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Trieste, April 23, 1876
¡Querido amigo!
Your letter pleased me all the more as it gives me a chance of penning a reply and as it is most desirable to be able to write letters from time to time. Don't be surprised at this “sudden” change in attitude: that I earlier1 tried to shed the burden of replying, but now long for it. A natural law that holds for me is responsible for the complete transformation of my mood. I cannot stick to any place or subject to the bitter end, regularly skip a lecture when the course is in its final stages (the earlier stages are not under discussion here) and am almost eaten up with impatience whenever my stay anywhere is nearing its end. This is precisely what has been happening to me in Trieste. The lovely days in Aranjuez2 have also turned out to be far from lovely. I believe that I wrote to you once before that the weather, out of a mistaken sense of liberalism, is wont to turn vile on Sundays and holidays; well, ever since Easter Tuesday,3 this force of nature has been behaving so abominably that we have all been hankering after the old tradition of a beautiful Sunday. It rains every day, sometimes drizzling, sometimes pouring; the sky, normally a glorious blue, and at night blue, red, green, orange, and violet (perhaps in the early mornings as well, but I tend to sleep