Dear Friend,
I am glad your letter has already reached me, for I start early to-morrow in order — if all goes well — to arrive in Paris by the 1st of February.
I have at last decided to start under all circumstances, and specially from dietary reasons. I am somewhat knocked up, and am suffering from extreme nervous exhaustion. The last eight days have convinced me that here, in uneasiness, wanting to work and not being able, I shall not get better. So I snatch at a somewhat desperate means — a by no means trifling journey — in the hope that it will refresh me and strengthen my nerves, as one often experiences this by travel and change of scene.
My opera scheme for Paris is, nevertheless, ready; only I have still to translate it. How do I feel with all this? Fearfully stupid; for I seek continually to belie myself on behalf of my friends.
I shall spend the first days in Paris very quietly, and be purely concerned about restoring my much-impaired health. Wigand's honorarium — which, according to your news, I am to find in Paris — I have reckoned upon for my expenses there: may I not be deceived. I hope Wigand will send me some copies of my new pamphlet: he or you might send me at once a first copy in a wrapper (at my cost). For the present the old address holds good: Mr. Albert Franck, libraire, rue Richelieu.
I must write to K. in detail, and in a decisive manner; besides, I want to know if he has a voice. He will soon hear from me. Salute the whole R. family, with all the strength which in this present exhaustion is still at my command. I can't write any more to you to-day. I am about to start. More from Paris. Salute dear good Heine: I thank him a thousand times for his letter. Farewell.
Your
Richard Wagner.
[Address without Christian name: Monsieur Wagner, 59, rue de Provence.]
Source: Richard Wagner's Letters to His Dresden Friends, Theodor Uhlig, Wilhelm Fischer, and Ferdinand Heine, trans. J. S. Shedlock (Scribner & Welford, 1890), No. 7