A new journal deserves a new entry. I write this on a train, watching telegraph poles slip by like stolid soldiers, listening to the hum and crack of the tracks below, and hearing the chattering voices all around me in myriad languages. The trip from Germany is as a trip to another world; so much change in the people and the food has occurred in this brief time that I hesitate to think what might await elsewhere.

They have brought me soup; I do not eat it because it contains a harsh lump of meat and fat, which is perhaps as appetizing as a stone, but there are bland crackers and salt to be had, which seem fine enough. Would it seem that I could get a sour tuber covered in the salts of the earth or a thick berry paste, I would, but as father says, such things are not looked at well in society, and I must make do with washed salad in most places.

Saturday has come again; I have always liked Saturdays. They once heralded the last free day before the week begins once again, though the definition of free days during my early years was always so nebulous that I hesitate to think what I imagine as freedom: hard labour, gardening, chorus instruction (something I was just as skilled at as a crow), and dares from the others that would so often get us all a beating from the superior. This particular Saturday has been bright, a welcome cry from the dismal storms that followed my journey thus far.

Father was correct, again. Immersing myself wholly in English has made the transition much easier. Considering, however, the vast majority of the trip required a jaunt through France, I daresay I should have studied French, as well, rather than refer to a book and butcher the language so finely and in so constant a manner. I have met several interesting individuals, one being an electrician from Genova who sits across from me in my booth (even now he eats my soup), and continues to ask about my condition. I find it is easier to be ill than be an object of fascination. At home, the visitors to the manor are all so direct in their manner, wanting to see a brother or sister or myself perform some amazing feat of strength or show the places where our unnatural bones jut out some way or another, or ask so many questions of varying inanity and invasivness that the process has become largely routine; here, where I am merely ill, most individuals seem to grant a wide berth to myself, and I am largely left alone except for the very young and very curious, both of whom are often more interesting to talk to.

This electrician fits the latter. He has chattered on about something being worked on in America by Alexander Graham Bell, something about how electronic devices could produce hard consonant sounds. I am familiar with the material, as an individual by that name had been mentioned by father's friend von Helmholtz, who had produced acoustic vowel sounds with tuning forks and had sent someone by that name one of his books about the experiments (I keep a bass Helmholtz resonator myself; I find the directed sound properties they possess to be quite intriguing). I had, however, been unaware of this particular line of research. I must write to Mr. Bell and see if I cannot procure a copy of his papers.

This man has asked repeatedly about the state of my condition, and why the rain over the past few days has caused me such pain. I have managed to weave a tale about an affliction of the bone and muscle that causes great discomfort in the humid air (this is at least partially true; the brass and copper that makes up some of the primary joints do inflict some pain in times of great humidity, but it is more a matter of discomfort and fades over time. My siblings also report this.), and terrible burns I suffered as a child (this is quite blatant, but the excuse perfectly covers why I am loathe to remove my bandages). He is not satisfied with this, but his pressing curiosity thankfully wanes as the trip goes on.

No pressings in this journal yet, I'm afraid. I've not yet encountered anything I could not see in the garden at home, though the only flowers I have seen are those peddled at the markets and the only trees far off in the rolling distance; much of this trip has gone through spectacular cities and towns, however, testaments to the fire of knowledge that drives mankind through dark nights and which has doomed at least one titan to a horrid fate. I have often wondered if that fire was good or ill, and was told repeatedly as a child that is was always a terrible thing, though I am alive, and without it, I and my siblings would be nothing more than an idea jotted down on paper, relegated to nonexistence. I prefer to think that it is nebulous and amoral in its nature, for I believe morality is only wrought by men and thinking kinds, not by passive materials.