resided in the feature of the cake ’s only having two layers.  This is unacceptable.  All cakes must be possessed of three layers to be concluded wholly successful.  Perhaps the lowborn can enjoy two layers of cake, but those of us who are cultivated know that the cream and the cake must be afforded proper portions in each bite.  It is, I dare say, a scientific law within culinary circles.  But Betty —being of such a hysterical disposition —collapsed in tears at my reprimand.  When Father overheard the chastisement, (in which I was completely justified), he immediately soothed her and sided with the maudlin woman against me!  When I then accused Betty of poorly allotting the amount of sugar, Father took me roughly aside and berated me with such ferocity that I wept a deluge of tears, as opposed to Betty ’s shallow tears.  Yet, Father ignored my heartbreak in favour of Betty ’s.  A cruelty, to be sure, and an absurdity against the laws of Nature.  It is well-established that more finely bred people feel emotions more keenly and deeply than rough-worn labourers.  But did Father soothe his daughter in her time of distress?  Did he recant his harsh words when I wept alike to Andromeda chained to the rocks?  No.  He mentioned something irrelevant to the situation —concerning Betty ’s youngest brother and the War that had come and gone and such —and then left me alone to gather my tears.  What cruelties Father hoists upon his one and only daughter!

 My consolation came only later when Ariel appeared in the garden.  I was sitting among the trellis, on a bench with the woodbine all around me.  Ariel alighted beneath a statue of the Madonna.  He was disposed to listen and so I confided in him, feeling much better while I spoke about, and ate, the cake in question.  I offered him a piece, but he seemed unmoved by it, despite my magnanimous approval of Betty ’s failed attempt.  Perhaps Fairy food ruins the lowly fare that we mortals consume.  Or perhaps Fairies may not partake of our food without trapping themselves forever in our world, much as it is said we will be trapped in theirs should we partake in their feasts.  Nonetheless, Ariel could have benefitted from some food.  He was much more gaunt now than when we first met.  His face was shrunken, his eyes dimmer than ever before, and the blueness of his lips spread along his pallid features.  He looked as anemic as any blue-blooded member of the royal family.

 And then Caliban chased him away.  At times I feel as if the whole of this household conspires to vex me with their every breath!

 July 2nd, 1922

 My nerves have been too racked of late to write.  I have attempted to find solace in the works of William Shakespeare and the poetry of Robert Browning.  The former I adore, but the latter is a prattling knave whose works are deliberately enigmatic in the worst conceivable manner.  Did he think himself so clever for having written such abstruse dribble?  I dare say, his “last duchess ” should have left him at the altar.  I do not understand it, nor do I believe it a failing on part of my intelligence.  Rather, obscurity reveals paradoxically the inabilities of the poet, and Browning ’s works are resplendent in their unrefined dimensions.  Had he written his work less obtusely, he would have benefitted his audience and himself and his poetry with readier comprehension.  I regret having ascertained Father ’s copy from his library.  When I returned it I happened upon him reading to someone in the recessed window, near the globe.  Sneaking surreptitiously within, I found that he was reading to none other than that bovine busybody, Betty!  From what I heard, he was reading John Donne, which infuriated me.  What infuriated me more, however, was the patience with which he explained to the dull intellect of that lowbred woman the deeper meaning of Donne ’s poetry.  As if she could plunge those depths!

 I was so upset that I bumped into a small table and knocked a book loudly onto the floor.  Father perceived me at once and called to me.  I had no recourse but to step forth into the humiliating scene.

  “Is that my book of Robert Browning? ” Father asked.

  “Yes, ” I answered.

  “And did you enjoy it? ” he asked.

 I answered that I did not enjoy it; that Mr. Browning was too overripe with himself.

  “A peculiar way to put it, ” Father said.   “But it is not to everyone ’s tastes.  Perhaps when you grow older, and more familiar with the subtler meanings, you will grow your appreciation for it. ”

 I could not bear this remark!  It allotted me such short thrift, and no less from Father himself!  And while in the audience of that cow-eyed imbecile, Betty!  I stormed out of the library in a hail of tears and have not spoken a word to Father in three days ’ time!  Indeed, the only person to whom I speak at all is Ariel, and only whenever it pleases him to make himself known.  I have no means of summoning him and, so, my confessions and consolations are entirely dependent upon his own capricious nature.  It is insufferable!  I am as a prisoner in my own home!  When will I enjoy the freedom that so many others take for granted?

