14 July

Uncle Jack still gone. I guess I know what that means. I must find a way out of this today. Must discover some fun. I have only just escaped from dear Miss Prism by telling Dr. Chasuble a little white lie. I informed him that Miss Prism had a slight headache and suggested a "stroll." He said he would "Hang upon her lips!" Then he called her *Egeria*! Said it was a reference to the *pagans*! I think he has been making love to her!

!!!!!! Ernest is here!!!!!!! At last! And he is exactly as I imagined him. He says I am the "visible personification of absolute perfection" and then he proposed! 3:00pm More later. No, now I am to be a married woman, I will put aside childish diaries once and for all.

(Ed's note: there follow no more entries, and documentary evidence has not been found to provide any further information on a Cecily Cardew, aged 18, from Hertfordshire.)

13 July

Oh I *do* hope that when Ernest and I get married he will have a sister that I can make mine. I have always wanted to have a sister to sleep with. It is so very lonely here with no one to share all the wonderful secrets of your life. I certainly can't share anything with Uncle Jack! He is gone again, in a highly nervous state. Uncle Jack seems quite agitated!

12 July

Uncle Jack back this afternoon for tea, and whistling (!) a tune which I highly suspect may have been from an *operetta*! Ghastly operettas! Wherever can he have learnt *that* sort of music (if one can call it music)?

11 July

No letter from Ernest in absolute days! Perhaps he does not love me anymore. But no, I am sure that certainly could not be. Perhaps, the consequences of his latest indiscretion have prevented him from writing to his little Cecily.

Oh goodness, I hope he has not been *killed*! It would be *most* ungenerous of him to die *before* marrying me.

10 July

Uncle Jack said at dinner this evening that cousin Ernest would have to choose between this world, the next world, and Australia. I suppose he will choose Australia becasue there certainly will be many opportunities for adventure there. Uncle Jack is going up to London this weekend to buy dear Ernest's outfit. How handsome he will look in a safari outfit (Ernest, not Uncle Jack)! I *do* hope Uncle Jack will get him one of those explorer helmets—I *do* so love a man in a hat.

I am very excited to get letters from Australia. I wonder if they use stamps. It is terribly *wild* in Australia.

9 July

I have had the most unimaginable *shock* this evening! Uncle Jack has announced that cousin Ernest is going to be emigrating immediately. I can not imagine what desperate trouble he can have gotten himself into that would require such entirely *dire* measures, but I feel I certainly must prepare myself to live as a widow, for I fear I never shall see my darling Ernest more. He has not written to inform me of his position or of any plans to spirit me away with him, and so I am quite entirely *bereft*.

8 July

Ernest says I must not fear the attentions of mere *boys*. He says he will come for me soon without fail, and that I am to be a very *patient* little girl and think of him often. Oh, my prince! I know some day he will come for me. But will he ride a white horse or a black?

Tomorrow I simply will be obliged to tell Uncle Jack that I can marry no one but Ernest. In matters of matrimony, one must take a firm stand.