12 November 1900

 

I told the nurse who comes daily to dress the wound in my ear that I do not expect to recover.  But he smiled and said nothing: I suppose it was wrong of me to expect him to have any concern for my physical welfare, since nurses never do.  I would not mind death if it were not for the ugliness of those who minister to it.  When I went last year to the dentist to have my teeth removed, the sight of the vice and the gas pump had no effect upon me.  The real fright was the dentist - when I saw him, I called at once for anaesthesia.