 July 2rd, 1922

 Today was the anniversary of mother ’s death.  Father went walking about the estate, accompanied by Betty. I mislike that.  When he returned his eyes were red and Betty advantaged herself during his vulnerable state to take liberty of his arm.  The impertinence!  The audacity!  She should have been stripped and beaten like the presumptuous harlot that she is!  She plots grave machinations.  She seeks to endear herself to Father, to make herself indispensable, and thus to establish herself in his intimacy, thereby exacting awful control over him, as belike a sorceress unto King Solomon.  It is most intolerable!  I know not what to do about it, however.  Perhaps I shall put a few of Father ’s hair in a jar, alongside nails and wax, and bury it.  That is a sure trap for witches, from what I understand.

 I have been thinking of Mother today.  She was French, so it seems only congruent that she should have died as she did, from what Father has deemed the “French disease ”.  I do not know the particulars of this vague disease, but it favours all the more my inclination to despise all things French.  Indeed, I am dedicated to being wholly British in bearing and pretense and perspective.  Or perhaps a Fairy, if only I could have butterfly wings rather than those of a dragonfly.

 There are children missing, or so the gardeners were saying today.  Lowborn children from the country, I should say.  The commoners bear so many children that I think one or two missing from each family should not be cause for alarm.  They breed like sows, after all, and their litters are overfull. They seem to think, in their own superstitious way, that a witch has taken them.  Maybe a witch has.  Maybe Betty is one such witch.  Betty has always been beholden to an excess of appetite.  Yet today I noticed that she was ever cramming food into her maw, like some sow soon to farrow.  I ’ve also noticed that she has grown more corpulent of late.  Today I saw her belly strike the table repeatedly as she rolled out dough for our evening supper.  Had I witnessed her nurse a litter of piglets I would not have been astonished in the least.  Maybe she is a witch and she has eaten the lowborn children.  If so, the Fairies will not let her take me.  I will not feed her expanding largess.  I would rather shove her down the stairs.  How can Father indulge her so?  Can he not see how bloated she has become beneath her frock?  The mere sight of her is repulsive enough to disturb the hungriest appetite.

 I resolve myself to speak to Ariel about betty and see what he would advise to do to remove her from the household.

 July 3rd, 1922

 Caliban is dead.  It seems he contracted some virulent variety of worm while entertaining himself in his usual bestial manner.  Clifford and Jasper were given the strenuous duty of carrying the heavy beast out to the field and burying him beneath a rather idyllic oak tree. Why they should wish to ruin the scenic oak with the overbearing beast ’s presence, I do not know.  Betty was not to be consoled, though Father attempted with all the heavenly powers at his disposal.  I could scarcely understand the need.  It was a dog and dogs are earthly beasts resigned to their earthly brevity.  It is not as though an actual soul had perished, only a small ball of nerves and instincts bound up in a skull.  It is no different than a butterfly tumbling dead in a strong wind.  Less tragic, I should say, for I do love the beauty of a butterfly ’s wings whereas there was nothing beautiful about Caliban.  And his death was not so proud as that of a butterfly ’s.  Jasper and his father were afeared to touch him due to the roiling, writhing creatures in his bowels.

 Later today, while everyone was preoccupied with consoling each other over the departed hellbeast, I was visited by Ariel.  I recounted for him the passing of Caliban.  He was as unmoved as I was, though there seemed to be a certain comprehension in his eyes that I rarely saw there.   He is my confidant, of course, and so naturally I am inclined to relay to him the particulars of my daily life, but this was the first time he seemed to understand more than he would say.  There was a “knowing light ” in his eyes.  I cannot express it in any other fashion.  Perhaps he suspected, as I did, that Caliban was the sort of beast that would seek out its own destruction in its own careless, heedless manner.  If so, I am glad Ariel and I are so alike in our thinking.  It accords a certain harmony of thought that bespeaks much in the means of sympathetic comprehension.

