Thursday, October 5:
Departure for Sorrento; as the ship leaves, beggars swim around in the water, among them a boy who stands out on account of his brown skin, his beauty, liveliness, and agility, "like something direct from Nature's workshop," says R. He gathers the coins thrown into the sea in his mouth.
On the ship, singers and guitarists and fiddlers, cheerful and mournful popular songs, at the same time wickerwork and oysters being bartered, all languages being spoken; while a dark-blue sea sings its eternal lullaby, and the blue line of hills encloses it all. A curious dream!
Is it its strangeness or its familiarity that makes us feel so melancholy, a gentle yearning, I might call it, but for what? Not for living! A gentleman from Magdeburg speaks to R.; he was at our performances and speaks very nicely about them.
Sorrento, the Hotel Vittoria: we have taken the little cottage beside the hotel, wonderful peace. During the siesta hours R. and I read, to ourselves, Sismondi's Les Républiques d'Italie.