Dear Friend,
My wife has just told me a happy thought of hers, which leads me to address you quite a big petition.
It is a matter of making one more effort to obtain a life-lease of the Bodmer property at Seefeld, near Zurich. Were it to succeed, I should be relieved of all cares about an estate of my own, and for a mere rent I should arrive at the same enjoyment I am seeking. This place is let at present as a summer residence to a family by the name of Trümpler; so that the Bodmers would have to be persuaded to give these ancient tenants friendly notice and let me have the place for life, or perhaps for a term of ten years.
So far as we know, it is rather a habit than a requirement of the Trümplers, to occupy the Bodmer place, and if the Bodmers themselves were glad to let us have it, I have no doubt they would find no difficulty in inducing the Trümplers to stand back. Therefore it is merely a question of winning the Bodmers to my wish in earnest; and my wife, whom I have commissioned to make overtures to Frau Bodmer, desires the help of a third person who should tell that lady all the ingratiating things which neither she nor I can say: and to act as that third person, honoured friend, my wife considers nobody more fitted than yourself. So the heartfelt prayer goes up to you, to write Frau Bodmer and try to win her to my part. For that — my wife thinks — it might be advisable if you laid stress on my great want and need of such a quiet country home as her estate affords; perhaps also — so thinks my wife — if you pricked the lady's pride a little, and pointed out to her the honour it might conceivably bring her, to have her premises supply me with a fostering haven for my future art-creations. —
What do you say to it? Will you undertake it? —
On my approaching return to Zurich I should very much like to see this affair, which exercises me so urgently now, brought so far forward that I might take a swift decision.
Need I say how much it would please me to be able to bid good-day to you as well at Berne?
Many hearty greetings from
Your Richard Wagner.
Source: Richard Wagner to Mathilde Wesendonck, trans. William Ashton Ellis (Charles Scribner's Sons, 1905), No. 22