Tuesday, November 5:
We are preparing for our departure tomorrow when we hear from Herr Feustel that the people in Vienna have still not replied, so our journey is postponed indefinitely. Letters and telegrams have been sent to four of the Viennese, none has replied, yet in summer they assured us the money was available! R. greatly vexed; he cables to Uncle Liszt. Dreary period of waiting, during which one cannot work.
"Oh, sun, thou accusing flame!" Rich. exclaimed yesterday evening; I liked this poetic expression very much, and he told me it was old, Heine had once quoted it, "and he knew how to catch Germans." As we are talking about music and cadential form, I make R. laugh by saying that the reason people so love cadences is because the music will then stop and they will no longer have to exert their brains.
Domestic tasks of all sorts. In the evening visit from Feustel and the mayor, the latter on the question of legal adoption. The people in Vienna have still not replied; R. has now turned to my uncle for help.
In the evening after supper, during which Fidi gives us much amusement with his replies: "Do you know the picture?" "No, I know only the sweetshop and the tailor's," we take up J. Grimm's preface to Reineke Fuchs with great enjoyment. The comparison between fox and wolf, which, as R. observes, "reflects the whole world," delights us to the highest degree, and the answer to the question, "What makes the wolf so wise?" "His many fruitless expeditions," arouses us to almost uncontrollable laughter; in that way we all became wise.
Truly exalted by our enjoyable reading, we go off to our beds.