Sunday, October 29:
I write a long and detailed letter to Hans and ask him for permission to have the children converted to Protestantism. Family lunch and children's games until Marie M.'s visit. After she has gone, I read the children Tieck's Blond Eckbert, which makes a great impression on me too.
Monday, October 30: Curious anonymous letter from Graz: the eldest daughter of Paradise commissions a Mass for the Holy Grail, which will be demanded when the time comes. "Obey, keep silent or you will die"--signed Easter Flower. Addressed to the Mastersinger R. Wagner in Berlin, from the new Easter Realm.
I visit Marie M. and there meet Frau von Loe, who makes no great impression on me. In the evening our friend comes to us; we talk about the King of Bavaria. He is said no longer to be permitted to ride, as he has a hernia, and many unpleasant things alarm me very much. God knows!
R. relates that it was maintained in the Musikalische Zeitung that he was no true musician, the proof being that he had never ventured into the field of the symphony. "Well," R. says, "I should like to know who has ever written a symphony, except for Beethoven! How idiotic to make a generic term out of one man's most individual characteristic, as if everybody had to write symphonies like that." He plays us the Norns' scene and Siegfried's entry from Götterdämmerung, stirring our emotions indescribably.