Wednesday, December 4:
R. does a little preparatory work for his talk tonight, while I visit various churches: the splendid Church of the Apostles, Saint Peter, Saint Ursula, Saint Cunibert, Saint Mary in the Capitol, all of them interesting, but it is Saint Martin which especially moves and uplifts me.
Returning, I tell R. about my wanderings, and particularly about my delight with the lower classes of the population in Cologne, who are polite, witty, and lively. I also tell him of the unfavorable impression the cathedral made on me, my dissatisfaction with Gothic architecture when it is presented to one’s eyes as a complete whole, claiming to be beautiful. R. asks me whether I have ever received from any building an impression of beauty and perfection, and I have to reply in the negative.
Sadness over the fate of works of art: “Even something as popular as La Muette cannot in the present day escape being botched.”
Letter from Prof. Nietzsche, who tells me about a very curious letter to him from Hans regarding a musical composition of his which our friend sent to Hans, rather to our amazement.
At 7 o’clock R. gives his lecture to the members of the Cologne Wagner Society. He speaks at the beginning extempore, but talking like that into the blue makes him feel absurd, as he afterward told me, and so he then read a part of his report to the Wagner Societies.
When this is over I retire to my room and write home and to Prof. N., but R. has a banquet downstairs with a military band: the inevitable Tannhäuser Overture, after which R. then begs them to learn some other things. For the Freischütz Overture he sets the tempo for them and explains some nuances. He is amused by a Cologne song, on which one of those present extemporizes, with a refrain: R. Wagner is now here, singing it under the pretext of introducing himself to R. as a singer.
R. is altogether full of praise for the banquet, which seems to have consisted of “nice, earnest people.” But he is very tired and worn out.