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Late in December, 1867, Charles Dickens lost his pocket diary. In a letter to his sister-in-law, he described its disappearance as something " 'which,' as Mr Pepys would add, 'do trouble me mightily.' " Dickens preferred to destroy his diaries himself rather than leave them to accident and prying eyes. The disposable books were never meant to preserve the past for future savoring, only to keep track of Dickens's busy present and immediate future, especially his endless railway travel between his mistress, Ellen Ternan, and the far-flung platforms on which he gave dramatic public readings from his work. The pocket diaries provided no secret relief, as diaries sometimes do, ...