Tuesday, January 20:
“Whoever acknowledges no nation as his own might just as well not have been born.” “I am one of them,” I say laughing. “A woman takes the nationality of her husband; men have always taken foreign wives, who are designed, like birds, to carry the seed hither and thither. A woman follows her love, if she loves a German man, she is German.” R. is orchestrating the 2nd act, this the best news of the day! Utterly springlike today, starlings twittering in the palace gardens.
In the evening continued reading the book on India. Before that, a visit from the dean, who strangely enough is expecting Bishop Ketteler to found the German national church. The Protestant clergy are said to have voted almost wholly for the Catholic party, and from the womb of this fragile, desiccated church nothing more can be expected.