Here, my beloved friend, you have an answer — as good as I can make it today!
Our last letters have crossed each other. I won't wait again until perhaps further news comes from you, but first of all I want to thank you once more — although, to your noble way of thinking, unnecessarily — for all your loyalty and goodness. There is also the necessity of repaying you for what you spent in the sad task of putting the poor blessed one to rest.
Please give Natalie the 15 thalers that are left over: she shall receive a little assistance from me, every quarter-year, to the extent of 30 thalers; these 15 thalers can be considered half of the first quarter's payment.
Oh God, how sad, how sad I am! There are only wounds and scars in my heart, scarcely one single sound place. Life is boundlessly difficult for me, and the longer I live, the more difficult it becomes! — Unendurable sufferings, the consequence of the incessant agitations in which I live, have now obliged me to yield to medical attention even here. On account of the great irritation which is very troublesome and noticeable on my skin, in particular, I am making use of warm baths, for the time being, and drinking Vichy.
As yet I can say very little definitely in regard to my personal future: I wished to turn away altogether from Munich, but I can't do this to the young wonderful King, who hopes through everything to prevail over all that is making life difficult for him and for me, and who wishes to have me soon again close to him. How he will succeed in guaranteeing me peace and quiet is something on which I can offer no opinion. I myself cannot desire any great, radical change, and we still have to contend with elements of a most hazardous nature, to whom certainly every means seems permissible and against whom there is scarcely any way for one to venture. How then shall peace be secured for me? — And nevertheless, I shall have to fear some eccentric resolve of the King, if I persist in my own inclination to go away.
(You will certainly permit nothing of this to become generally known?)
Now then, enough for today! — Once more my thanks! Thanks! — All the arrangements made by the deceased are agreeable to me, I make no claims to anything — anything.
(I am very much pleased and touched that you have Papo!)
Good-bye, dear beloved one! Heartiest greetings from
Your
Richard Wagner
Source: The Letters of Richard Wagner to Anton Pusinelli, trans. and ed. Elbert Lenrow (Alfred A. Knopf, 1932), No. 45