I have just attended the rehearsal of my Lohengrin! I cannot lock away the incredibly moving effect of this first hearing, amid the fairest and most affectionate circumstances, artistic and human, without imparting it at once to you.
Twelve years of my life — what years! — have I passed through!! You were right, when you so often wished me this delight; but nowhere could it have been offered me so completely as here! Ah, were you two here to-morrow!!
A thousand sincerest wishes!
R. W.
Source: Richard Wagner to Mathilde Wesendonck, trans. William Ashton Ellis (Charles Scribner's Sons, 1905), No. 121