To the Black Horse at Prague I send you a kind greeting: I read your brochure yesterday, and could not help laughing, it seemed to me such utter irony.
Be sure you send me from there the programme of your performances; the last thing which reached me from Prague bore the motto of the Faust-symphony. Much in human life is doomed to oblivion, very little is unforgetable, but according to that little is determined the whole worth of existence itself. "To be, or not to be," is the question here also, and the cross is ever laid on the "to be."
I would very gladly come to Carlsruhe, but Otto's strength is not quite re-established; he can bear so little yet, that we avoid all excitement. Nevertheless, perhaps it may be possible between this and the 14th; he displays a wish for it himself.
And now my sincerest regards to you, and prepare yourself for the green portfolio; I hope we shall succeed in providing you with quiet. If you should care to bring one of your flock with you, such as Bülow or Cornelius, he will be equally welcome. I trust the green hill will grow dear to you once more!
Your Mathilde Wesendonck.
Sunday Evening.
Source: Richard Wagner to Mathilde Wesendonck, trans. William Ashton Ellis (Charles Scribner's Sons, 1905), No. 165