A diary is a faithful friend. No matter what one confides to it, it
forgets nothing and discloses nothing. When I look through these
records, I cannot realise that I have experienced and written all this.
It is a strange history.
And who have I been! From the old man that I felt myself to be when I
entered these forests, I became a younger one, from a young man I have
grown to be a poor old creature, before whose half-blind eyes the notes
dance up and down on the page, when I play the organ for mass in the
church. The people have pushed me aside.
_Mein Gott_, others fare no better, and I desire nothing; I have done my
part and am content.
1864.
For fifty years I have not been out of these forests.
The woodspeople come into existence, live and die and not once in their
lives do they climb the mountain, from where one can behold the glorious
picture and, on clear winter days, the sea.
The _sea_! How my heart swells at the thought! Yonder moves a boat, and
within stands a youth beckoning--
Heinrich! What is it?
How foolish of me to have spent my whole life in the Winkel, when I
should have been a sailor!