Friday, October 14:
Orleans taken by Bavarian troops. “That we should live to see this, the humiliation of the French nation!” R. says. “And on top of that a wife and a son—is it not a dream?” He adds with a laugh, “Since I have known you, I have been unable to live without loving a woman.” A ray of sunshine cheers us greatly, music, we think, and R. suddenly says: “I should like to know whether there is anything in any art more like this than the point in the Eroica where the theme is played in three different keys in succession. That is will, utterly freed and relieved of the weight of individuality. The material is always a limiting factor; one has only to think of human beings dancing, resting, drinking, sleeping, and so on—all that ceases to exist here.”
He orchestrates, makes Fidi-music, as he says. Fidi with us at lunch. Afterward with the three girls to the fair; great delight in the Punch and Judy show, whose director distinguishes himself through his lively (Silesian) dialect and his good ideas, his puppets through their energetic movements. “The elegant visitor” standing beside the carrousel! I let the children ride on it, Rus runs after them. In the evening more Don Juan.