Thursday, October 12:
Loulou’s birthday, lovingly celebrated as usual. R. Pohl departs. The children play; R. works; I write to Herr von Gersdorff, entrusting the Tristan affair to him. Hermine’s sister writes me a letter full of invective; R. takes this matter into his own hands and sends her 100 florins.
Still no news from anywhere regarding nursemaids. While the children are at a puppet show with Vreneli, I converse with R. about my father and his influence on people with such things as Norma, Somnambula, etc. “He was the illustrator of a vanishing world,” R. says, “as, for example, with his gypsy airs, which have no particular pretensions. The center for that sort of thing was Paris, now dead and gone.”
In the evening Carlyle, after I showed the children slides on the magic lantern.