 July 7th, 1922

 The nerve of Rosamund!  She had the audacity to label me a “spoiled princess ” in front of Clifford, Betty, Madeline, and countless others in Father ’s service.  I should have slapped her, truly, and brought with the blow a new appreciation for her true standing within the household.  Her impertinence and insolence are unbearable!  I am all tears now and cannot compose myself!  I should like to fly away from here at once!  Away from her torturous lessons on French and Clifford ’s insolent smirks and the disapproval in Father ’s eyes!  The latter I cannot tolerate, for they did not flinch or baulk at Rosamund ’s impudence!  Rather, Father walked away, abandoning me to infernal judgments.  It was his most heartless betrayal yet.  I cannot bear it.  I shall leave here asa condemned soul escaping Dante ’s Inferno.

 Yes, I shall fly away.  It is simple enough.  Or so I should think.  Ariel has offered me my grand exeunt, and I shall receive the offer readily.  Granted, I am not overly fond of the wings I am promised.  Butterfly wings would better serve me, but I suppose his wings are beautiful after all.  They have a spectral sheen to them that is very fetching, in its own way, and I think, upon further consideration, that it is not so much the wings that detract from the overall aspect of Ariel, but that imbecilic stare that inhabits his face.  Undoubtedly, were I to wear such wings as are possessed by him I would better flatter them, and so transpose with the beauty inherent in my features the composite impression of such wings.  Indeed, though Ashputtle wore tatters and was blackened by her menial labours, her natural beauty rendered anew all with her innate loveliness, outshining her sisters when in their more lavish dresses.  An old shoe, thus, may be made beautiful if it houses a lovely rose.

 Perhaps I shall join the Fairies and write of my times among them, recording their habits and customs and creeds.  It would be a grand sensation among Europe.  It may even inspire the world to relinquish all future wars, bringing harmony and everlasting peace to humanity.  Do I flatter myself overmuch in such ambitions?  No.  I dare say I do not.

 July 8th, 1922

 I sat before the pianoforte today, practicing my Moonlight Sonata.  The piano belonged to mother.  Father expects me to grow proficient in the intricacies of the keys, but I would rather have my fingertips feverishly dancing along a typewriter, hammering out bizarre manifestations like a blacksmith at the beck and call of his daemon.  Yet, Father persists in his refusal to purchase the Remington I desire.  My mother was said to be a songbird, with an excellent voice and an excellent adroitness for ivory.  I will not be a songbird in a cage.  I will fly free.  This I vow.

 At times I feel as if I am an esteemed breed of dog, to be groomed and bred and to have no life of its own.  Do I pity myself overmuch?  No.  If pity is considered in degree of recompense to its merit, then I am woefully lacking compensation.  For who has endured such trials and tribulations as have been my breakfast, lunch, and supper?  But I choose to fancy myself an oddity insomuch as all pioneers and iconoclasts tend to be.  If I am alienated among my own home, then it is because I am such a rare specimen of peculiarity that none may share in my propensities and insights, including those sharing my blood.  An anomaly, I will live a life that will not be appreciated except by those generations yet to come, when the collective of humanity progresses beyond the limited vision of their yesteryears.  Perhaps I will be an Aristotle, or a Da Vinci.  The fault lines of the earth shift beneath my feet, bringing seismic change.  I do not doubt that my understanding of Fairy kind will bring mankind out of the shadows of a Dark Age and into a new Age of Reason.  My halo of learning burns bright, and those in my home cannot bear the brightness of it.

 July 10th, 1922

 What a frightful day!  Whereas yesterday had been woefully uneventful, today was extraordinarily tumultuous in its seismic cataclysms.  Oh, but where to begin?  I will start with the greatest calamity of all: Rosamund saw Ariel today!  And just when he was renewing his offer of wings!  She came upon us in the woods.  I had gone walking to clear my mind after a row with Rosamund over my French.  She had accused me of forsaking all learning of it, which I will not deny to be true.  I had quite given it up, for it no longer concerned me, nor would it concern me however much the inducement or admonishment.  I had wholly made up my mind on the matter.  I would leave to join the Fairies.  Let them conjugate that verb!

