Tuesday, December 27:
A good night for R. Pleasure in the Fl. Blätter, also in the gifts for me which arrived belatedly. Less in Mme. Remusat, since he has reached the point where Nap. sets up his court. The weather, however, is still not good, and it keeps bringing R. back to the Orient; as we are on the way to the Villa Camastra he talks of this ancient civilization, which we in the West have copied “like thieves.”
In the evening Blandine persuades Rubinstein to play the final movement of [Beethoven’s] C-sharp Minor Sonata; when I remark to R. that this kind of music is not intimate, but demands a concert hall, he says, “Yes, of course,” and goes on to deplore the many things in art which are dying out. Then, to our enjoyment, Rub. plays some mazurkas and also a Chopin waltz. The day before yesterday, in connection with Polonia, R. had spoken enthusiastically about the mazurka, a creation of the Polish people. We play whist, and R. is in very high spirits, making jokes which are impossible to transcribe (one of them, for example, as he leaves the room: “I now withdraw like a hippopotamus”), and I go off to bed glad about this.