Tuesday, December 9:
The night was not bad, and the erysipelas seems to be subsiding, though it has now spread to one ear, which is very painful. A little reading and talking, interspersed with sleep. There is one merry moment when I ask R. whether he would not like to smoke a cigarette; at that very instant he had thought of it himself, and I am able straightaway to give him one, which he smokes very happily. This constant identity of thought between us delights us, and he tells me to make a note of it! Concern over the distress in Silesia, on top of that corn taxes and - no minister present at the debate! The Bayreuther Tagblatt of December 9 enclosed; see notes. Here a man who killed his sweetheart in a fit of justified jealousy has been sent to prison for 12 years, as if it had been a dishonorable act! There is no pleasure in looking at the outside world, and my constant prayer is that I may succeed in keeping R. in his element by concealing the realities of life from him as much as possible. R. told me I was doing with him what, according to a picture in Charivari, was done with the Queen of England when she journeyed through starving Ireland: people stood close together spreading out their coat-tails to conceal the starving inhabitants from her. Interrupted my diary from the 9th to the 20th - I shall now attempt to catch up.