Friday, January 19:
He slept well and is in such a merry mood that the doctor is unable to massage him for a while. He told him that the stomach tube was an invasion of his personal rights! At lunch we chat contentedly, sharing memories of Prince Georg. Around 1 o'clock he goes to call on "the princes" — this stems from our meeting Count Bardi yesterday and not recognizing him; R. went after him to apologize and then announced his visit. He finds, as he tells me, two charming Austrians, with whom he jokes. We then take our walk in the botanical gardens.
Over coffee, L'Italie brings us, to our astonishment, all kinds of news from France — Prince Napoleon arrested in consequence of a manifesto. This evokes a lively response in us, since we had just been talking at lunch about that terrible 2nd of December and the admiration for Napoleon III it aroused in the kings of the world. (The fact that hunts are preceded by hymn singing is also discussed.) R. talks to the doctor about vegetarianism and deplores the stupidity of vegetarians who despise milk, which is after all the food Nature gave us.
In the afternoon we ride to the Piazzetta, R. and I, and delight in Venice in the moonlight. In the evening he continues reading Don Carlos to us; we end with the scene between Marquis Posa and Carlos in the fourth act. R. is delighted with the slim and free figure of the Marquis, and, when I say to him that I believe these things, now all but ridiculed, will still grow in people's estimation, he says: "Of course. It is Aryan ideality, and it is we who have produced it." Then he plays the beginning of the Ninth! He compares it to an improvisation and says: "Such sublime naïveté! How long it takes for one to reach this stage! In the early symphonies he still has scaffolding around him."