 While walking I was weeping at my misfortunes.  It was a hot summery day, but the shade of the forest afforded me some small comfort while in my time of woe.  Ariel alighted above me, crouching low upon a branch with the sunlight and shadows battling about his dappled shoulders.

  “Wings? ” he offered.

 I wiped my tears and attempted to smile encouragingly.   “I would like them very much, ” I said.

  “Come, ” he said.  He crawled upon all fours down the side of the tree and beckoned that I should follow him.

 Before I could follow, Rosamund appeared in the dappled shade, pale and shrieking like some banshee in heathen Ireland.  I turned away from Ariel, confronting her absurd expression of horror, but before I could explain the situation, she snatched me by my wrist and yanked me along and out of the forest, senseless in her affrighted state.  Indeed, she did not relent until we were in Father ’s house and before Father, in his private library.

 The melodrama that followed cannot be recorded, so chaotic was it in all its preposterous dimensions, but the conclusion of the misunderstanding was that I was forbidden from leaving the house.  Meanwhile Rosamund —being deemed a lunatic by Father —was exiled from the household itself.  Clifford accompanied her in her departure, looking rather more chivalrous than I could have thought him, especially with those overlarge ears of his.  Perhaps he had an ancestor whom was a knight in another age.  He held his head high and seemed as stalwart in his determination as Don Quixote chasing Maiden Folly.

 Rosamund, on the other hand, was overwrought.  Even unto the last moment of her presence in Father ’s house, she swore that I was in danger.  Through lachrymose pleas she swore to a horror and spoke of the missing children among the commoners.  What drivel!  To think she had been my governess, sworn to elucidate the world for me!  It is too much like the lunatic leading the asylum!  And to think she might actually care for me and my well-being!  A first, to be sure!  But I know better than to believe such poppycock (poppycock —a good word to use as a name for a Fairy who spouts drivel.  Perhaps I shall write such a character based upon Rosamund ’s hysterics).  She was merely attempting to retain her employment in service to Father.  Yet, the one thing Father cannot abide is a woman succumbing to hysterics.  And Rosamund was as hysterical as a rabid mare.  I always knew her frigid governess veneer was a mask for what was, undoubtedly, a very frayed disposition of agitated nerves.  The most outwardly austere of personages are those most likely to unravel when encountering something beyond their habitual, everyday experiences.   Let her gather up her ragdoll nerves in a countryside cottage far from here.  She could benefit from more sun.

 To think that she should have maligned Ariel so!  Deeming him a monster!  The Good People are invariably good if treated so.  The only misnomer to be considered egregious is that of Rosamund ’s title as “governess ”, for she could not govern her own head, let alone mine.

 Despite the chaos of the day, I had the wherewithal to disavow all of Rosamund ’s ravings.  Thus, whereas Father believes Rosamund unsettled in her wits, I have escaped unscathed in Father ’s estimation.  Indeed, I am by virtue of contrast with Rosamund ever elevated in Father ’s estimation.  He is likely to attribute my previous fancies to the influence of my former governess, and so I am absolved of all previous infractions of sensibility by having what Father presumes to be a moon-eyed teacher.

 The advantages in this current predicament are manifold: Rosamund ’s absence from the household and the fact that Father does not believe in Ariel or his Fairy kin.  Thus, my dreams of becoming a Fairy go undiscovered, and, so, unimpeded.  Just so, I fear that Ariel may have been too unnerved by today ’s tumult to return and offer me again my wings.  Perhaps all is ruined.  Perhaps not.  We shall see.

 July 11th, 1922

 There is no concealing it!  Indeed, I wonder how I could not have seen what was so plain before me —Betty is with child!  What a scandal!  I wonder who the father is.  How delicious if it was Clifford!  Oh succulent spite!  To think he might have begat upon her and then fled with Rosamund.  I hope Rosamund is with child as well, and that he should flee her.  Crumpets deserve as much.  But I do mislike Father ’s keen interest in Betty ’s condition.  He would be better to turn her out before she should bear her piglet, lest the scandal sully our household.  What would high society think, knowing we have a maid soon to birth a fatherless child?  They would think it the abode of Bacchus.  I cannot debut in society with the swollen, shadowy figure of Betty overhanging me.  No matter how dignified and regal, I will be tainted by the association.

