In a letter dated July 7, 1882, Hearn tells Mr. Watkin that he had entered into an arrangement with Worthington, the publisher, for the issuing of his translation of Gautier's stories made at Cincinnati. It was to cost him one hundred and fifty dollars, but there was an understanding that this money was to be repaid by royalties on the sale of the book and any extra profits. He announced his intention of going North in a few months by way of Cincinnati, as he wished to see Worthington about his new publication. Though he was making, he said, the respectable wage of thirty dollars a week for five hours' work a day, he felt enervated by the climate, incapable of any long stretch of work, and thought change to a northern climate for a bit might stimulate his intellectual powers. He then touched on the changes that passing years had wrought in his outlook on life. "Less despondent, but less hopeful; wiser a little and more silent; less nervous, but less merry; ... not strictly economical, but coming to it steadily." His horizons were widening, the accomplishment of a fixed purpose in life was really the only pleasurable experience, and the grasp of a friendly hand the only real satisfaction of an existence that wisdom declared a delusion and a snare.
Hearn at times indulged in exaggerated fits of economy, the one thought that animated him being the idea of freeing himself from the yoke of dependence on the whims of employers--from the harness of journalism. He made up his mind to keep house for himself, so hired a room in the northern end of the French quarter, and purchased a complete set of cooking utensils and kitchen ware. He succeeded in reducing his expenses to two dollars a week, and kept them at that (exclusive of rent), although his salary rose to thirty dollars a week. Having saved a respectable sum, he formed the fantastical idea of trying to keep a restaurant, run on the lines of the cheap Spanish and Chinese restaurants he had been wont to frequent. "Business--ye Antiquities"; hard, practical business! he told Krehbiel; honourable, respectable business, but devoid of dreamful illusions. "Alas, this is no world for dreaming."
The venture ended as might have been expected. Hearn had not inherited the commercial instincts of his ancestors who sold oil and wine in the Ionian Islands; his partner robbed him of all the money he had invested, and decamped, leaving him saddled with the restaurant and a considerable number of debts. A swindling building society seems to have absorbed the rest of his savings.