[...] Your purchase and publication of The Rhinegold proves to me that quick returns are not your object in all your ventures. The interests which you have taken into consideration in this instance are highly flattering to me and do you the greatest honour. The question now is, whether you are inclined to shoulder with me the full consequences of this enterprise and to venture a capital outlay on a great connected work which, I am bold to assert, will redound to the honour of the German spirit. [...]
[...] As you know, three big works besides The Rhinegold are projected for the completion of my Nibelung cycle. The first, The Valkyrie, is quite complete, and I have already in my hands a pianoforte arrangement, which, it is true, would need considerable simplification for purposes of publication. Of the second, Young Siegfried, two acts are complete. The whole might easily be completed with the third (Siegfried's Death) in the course of a couple of years. At present my efforts in Germany are directed to provide the means of staging this work for the first time. I hope great things of the extraordinary wealth of musical resources in Vienna, especially if I achieve the necessary standing here, a thing that needs patience and suitable leisure on my part. I hope, then, to open the new Royal Opera House, which is about to be built in two years' time, with The Rhinegold and, if possible, to follow this up immediately with The Valkyrie.
Herewith I lay before you a scheme, to the fulfilment of which I am prepared to dedicate all my energies. Will you help me with it [...]? Should you feel inclined to publish this great work, The Valkyrie (of quite special interest, I venture to assert), at once, together with a pianoforte arrangement, it would suit me very well, for the public would get to know it and a movement on the part of the educated public would give me much-needed assistance towards my goal. In any case, I draw your attention to this work as the object which would in time indemnify you, should you be ready now to do as I wish and place 3000 francs at my disposal forthwith. Perhaps we could effect the sale of this and the other works simultaneously, on the basis that you should pay me 3000 francs down on each work delivered ready for press, and another 7000 francs on the day of the fresh stage performance of each. But I do not wish to importune you. I understand how hard it must be for you, however great may be your confidence in my achievements, to overcome your prejudice against what for the present may seem chimerical in my projects; the more so, indeed, as you cannot yet have gained reassurance even from The Rhinegold (already published), the performance of which must necessarily remain a problem until I have collected the data to enable me to [...]
Source: Letters of Richard Wagner, Vol. 2, selected and ed. Wilhelm Altmann, trans. M. M. Bozman (J. M. Dent & Sons, 1927), No. 501