February 3 + 

This morning on arriving at S. Kensington, went straight to a Chemist’s shop, but finding someone inside, I drew back, and went on to another. + 

“Have you any morphia tabloids?” I asked a curly-haired, nice-looking, smiling youth, who leaned with both hands on the counter and looked at me knowingly, as if he had had unlimited experience of would-be morphi nomaniacs. + 

“Yes, plenty of them,” he said, fencing. And then waited. + 

“Can you supply me?” I asked, feeling very conscious of myself. + 

He smiled once more, shook his head and said it was contrary to the Defence of the Realm Act. + 

I made a sorry effort to appear ingenuous, and he said: + 

“Of course, it is only a palliative.” + 

With a solemn countenance intended to indicate pain I answered: + 

“Yes, but palliatives are very necessary sometimes,” and I walked out of the hateful shop discomfited. + 