 But Father —for all his austerities and forbearance —is too soft-hearted toward Betty to lord over his household properly.  It does him no good.  It does the Wellington estate no good, nor its legacy.  If Father wished to do her a good turn he would locate the father of the bastard and rectify him promptly with the mother of his child.

 July 12th, 1922

 It was a strange stretch of hours that passed today, and a stranger evening.  Everyone glances at me sidelong within Father ’s house, almost surreptitiously, as if they hold a secret behind their lips and they fear they may let it slip simply by breathing.  No doubt, it is scorn.  They presume to take great cares with me, but that is a farce of pretense for what is otherwise derisive attitude and malfeasance.  Even Father seemed to be unforthcoming today, condescending only to ask me how I might appreciate an expanded family.  Were Father to remarry, I should not care.  It is beyond my capacity to care.  He should pursue whichever folly chances his fancy and I will pursue mine.  The deathly circumspectness of everyone taxes on me so.  I would rather they reverted to their outright insolence.  I tire of their taciturn tension.  It is like being in a house of snakes, all coiled tautly and ready to strike.

 But poor Ariel!  He suffered a dreadful episode today, the nature of which still eludes me.  We were at the edge of the woods, at that time which the French call l ’heure bleue.  Advantaged by the distraction of Betty ’s condition, I stole out undetected by Father and by the servants.  Ariel was, as usual, crouching upon the branch of an oak tree.  I was reading to him one among my favourite poems, “The Stolen Child ”, by Yeats.  All seemed well enough —even if Ariel seemed not the least interested in what I was reading —when suddenly he succumbed to a violent paroxysm.  At first glance I mistook his fit of trembles to be a Fairy prank.  But when he spoke his voice was so altered from his customarily buzzing voice that I then thought him attempting a more perfected emulation of human speech.  Would that I had more influence over such an affectation, for I would have steered him toward a better-bred tongue!

 In this lowborn dialect he exclaimed loudly.

  “God help me, Miss!  Please!  Fetch…fetch…the priest…Save me! ”

 He nearly fell from the tree, finishing his imitation with a cry of despair.  Shortly, however, he choked back his affected country accent and spoke, once again, in his vibrating Fairy voice.

  “No mind, no mind, ” he said.   “None for you. ”

 I took this to mean that he meant I should not fret over his failed outburst of human speech and should mind my poetry again.  I did so, finishing my reading.  Truth be told, I do not believe that the poem held him in any interest.  Perhaps he did not care much for Yeats.  Perhaps Ariel is prejudiced against the Irish.  I cannot fault him that.

 I believe that Ariel must have been aspiring to repeat what he must have heard some inane, lowbred child exclaim upon seeing the Fairy.  The commoners are a superstitious lot and would fear the Good People when they should instead rejoice in their appearances.  Oh, but you cannot elucidate the idiotic masses.  They misunderstand the simplest of things.  Like Jasper with his wayward eye, they cannot keep their vision of what is true and what is not aligned.  Their perspective drifts wildly awry.

 Yet, I must write down that I saw something strange upon my friend as he contorted and writhed in his sudden paroxysm.  There was something along his back, though I could not discern it while facing him.  It was more than his wings —almost a protrusion of some sort —but it was ambiguous in its form so utterly that I could not conclude its nature definitively.  It seemed almost an incandescently metallic blue or green, shimmering as a spectral shell or carapace.  But it was glimpsed only at slight angles, necessitating a better view from behind.  Perhaps it was simply a fancy of mine.  Perhaps not.  He flew away before I could further discern its peculiarities.

