She was as much interested in the more important questions that affected us as in the accidental details of our life in relation to society, and she had the magnetic power of extracting the very best out of those with whom she associated.  Her daughter gave one quite a different impression.  She was barely fifteen and had a rather dreamy look on her young face, and was at the stage ’in which womanhood and childhood meet,’ thus allowing me to pay her the compliment of calling her ‘the child.’  During our lively discussions and outbursts of merriment, her dark pensive eyes would gaze at us so calmly that we unconsciously felt that in her innocence she unwittingly understood the cause of our gaiety.  In those days I suffered from the vanity of wishing to recite my poems aloud (a proceeding which, by the bye, annoyed Herwegh very much), and consequently it was no difficult task to induce me to read out my Nibelungen drama.  As the time of our parting was drawing near, I decided I would read Siegfried only.

When Liszt was obliged to leave for Paris on a visit to his children, we all accompanied him as far as Strasburg.  I had decided to follow him to Paris, but the Princess intended going on from Strasburg to Weimar with her daughter.

During the few spare hours of our short stay in Strasburg I was asked to read some of my work to the ladies, but could not find a suitable opportunity.  However, on the morning of our intended parting, Liszt came to my room to tell me that the ladies had, after all, decided to accompany us to Paris, and added, laughing, that Marie had induced her mother to change her plans, as she wished to hear the rest of the Nibelungen poems.  The prolonging of our journey, with all its delightful incidents, was quite in accordance with my taste.

We were very sorry to part from our younger friends.  Bulow told me that Joachim, who had been holding himself rather aloof, could not forget my tremendous article on ‘Judaism,’ and that he consequently felt shy and awkward in my presence.  He also said that when Joachim had asked him (Bulow) to read one of his compositions, he had inquired with a certain gentle diffidence, whether I should be able to trace ‘anything Jewish’ in it.

This touching trait in Joachim’s character induced me to say a few particularly friendly words to him at parting and to embrace him warmly.  I never saw him again, [Footnote:  This was written in 1869.] and heard to my astonishment that he had taken up a hostile attitude to both Liszt and myself, almost immediately after we had left.  The other young men were the victims, on their return to Germany, of a very funny although unpleasant experience, that of coming into contact with the police at Baden.  They had entered the town singing the same bright tune of the fanfare from Lohengrin, and they had a good deal of difficulty in giving a satisfactory account of themselves to the inhabitants.