The death of his mother decided Ruskin to give up the Denmark Hill house, and to transfer his possessions to Oxford or Brantwood Mr. and Mrs. Severn had been established in the old home at Herne Hill, where Ruskin's nursery was always kept as a sanctum for him when staying in London. The departure from Denmark Hill was a severe wrench to him. “Increasing despondency on me,” he wrote in his diary (January 11, 1872), “as time for leaving draws near.” “I write my morning date for the last time in my old study” (March 28). The next entry is at Oxford: “29 March, 1872. Good Friday. In my college rooms, having finally left my old home. I open at and read the 39th of Ezekiel, and, secondly, by equal chance, at the 16th Psalm.” These Sortes Biblicm may be taken as declaring the spirit of the work which he had now been set free to resume at Oxford. “Therefore, thou son of man, prophesy against Gog”; what was this but Ruskin's mission? “I will bless the Lord, who hath given me counsel”; is not this the spirit in which he discoursed upon the heavenly wisdom inThe Eagle's Nest? He had at first proposed for his next lectures three more on Landscape and then three on Fishes.