Wednesday, September 27:
Last night R. had his other regularly recurring dream, that is to say, that he had stolen, and behaved in a cowardly way, passing two men and trying to put the purse down so that they would not see it, but they noticed it, whereupon he woke up. He got up once during the night and read the book on Buddha. In the morning he notices some photographs on my desk, among them those of Palma Vecchio; he finds the women lovely, but the Christ operatic, with his curls and too-great beauty. In the middle of breakfast he gets up and discovers the Saint Cosmas, which I think pleases him. We now talk almost constantly about Buddha; recently R. remarked how impossible it would have been for him to set him to music if he had had to concern himself with mango trees, lotus blossoms, etc.
In the afternoon R. and I go to the Piazzetta, where R. has the idea of taking the steamer to the Lido to fetch the children. On the steamer R. was delighted by a dog, and he said, “What a joy it is suddenly to see such a naive creature before one’s eyes!” We do find Siegf. and Stein, but the girls are unpunctual; we decide to say nothing to them and to play a joke on them, but at supper we discover that they were delayed by a horrible accident; a young lady was drowned, they saw it and also witnessed the despair of the father, husband, and brothers! . . . The evening passes in horrifying accounts of it.
After the children have left, I bring the conversation around to the Society, about which Wolz. has asked me: [At lunch R. told us that he had written “some flattering words” to Frau Materna, then to Niemann about Wilhelmj, since he could not bear such cases of injustice; then he went walking in the direction of the Cannaregio.]