July 14th, 1922

 Betty incessantly complains about the pains she feels in her condition.  She crudely complains, also, as if the scandal was not ribald enough.  Speaking of things gnawing at her from within, too concerned with the repercussions of her Babylonian sins to appreciate how gnawed our household is with the shame of her continued presence.  Father is going to great expenses —both financial and social — to accommodate Betty and her despicable condition, whereas were I mistress of this household I would turn Betty out of my home forthwith, alongside most, if not all, of the other insolent parasites to which Father ’s house has been claimed as host.  Were I Father I would put her down like any crippled mare.  Her condition has made it exceedingly difficult to attend to my journal, or any writing I might venture to do.  She is too loud —a donkey in a storm of biting insects would have more self-possession —and it is a trial to merely jot down these words, so disjointed are my thoughts as the house echoes with her cries.  An opera house suffers less melodrama.

 July 17th, 1922

 O joyous day!  And ever more joyous night!  Ariel led me through the woods, toward the peat bog, and thereupon introduced me to the other Fairies of his acquaintance.  There were four in all: two young boys, roughly the same age and appearance as Ariel, and a tall girl of lovely aspect.  Like my dear friend, these specimens were bereft of clothes, unmindful of their own nakedness, and while I admired the liberty with which they lived, I vowed that even while exulting in my own Fairy freedom I should dress myself up in all manner of pretty gowns so all those who looked upon me would do so with great reverence and envy, being that I would become the most idealized spirit of beauty and liberation.

 And because I would be no hedonistic Fairy.

 The tall Fairy girl spoke, addressing me with a voice similar to any girl ’s my age, except for the buzzing edges of her words.  Her throat vibrated as if to burst.

  “Welcome, ” she said.   “Wings? ”

 She had dragonfly wings like the others, but she had a crown of reeds along her forehead, above her empty eyes.  She must have been the Fairy Queen, Titania.  Who else could she be, being so tall and regal?

  “Wings? ” she repeated.

  “If you would, please, ” I said.

 The two young boys were crouching among the bog.  There was, I realized, a cluster of small pinkish bubbles floating buoyantly atop the sprawl of green duckweed and algae.  One of the boys plucked a single pinkish bubble and brought it forward, holding it up with one hand while wading through the thick, putrid sludge of the bog.

  “Turn, ” the Fairy Queen said.

 I did as I was instructed, eager and excited, but also slightly afraid.  The Fairy boy put the pinkish bubble on the nape of my neck, beneath my curls.  It stung.  There was a sharp, brief pain, like the little sting of a wasp, and then it subsided.  Somewhat.  Truthfully, it has not stopped stinging since he put the bubble upon me.  I cried out and wiped my eyes.  The Fairies assured me it was necessary.

  “Wings grow, ” Ariel said.   “Soon, fly. ”

 They said no more.  I wished to speak with them more, but I was not feeling well.  I left for home, a little staggered and dizzy.  Ariel did not accompany me.  The Fairies watched me leave, staring at me with unblinking, vacant eyes.  I felt cold, and my neck hurt, but I was delighted.  Soon I would grow wings and leave this terrible house behind.  My liberation was at hand.

 July 20th, 1922

 I have had a fever for the last few days, and have been confined to bed while everyone tends to Betty.  Madeline visits me briefly every other hour, bringing me water and asking if I should like anything.  She offers me soup, but I am in no mood for food.  I ask only for water, my diary and a pen.  Very soon, when I am of clearer concentration, I will write my farewell letter to Father.  I hope he will not be too heartbroken at my departure.

 July 22nd, 1922

 My health has improved, but not enough to leave my bed.  Father visited me, briefly, to see how I was faring.  He would not speak of Betty, nor did I wish him to, though I could discern that his concern for her well-being seemed markedly more than my own.  I cannot lay on my back, but must lay on my side, for my nape hurts.  The pain has begun to spread down my spine.  I have not had the strength to rise and peer in a mirror to see how my nascent wings grow, nor do I tell anyone about my wings for fear they will attempt to confine me when my wings have grown a span enough to lift me.  I keep the blanket and sheets up to my chin at all times and tell everyone that I merely feel ill because of my monthly menstruation.  I insist that I do not need to see a doctor.  At times it feels as if I am in a chrysalis of heat and sweat and that my flesh, itself, will split open so my new self may emerge.  At other times I feel as if something speaks to me with a buzzing voice, though no one except myself dwells in my room.  I do not understand it.

