'I am delighted that Fritz [Schnack] is making a nice tour which shows that you are both well--let him only make further plans, and travel!... I will be careful that you get a cast of the medal. It will interest Fritz as a connoisseur--he must imagine the gold. I am very well and the summer becomes finer every day. In the autumn or winter I really must look in upon you myself and not merely in a portrait. 'Have you a great deal too much money, or may I send some? I should like Fritz to spend plenty in travelling and he can afterwards entertain you and himself again with his sufferings!... 'Your JOHANNES.'[79] Years before this date, Frau Caroline had, at the urgent and oft-repeated wish of Johannes, given up her boarding-house in the Anscharplatz, and retired to enjoy the remainder of her life as mistress of her son's quiet home in Pinneberg. Johannes kept his stepmother supplied with the necessary funds, which were regularly transmitted to her through his publisher, Herr Simrock of Berlin; but he was never tired of urging upon her his readiness to meet intermediate demands as they might arise, and particularly of suggesting holiday journeys for Fritz Schnack as a good way of spending extra money. Frau Caroline and her son, who both worshipped Johannes, frequently incurred his displeasure on account of the moderation with which they availed themselves of his generosity. He never went to Hamburg after his stepmother's retirement without reserving a few hours to visit her at Pinneberg, and there, in the modest little dwelling he had provided, felt himself, as it were, in the old family home. He would sit in a corner of the sofa in the room by the side of the shop filled with clocks whose hands pointed to the right time and whose pendulums swung cheerily to and fro, and chat happily with her and Fritz, hearing little items of domestic news, asking after this and the other acquaintance; then would suddenly relapse into silence and reverie, which were unfailingly respected by the two people to whom he was so dear. By-and-by, after he had arranged his thoughts, he would come out again from his musing to continue the pleasant chit-chat where it had been left.