Dear Old Friend!
One of these days, now, the piano score of The Mastersingers shall be sent off to you: up to now I have long been combating the unscrupulousness of the local bookbinder. Welcome this token of friendship kindly!
Now I have a request to ask of you. As a result of a commission from Italy, where my operas are also being considered, I sent a telegram yesterday to the worthy successor of honest Meser (of blessed memory), Herr H. Müller, Royal Music-Dealer, instructing him to have copies made of the scores of Rienzi and The Flying Dutchman, after the originals left in his charge for such purposes as this. As usual, this admirable man has now exhibited his characteristic quality of completely ignoring all communications from me: so would you please do your best, exercising all your personal authority, to urge him to
1) Take care of these copies (especially that of Rienzi) as soon as possible.
2) Send information regarding this to Signor Francesco Lucca, Editore di Musica, in Milan, as well as to inform Lucca at the same time of the charges for the copying, and in general to come to an agreement with him regarding the exact payment that will be expected.
This Signor Lucca is busy trying to arrange for the performance of Rienzi (above all) in Italy and has applied to me for the scores. Since I no longer possess a single copy of them myself, I could do nothing but refer him to the firm of Meser in Dresden: therefore he telegraphed them from Milan, five days ago, but received no reply of any sort.
Herr H. Müller, I hope, will be good enough to pardon me for addressing myself to him through you instead of directly: this is due to my apprehension lest my highly esteemed publisher leave me, as is his custom, entirely without reply or information.
You will therefore oblige me especially, if you keep pretty much at this fellow's heels and, by looking in at his "publishing museum" every day and perhaps by other ingenious means at your disposal, endeavour to learn whether he is carrying out the orders which, unfortunately, were given to him by me.
You will never be able to realize what misery and vexation I have had to endure, thus far in my life, from such rabble! (This of course is entre nous! Don't let it come to the ears of Meser's successor, for he would at once sue me for libel, through that admirable lawyer Schmidt!)
Dearest, I am still constantly being injured by all sorts of things, and yet I am trying to recover as well as possible. Fortunately, nowhere — especially in Germany — can anything entice me to come forth from my retirement. With Dresden, I had in mind an attempt to procure some guarantee for The Mastersingers against the abominable incompetence of the Kapellmeisters there: and with what a nice reception was I met there! As soon as I persisted in my effort, they put my work on the shelf immediately, with the utmost coldbloodedness. For that part, see now, yourself, how you will like your friend's composition performed "sitting." Still, however that may be, you are and shall continue my best friend, whom I now hope to see soon again.
A thousand hearty greetings from your
Truly thankful
Richard W.
Source: The Letters of Richard Wagner to Anton Pusinelli, trans. and ed. Elbert Lenrow (Alfred A. Knopf, 1932), No. 52