Schumann writes a few days later in his diary:  “Mit Ernestine gebrochen.”  Schumann consoled himself later by saying that he did Ernestine no wrong, for it would have been a greater and more terrible misery had they married.  “Earlier or later my old love and attachment for you would have awakened again, and then what misery!...  Ernestine knew right well that she had first driven you out of my heart, that I loved you before I knew Ernestine.”

Ernestine herself wrote him often.

“I always believed that you could love Clara alone, and still believe it.”

In January, 1836, the engagement with Ernestine was formally broken.  Shortly after this, Robert’s mother died.  He was compelled to leave Leipzig in dismal gloom.  He said to Clara simply, “Bleib mir treu,” and she nodded her head a little, very sadly.  How she kept her word!  Two nights later he wrote: 

“While waiting for the coach at Zwickau,

“10 P.M., Feb. 13, 1836.

“Sleep has been weighing on my eyes.  I have been waiting two hours for the express coach.  The roads are so bad that perhaps we shall not get away till two o’clock.  How you stand before me, my beloved Clara; ah, so near you seem to me that I could almost seize you.  Once I could put everything daintily in words, telling how strongly I liked any one, but now I cannot any more.  And if you do not know, I cannot tell you.  But love me well; do you hear? ...  I demand much since I give much.  To-day I have been excited by various feelings; the opening of mother’s will; hearing all about her death, etc.  But your radiant image gleams through all the darkness and helps me to bear everything better....  All I can tell you now is, that the future is much more assured.  Still I cannot fold my hands in my lap.  I must accomplish much to obtain that which you see when by chance you walk past the mirror.  In the meantime you also remain an artist and not a Countess Rossi.  You will help me; work with me; and endure joy and sorrow with me.

“At Leipzig my first care shall be to put my worldly affairs in order.  I am quite clear about my heart.  Perhaps your father will not refuse if I ask him for his blessing.  Of course there is much to be thought of and arranged.  But I put great trust in our guardian angel.  Fate always intended us for one another.  I have known that a long time, but my hopes were never strong enough to tell you and get your answer before.

“What I write to-day briefly and incompletely, I will later explain to you, for probably you cannot read me at all.  But simply realise, that I love you quite unspeakably.  The room is getting dark.  Passengers near me are going to sleep.  It is sleeting and snowing outside.  But I will squeeze myself right into a corner, bury my face in the cushions, and think only of you.  Farewell, my Clara.

“Your ROBERT.”