I've been allowed to quote from the 1856 diary of Agnes Griffiths, a farmer's wife from South Pembrokeshire. I've said before I finddiaries very revealing.

If mydairies were ever to be published, I would be mortified. I often speak to myself in my diaryand I want to keep my thoughts private (some of them, anyway. Can't remember who said 'If everyman's thoughts were known, we'd all be hanged'). My sentiments exactly.

Major purchases, placesI went during the day are duly recorded.I never writeabout world events or what work I've done on the novel, butI often write aboutwhat my grandchildren do and say.

(I asked Oliver to sit on my knee when he was six years old and he told me I should have a baby because I like hugging people. I was fifty something then, so it would have been a miracle.

He was three whena chocolate melted in the sunand thoughta bee had licked it.

WhenHarrywas ten he told Oliver to 'go to see' to me on the computer.)

And so on. Of no interest to anyone outside the family, at all.

Peter's diaries are in his small, neat hand. (He wouldn't find it too difficult towritehislife-story on the back of a postage stamp, in much the same way as a Chinese calligraphercopied the Bible onto a grain of rice).

Hewrites the dates down in advance for dental and doctor appointments, car servicing, letters he sent and their content.Thirty years of his diaries are stacked neatly in a drawer.The family often ask him to check back to see when they did something or other.The diaries are meticulousand a true record of what has happened.

Agnes Griffiths's dairy reveal a hard-working life. Each week,she bakedfifteen loaves. On Thursday, September 14, 1856,her Christmas preparations began. She made a plum pudding, using sixteen eggs, whichcost two pence each and were 'very dear'.Two geese were killed for market, tocompensate for the money she would have made selling the eggs. All this and looking after 'darling baby Gladys', who was just a few months old.

I love Agnes's diary, for its honesty and for allowing me a glimpse of household life all those years ago.

However, there are certain pompous so-called 'diaries' thatI can't abide. These are not truediaries, but concocted fiction,written for the sake of publishing a book and it shows, of course it does.The fictitious 'diary' becomes a hookto hang a book on.

Irecommend'Lord Hervey's Memoirs', now out of print but you might find a second hand copy. Spiteful, foppish, malicious, keenly intelligent, it is an undoubted treat.