 Ariel has not visited me at all.  I have not seen him since I followed him to the swamp to meet the Fairy Queen.  I hope he is well.  I wish to thank him once my wings fully blossom.

 July 24th, 1922

 I overheard the servants whispering in the hall, speaking of monstrous things.  They said that Betty ’s child was stillborn.  The reason for its hopeless birth?  It had been infested with parasites!  From milk, no doubt, for Betty has always been an unmannered cow who enjoys milk straight from the teat.  Doctor Froud attended the delivery ,but he was unfamiliar with the parasite, having never encountered them before.  What I have gleaned from overhearing the servants is that they are not unlike larvae.  Never having been inclined to milk, I feel that my natural predilection is thus validated.  That bovine busybody has reaped her just rewards for an intemperate appetite and intemperate passions.

 With Betty ’s bastard child expired, I had hoped the household would be quieter.  Alas, this wish has not come true, for Betty weeps greatly while Father consoles her.  I loathe this absurd development.  He is too attentive with her, and Betty is too familiar with Father.  But it is no matter.  I will be absconding soon, never to return.  My wings grow!  This I know, for I feel how sensitive they are while abed.  I can walk now, though weakly, and I must be careful not to draw too much attention to my metamorphosis.  Most of the household think I am having a protracted temper tantrum, cloistering myself in my room because of some petty jealousy for Father ’s attentions.  Let them think such!  It facilitates my efforts to keep my secret from them, for they shun me presently.  Beneath my silken shift my diaphanous wings grow, undetected.  Occasionally I swoon, and have even fainted, but it is no matter.  I can anticipate when such episodes are to come, the vibrations growing stronger in my neck and at the base of my head, and so I hasten to my bed, covering up before the weak spell topples me.

 My only difficulty, truly, is ascertaining sufficient food.  I have arranged that Madeline bring me biscuits every other hour, alongside tea and several cubes of sugar.  I eat the sugar more often than I drink the tea, but it is a good pretense for so many cubes a day.  Madeline is a recent addition at the household, so she does not know what is and what is not a routine serving.  Meanwhile, her ignorance serves me as well as any other servant I might need.  Were that all of the servants were so unquestioning toward my commands!  This household would be a tolerable place to abide, at least for a time.

 July 25th, 1922

 Betty has perished.  It is, admittedly, a shame whenever anyone passes away, but why should Father be so lugubrious?  I have never in my life heard him cry so miserably —or express any emotion in his strictly stoic features —and yet he is a ruin of tears as he walks through the garden.  It is not the first instance of a servant dying while in service to the house.  Why should Betty ’s death invoke so many lachrymation?  It is no different than when any dog should die in the kennel, but Father seems to have taken it too keenly to heart.  He oftentimes stands in the scullery, gazing about as if looking for something, then alternately sighing and sobbing in turns.  It is most unmanly for the master of a household to be seen thus by his servants.  They will sense the weakness and exploit it by performing their duties most lackadaisically.  Indeed, I looked out of my bedroom window and caught sight of the gardeners lounging in the shade of an oak tree.  Such ungrateful parasites!  Perhaps when I grow my wings out I shall lift Jasper and drop him from a goodly height.  It may knock his wayward eye straight again.

 July 26th, 1922

 Ariel visited me last night!  Happy news, indeed!  I had thought that he had forsaken me.  Happier news, yet, is that I have grown to understand him now.  I had never noticed it before, but the vibrations in his words form a language in and of itself.  Like the undercurrents on a lake, they flow with meaning beyond the superficial level.  He is more articulate than I ever credited him to be.

 But my pain has increased alongside this comprehension.  This pain should be expected, I suppose.  Growing wings must be painful for all Fairies.  Yet, I console myself in the thought that this pain is but a chrysalis from which I shall emerge more beautiful and independent than ever.  I await that day eagerly.

