Written against this in the margin of the draft are two lines of which only the first can be deciphered. It reads:
The evening is the time to praise the day
I feel pretty sure that my friend was trying to incorporate here something he and Mrs. Shade had heard me quote in my lighter-hearted moments, namely a charming quatrain from our Zemblan counterpart of the Elder Edda, in an anonymous English translation (Kirby’s?):
The wise at nightfall praise the day,
The wife when she has passed away,
The ice when it is crossed, the bride
When tumbled, and the horse when tried.