Monday, May 13:
Loldchen in bed, always the problem child! A curious episode causes us much merriment. Returning home from my birthday preparations, I find R. in not such a good mood as usual, and I take the opportunity to disclose to him a domestic trouble with which I would not otherwise have bothered him, for fear of spoiling his good mood; he is so absent-minded, however, that he simply, for the first time in his life, offers his hand to the girl about whom I have been earnestly complaining, thus contravening my intention of dismissal, etc. When I explain the situation to him, he chides himself for his incredible absent-mindedness, but I have to laugh heartily, and everything dissolves, as always with us, in great merriment!
In the evening R. rehearses with Herr Jager, I also had a rehearsal with the children; when we returned home, I found R. exhausted and out of humor, all the wretchedness of the theatrical world coming back to him. Oh, solitude!
In the evening reading, but before that more about the attempted assassination; everybody indignant, but nobody shocked at belonging to a society in which penury is rampant. Fine description of the state of mind of Robsart the father in Kenilworth, the projected hunt on which he turns his back in silence.