Dear Benedikt:
Härtels want to publish a good portrait of me. A bungler recently tortured himself with my physiognomy here, but he did so badly that—despite all likeness in the portrait—he managed to do only a caricature. Therefore I turn to you, for—you know me, which is the main thing. Listen, then! Could you make a new lithographic portrait of me by using as model the daguerreotype of your last portrait of me which is in your possession? Or would it be good if I were to be daguerreotyped from life and a copy were sent to you? What do you think? Answer me at once with two lines; I'll see to it that Härtels will pay a good price. I'd be pleased if you would do it: no one here can make a good picture of me, and they want one in Germany.
We've just presented The Flying Dutchman here, four times in a week, with a sharp increase in the price of admission and always with a full house. The performance was passable: I've thought of you, Anders, and Lehrs. It is now eleven years since I wrote this opera in Meudon!
Minna sends her kindest regards. I'm exhausted from my recent exertions. I haven't even been able to give the treatment a thought. But from this week on I'll rest: then I'll start on Lindemann's regimen. Give Lindemann my best regards.
Write soon—or rather at once to
Your
R. W.
Source: Letters of Richard Wagner: The Burrell Collection, ed. John N. Burk (Macmillan, 1950), No. 118