No doubt the drawing ceases to please you on the following day--" "Oh, what nonsense you are prating, old man! (That is exactly what he said.

'Nonsense.') How can a dying child cease to please you?
Of course, if he lived, he might have become a scoundrel, but when he is dying--No, old man, that isn't it.

For I am killing it myself.

I do not sleep all night long, I jump up, I look at it, and I love it so dearly that I feel like stealing it.

Stealing it from whom?
What do I know?
But when morning sets in I feel that I cannot do without it, that I must take up that cursed pencil again and create anew.