 July 27th, 1922

 I have been fainting of late.  When the pain becomes too much.  When the vibrations overwhelm me.  I wake in strange places, baffled as to how I came to be there.  This morning I found myself in the woods, up a tree.  It took me a long time to climb down, for I was in great pain and fatigued.  My fingers hurt, the nails broken and jammed with bark.  I scraped my body climbing down.  Only Jasper saw me coming from the woods.  I scowled at him and he looked away.  Yet, his wayward eye remained upon me.  I should like to take a stick and poke his eye out.

 There was great bustle in the house as I rested in my bedroom.  Voices and hurried scurrying.  They talked of country children being found.  They said other things, but in hushed voices.  Father was among those in the large company that left the house.  A rider was dispatched to fetch Dr Froud.  I do not understand what the fussy haste was all about.  I am too tired to.

 July 28th, 1922

 I awoke in the peat bog today.  Shoeless and clueless as to how I arrived there.  Queen Titania was not there, nor were the other Fairies, including Ariel.  I walked home.  My shift was ruined.  Stealing into my bedroom, I changed clothes and had Madeline bring hot water for my tub so I might wash myself and my shift.  I was feverish yet, but also felt clammy, too.  Fatigue drained my strength and I committed the shift to the garden, flinging it out my window.  It plummeted to the earth, caked heavily with mud and peat.  I fell asleep in the tub and did not wake till my fingers were pruned.  Sluggishly I crawled out of the tub and into my bed.  The bed was soaked through, but I did not care.  I slept until evening whereupon I woke and began to write this entry.  I feel groggy once again.  The pain surges.  Must sleep.

 July 29th, 1922

 The pain is unbearable.  The nape of my neck throbs.  I cannot think very clearly.  Writing these words is difficult.  Pain.  The voices outside my window throughout the day.  So many buzzing voices.  I hear them constantly.  It is another language.  Like French.  But I understand so much now.

 It hurts so much.  Cannot tell Father.  I will get my wings soon and be free.  It hurts!  Pain.  Voices.

 Cannot write much.  Cannot think well.  In English.  Hurt.  Pain. Voices.  Head pulses.  Throbbing.  Words.  No.  Madeline, close window.  Voices in garden.  Too many.  Buzzing.  

 Pain.  Back.  Hurt.  Buzz.  Voices.  Stop.  Please.  Stop.

 Examination of Patient #6, Conducted by Dr. Brian Froud on August 3rd, 1922

 After an extended surgery, the specimen has been removed and placed in formaldehyde to preserve its anatomy until further dissection can be conducted.  Like the others, it is an insect belonging to some new species, or perhaps a very old species that has hitherto remained dormant until recently disturbed.  Whichever case it may be, it is a marvel of evolution.  Measuring half a meter long, it resembles mostly insects within the Odonata order.  It is parasitic by nature, however, and attaches itself to a host ’s spine using its legs, thorax, segmented abdomen, and its terminal abdominal appendages.  Its jaws penetrate the base of the victim ’s skull to manipulate the host ’s cerebellum to appropriate motor function.  By vibrating its thorax the insect manipulates the host ’s vocal cords to imitate speech.  The life cycle of these insects —as accurately as I might approximate it —consists of a hive of larvae infesting a host, feeding from the host ’s body until the host ’s death, then the larvae emerge, enveloped in globules that are, in fact, chrysalises formed from the host ’s dead cells.  An embryo is gathered by infected hosts and then implanted into a new host ’s spine for fusion as the embryo matures to adulthood.  Using the host, the adult repeats the cycle by infesting new hosts with its larvae, primarily through ingestion.  The complexity of this life cycle offers hope that we may curtail the colonization by such a pernicious species before it can grow pervasive.

 Due to the nature of the parasitic insect, the patient died during the procedure, as have all of the patients I have attempted to treat with surgery.  The inextricable nature of the creature makes it impossible to remove without a terminal outcome, so intricately bonded is its body with the host ’s spine.  For the sake of the safety of the remaining servants and the master of the estate, I have advised that they leave the household while a thorough investigation is carried out by the local authorities.  I have been told that there will be no total extermination due to the importance of the specimen.  My experience with the specimen will also be required in future examinations, for the British Armed Forces are interested in the specimen and its potential implementation as a weapon to protect Great Britain from future foreign hostilities.  I hope to prove myself invaluable in such an ambition.