Saturday, April 24:
Asked the doctor about my mother and received comfort from him, which a letter in the evening from Claire confirmed. The children better.
R. discusses with me the incident yesterday and feels that he was punished enough for his foolish anger by not going on the walk with me. Then he writes letters, among others to Semper, to let him know the truth concerning the Munich festival theater affair.
Arrival of a pamphlet, R. W. — l’homme et le musicien; much of it good, much wretched, always the same old stories of ingratitude, etc.
Gave Loulou a geography lesson and then showed her on a hazel twig how blossoms and fruit evolve. Thundery evening. R. returns from town, having been bitten by a dog! Terrible shock. However, the doctor says it is nothing serious.
Letters from Mathilde, Schuré, nice and manly, and Heim, who describes all the honors now being heaped on Semper. Appointed principal architect for the building of the cathedral in Berlin, then commissioned by the Emperor of Austria as a “famous master” to carry out work on the Hofburg and other buildings!
R. feels the rebuff to the King of Bavaria very deeply. He says he can imagine in what a curious light he must appear to people, since he is the only person to whom the King has behaved well. It would have to happen to him that a case of royal enthusiasm should turn out to be a case of monomania.