[...] Now that we have reached the point, my true and trusty Siegfried, when we have finally set foot on dry land and can calmly arrange our seed-corn for planting, it is first and foremost the need to secure this new-found calm - without which we who have been so deeply shaken can no longer hope to prosper - which induces me to inform you of a personal matter which has not turned out as we had expected but which, having been inadequately dealt with, continues to threaten not only my own peace of mind but that of my sorely tested friends the Bülows. Frau Schnorr continues to find herself in Munich, drawing a pension of 2000 fl., and possessing a free seat in the theatre, and, whenever she meets Frau v. Bülow there or in the street, she approaches her in a spirit of triumphant provocation, so that our friend has now turned to me, such is her anxious amazement. In response to my enquiries, it has been reported to me that at the time in question Frau v. Schnorr did indeed appeal to you, begging your forgiveness for her behaviour, and that you granted her your kind permission to absent herself from Munich for a time in order to return, as she wished, at some future date. The woman’s behaviour now shows how hypocritical was her appeal to you, since all she wanted was to be able to remain in Munich where she would soon find an opportunity to avenge herself, as she had sworn to do, in the most spectacular manner on Fr. v. Bülow. This remark of hers, well-authenticated as it is, has similarly been communicated to my friend Bülow. Imagine the feelings it must have aroused in this poor and painfully sensitive man, who has already been sufficiently tormented, no less than in his wife, who, in her total innocence, has shown only kindness to that worthless woman! It appears that this woman is only awaiting the moment of my return to Munich before exacting the vengeance which she has sworn to take on me. My King! In this affair your kindness and perhaps even your worries on our behalf have once again been abused because of the weakness or very real enmity of your inferiors. I would ask you now to put to the test the honesty with which this criminal woman besought your forgiveness: let her address the selfsame appeal to Frau von Bülow, either in person or in writing, and let her confess to having been misled by an impostor into committing not only an act of lese-majesty but into slandering a friend who had done so much on her behalf; in return for evidence that she has received this forgiveness, I for my part would have no further objection to her remaining in Munich in future, but on the condition that, whatever else happens, neither I nor Bülow would ever set eyes on her again. Since all further dealings with this woman are now out of the question as far as we are concerned — and for this she has only her own abject behaviour to blame - there can also be no further question of our using her for our artistic ends, for which purpose Frau v. Bülow had, by dint of her untiring intercession, obtained an increase in the woman’s pension from 1200 fl. to 2000 fl. In the name of justice, and in order to spare myself the reproach of misusing the Civil List for totally futile and unmerited expenses, I must therefore insist that Frau v. Schnorr’s pension be reduced to the level originally intended by your royal favour; and in doing so you will express your royal acknowledgement and remuneration of a single, passing artistic achievement the like of which had never been seen anywhere previously. If - out of compassion - you were to agree to accede to my request but were to meet with misgivings lest the affair give rise to an unpleasant stir, I would declare in the most explicit terms, both in my own name and in that of my friends, that we are not conscious of having to fear anything, save the exposure of the most abject shamelessness on the part of a person who, on the contrary, by being left in the fullest advantage of her situation, gives us the appearance of harbouring the opposite kind of misgivings. - I believe by contrast that, in requesting this favour, I have proposed the least - and therefore the most necessary - level of punishment which, were it not exacted, would inevitably and regrettably encourage her in her base behaviour and in her defiance of your royal decrees. -
Source: Selected Letters of Richard Wagner, trans. and ed. Stewart Spencer and Barry Millington (W. W. Norton & Company, 1988), No. 363