Thursday, January 4:
R. slept well, and my consultation with the eye specialist is reassuring, which I tell R. with relief. He frequently calls me into his room to tell me various things from the history of the Persians, the intellectual quality of which he finds incomparable. He writes splendidly to Feustel (I have his letter copied), and at lunch — since news of the suicide of Count Wimpfen has also been received — we discuss this subject. R. cites the case of Nerva (I think he means Otho) as a suicide committed for the sake of others; my father will not accept this, and this greatly annoys R., who complains of what he calls my father's "turbulent somnolence" [the last ten words obliterated in ink by an unknown hand]. On top of this, he feels constricted by the reduction in our living space, and this makes everything seem disagreeable to him!
In the meantime Marie Donhoff puts in an appearance, charming and friendly; even R. finds her pleasant, though he is usually harsh in his judgement against her, and he recently said, "What sort of a human being is that, who thinks society more important than anything else?" She wins him over by talking very earnestly about Malwida's influence on her mother in persuading her to regard things from the standpoint of ideals.
In the evening R. and I are alone together, all the rest at Princess H.'s. We talk as we always do when we are alone. Gob.'s ideas — on the scholars' conception of the Temple and Jerusalem, his statement about the Greek philosophers ("they were artists") — provide plenty of material. Then R. comes back to Carlyle's idea about colonies and answers it to the effect that things which have not yet discovered their roots cannot perhaps be described as old. Then he tells me that he does not intend to write his article about male and female; at the most he will indicate his thoughts on the subject as opportunity arises. Unfortunately, however, his attitude toward my father is becoming increasingly difficult and incensed!