Cold quite severe. Time distributed as usual. Evening at home.

I was so much taken up all the morning with the important task of paying bills that I hardly had a moment for any other kind of occupation. They come in so thick and heavy that it is very difficult for me to find the wherewith to meet them, especially as my father’s resources do not yet for some time come in.

Home where I read Oedipus. The rest of the day passed as usual. It is impossible to be more monotonous than we are this year. Not the slightest variety. I read to the children at home in books suitable to them and then read to my Wife from Walpole’s Letters, which are quite amusing and lastly write something or other upon the President’s Message. But whether to publish or not I have as yet great scruples.