Friday, May 2:
R. had a really good night, and we are pleased with the success of our long walk. But today it is even colder than yesterday; it is reported that the vegetable crop has been killed by frost, and at breakfast we make all kinds of speculations about the world’s coming to an end through cold. R. says we should look ahead, rent a house on the equator in good time, and bring Fidi up to be an African explorer, so that he can discover the right place for his children. We part in gay tenderness, and at lunch R. tells me he has found a starting point and begun his work for the Bayr. Bl. At breakfast we talked about the biography. R. wonders whether he can continue to write truthfully in such detail, and he decides that he can, for truth and fiction, he observes, both suffer precisely because they are in fact neither the one nor the other.
I do not know what makes him think of Der Freischütz, but he points out to me how good it is that Caspar in the Wolf’s Glen speaks below while Max is singing above; maybe Weber did not deliberately aim for this effect, he says, but the overall impression is quite wonderful. In Paris, of course, Caspar sang too. The raw weather permits only a short walk in the palace gardens. R. then writes to Herr Tappert, returning his article - a very nice letter, kind and truthful, as is always his way.
In the evening we read Carlyle’s essay on Burns, and some poems by Burns as well, with interest. Georg calls us to watch the ratcatcher, in attendance at Wahnfried to protect our poor hens! We are amused by the lively owl, sniffing about everywhere. R. said recently that our peacock was like one of those vain poets: nobody takes any notice of him, and so he puffs and blows himself up and rattles his feathers.