Thursday, May 16:
R. is still happy with his reading of Renan’s Saint Paul, but he tells me in the morning that he always feels the need to consult Luther’s translations; for someone who has been brought up a German, its language is so familiar, and he prefers to look up the Luther text rather than the Greek. R. works, only 4 lines of text, he tells us, but very remarkable ones!
In the afternoon a rehearsal, which proves something of a strain on me, so that I have no voice left in the evening, which is no help in conversation. R., somewhat agitated, says he wanted to make music this afternoon, but Herr R. had gone off suddenly. So now in the evening we go through the glorious scenes of the second act, and I should have been full of bliss if I had not had the feeling that R. was not at ease.
It is remarkable with what confidence Herr R. plays something so new to him; indeed, he can even sing the text straight off at the same time. “What coldness that requires,” says R., “what presence of mind!” R. praises an article by Prof. Holtzendorff, who seizes the occasion of Vera Sassulich’s trial in Russia to expound present-day legal procedure.