Sunday, January 28:
R. had a restless night; an error of diet (beer) seems to have caused it. He works, and we ride in wonderful weather to the Piazzetta, where preparations are being made for the masquerade. At lunch R. is somewhat out of humour, but when he declares, "The best society thou find'st will show thee thou art a man among donkeys," we laugh heartily, and he tells us that J. Rubinstein's letter to me put that into his mind!
A letter from Richter recommends the baritone singer Sommer; R. replies. Before that he told me that he was not at all interested in hearing about children's ailments in Richter's household. When he comes to my room in the afternoon, I tell him the subject of my conversation was the happiness he must feel when he opens a work of his own and sees its absolute perfection; he denies that this gives him pleasure, since all kinds of thoughts about staging and so on come into his mind. But the public which goes again and again to see the things — they interest him. He also finds pleasure in the very large receipts in Vienna.
Unfortunately something is said in the evening about the heating in Wahnfried, and I, in the hope that something might be done about it, observe that our hot-air heating does not seem to be very good. This annoys R. He calms down, however, and at the end of the evening reads to us the final pages of Gob.'s history of the Persians.