Thursday, July 22:
Up at four o’clock, to Beckenried in the carriage, from there with our friends and Loulou by steamer to Brunnen, then up the Axenstein. Fine day, splendid moonlit evening; spent the night in the Pension Aufdermauer. R. cheerful in spite of great fatigue.
I deep in thought; the children’s future hovers before my eyes. Judith’s unfortunate family life makes me really feel what I am to the children and what I can yet become to them. It is as if I have had to suffer such woe in order to gain knowledge in their behalf.
Not for a moment, however, do I seek to relieve my heart of the pain which is racking it; I am downright frightened of feeling it less in the emotion of great happiness. As long as I live I wish to atone.