Dearest Old Friend,
You are probably downright angry with me? Heine, at least, has not replied to my last letter: I wrote him with the request to communicate the contents to you. I suppose this has been done, and also presume that you know how Paris — and also all who, with well-meant but badly informed zeal, thrust me towards Paris — brought me almost to death's door, and in any case to complete despair. This was a decisive turning-point in my life, which now, at least, has turned to good, in that I have become determined in both my resignation and my will. I am looking out how to support myself, and at the same time only apply myself to my art in such a way that I may retain my pleasure in and love for it. For the rest, I reckon no more on strokes of good-fortune, and only hope, under the protection of noble and truly sympathetic friends, to maintain myself in as sound a state as possible, so as to show myself useful to art according to my strength and circumstances.
It would heartily rejoice me soon again to have some news of you and Heine: of you I only know that you were near attending a performance of my Lohengrin at Weimar. Now, in any case, I remain here in Zurich, where I have found a circle of very dear friends. When one day you put yourself on the shelf, you ought really to be so sensible as to do it here. I have no words to describe the pleasantness of this place; in Paris I was completely Swiss-homesick! The sturdy, honest race of men would please you very much, and one can also live cheaply here.
Next spring I shall set earnestly to work at the composition of my Siegfried, of which, should circumstances prove favourable, I expect quite a special representation.
Now to a matter of business!
A lawyer, Blechschmidt, in Dresden, has written to me about a singing daughter of his, whom he would like to be trained according to my advice: he says you have been her teacher hitherto. I pray you, what shall I write to the man? I enclose a short letter, in which I refer him to you, as you indeed ought to give your opinion as to whether she really shows sufficient talent to be in need of exceptional training; in which case he ought, in my judgment — if he has enough money for that purpose — to seek out the best teacher he can get, for which I certainly give my vote to Garcia. Will you arrange the matter with the man?
One thing more! An unfortunate Prague composer, H., once, ages ago, sent me an opera of his, which later on he asked to have back again. Some one was to fetch it; he did not come, and I forgot all about the matter. Now he writes to me here. My wife declares that she gave to you and Albert all music of the kind that she found among the things I left behind me. I presume that whatever my brother received was handed over to you when he left Dresden. Do look one day and see if this c——d opera is amongst the music: it was only a pianoforte score, and I think bound in red. If you do not find it, perhaps it is with Professor Hähnel, who would hand it over to you if you showed him this letter. The unfortunate fellow has not even written me his address, and I am therefore asking him at the same time to send it you exact to Dresden. Then be so good as to send him this opera.
Sweet remembrances!
So you are all getting on remarkably well at Dresden. I hear much about Martha — that the performance is going smoother and better. Ah! how I regret being no longer there!
Good, affectionate, old, faithful friend! Arrange to spend your old age with us by the Lake of Zurich: you will not regret it! A thousand hearty greetings from myself and wife, who is quite well, and become a regular Swiss! Farewell! and be no more angry
With your thankfully devoted
Richard Wagner.
(Sterngasse, Enge, Zurich.)
Source: Richard Wagner's Letters to His Dresden Friends, Theodor Uhlig, Wilhelm Fischer, and Ferdinand Heine, trans. J. S. Shedlock (Scribner & Welford, 1890), No. 101