Sunday, October 10:
Today, 23 years ago, I saw R. for the first time!
Cheerful breakfast. Visit from General Herz in full American uniform, also adorned with American decorations! R. reads Schur's book; he laughs over the 'small eyes' and observes that in popular belief this always implies meanness.
Today R. goes for a walk alone; I stay at home with the children.
In the evening our musicians; a quartet by Beethoven. During the first movement R. says: 'This is the elegance of a profound spirit, gratified by form.' He makes a comparison between the hunting choruses in Der Freischütz and in Euryanthe. 'In the former,' he says, 'Weber was still entirely a popular poet; he wrote a chorus in the way people sing it. In Euryanthe he is much more of a dramatist; he writes the chorus as it sounds, from the point of view of Nature.' 'The March in Euryanthe, however flimsy and sketchy it seems, is also conceived dramatically and has a dramatic effect.'
Of his family R. says jokingly, 'I have as much connection with them as with the corn on my left foot.' He talks about October 10, 1853, and toasts it in champagne!