Dearest Minna,
This moment I receive your latest letter just as I was about to dress and be off to the station, having announced myself for a visit to Roger to-day. I had nearly seized the necessary reply to you as pretext for not going, and at the first instant was heartily glad of having found that pretext (with such gusto do I go there!), when I remembered that Roger's carriage would be waiting in vain at the station at Villiers, besides which I must really bite my sour apple if I want the so needful translation brought off. Imagine my laughter, then, when I read your strange insinuation that I might find myself so well off at Roger's château (as I'm so easily dazzled, you know) that I might repent having taken and furnished a dwelling here for the sake of reunion with you! I should have almost exclaimed, How little you know me! if I didn't recognise at once that this time you had let yourself be deluded by my brief remarks on Roger's country-seat and so forth. — But let us drop that; you'll soon learn different, and I shall make you no reproach about your curious apprehension. Merely thus much: these excursions cost me great, great self-restraint, but to bring the thing off I absolutely have to spur the somewhat lazy creature, who much prefers playing dominoes, to serious work.
I wrote to Fischer at once, as you will have learnt by now. I confess that this eternal grief and trouble around you fills me with positive horror, and I shall be heartily glad when I have you safe with me again; everything seems combining to give you sad and gloomy impressions. My poor dear Fischer, he has moved me deeply! I hope my letter will have a good, invigorating effect on him, and — after all he'll rally once again. —
I never want to see anything more of all the loose music etc. you've sent me a list of: it's a sheer encumbrance; throw it away as you please. What surprises me, is your saying nothing of the two Tannhäuser scores, originally presents to Boom and A. Müller of Zurich, which I reclaimed from them a short while back. Those two copies have not been used (at least I have given no order for it), and as the engraved full score will soon be out, I hereby request that those two copies be returned to their original owners, addressed to Alexander Müller. I shall thus get clear of the resulting obligations. —
What occupies my thoughts the most now, as you well may imagine, is your journey hither. Acting on the surest information, I had planned you out the following itinerary as the best and most convenient: —
1st day. From Dresden to Magdeburg. Depart 2.45 afternoon. Arrive 9.39 evening.
2nd day. From Magdeburg to Cologne. Depart 10.33 morning. Arrive 10.15 evening.
3rd day. From Cologne to Paris. Depart 9.15 morning. Arrive 9.0 evening.
This plan has the great advantage that you always have convenient hours of departure and arrival, travel express all the way, and in particular do not reach Paris at quite too late an hour. For the Strassburg and Metz train doesn't arrive till 11 at night; which, with the ceremonies over luggage etc. meaning another full hour before we got to our abode, would make it exactly midnight! That I should like to avoid. Then, I had of late been firmly reckoning on your having N. for companion the whole of your journey, and since I really greatly need Therese, I wrote Therese the other day to come at once, as you would be travelling another way and she therefore wouldn't join you. Now I must wait and see if she complies with my request and really gets here in the next few days; but as you have just written that you are not bringing N. with you, and also have found no other companion, consequently are definitely counting upon picking up Therese en route, it places me in great perplexity. However, I'll arrange it thus: Either — Therese obeys my orders, and comes to Paris in the next few days, when she shall first help me get things into order so that you may find no exertion awaiting you, and, as soon as you write me to do so, I'll send you Therese from here to Cologne (or to Frankfort, if you're absolutely bent on travelling via Metz); as far as Cologne (or Frankfort) you would get yourself accompanied by N. in any case, for you mustn't travel a single stage alone. Or — Therese obeys your orders, and remains at Zurich till you bid her join you; which would be pretty much as first arranged, only that I should urge you nevertheless to travel by Cologne (according to my plan above), and you would then order Therese to Cologne, to which distance N. would have accompanied you in any case. Once more I most earnestly recommend you the journey by Cologne, firstly for the advantage in the hour of arrival at Paris (9 o'clock), secondly because you would be travelling express the whole way, which is an inestimable convenience (believe me), whereas the route from Metz to Paris is one of the most circuitous and disconnected, with frequent change of carriage. — So follow my advice, and we shall soon know all about Therese. In any event she shall receive you at Cologne (or Frankfort). —
I am extremely sorry you have found no companion; we must try and get one here. With your next letter I'm expecting a fixed estimate of how much money you think you will need still; I would send you some at once, if I didn't want to wait and hear whether the Wiesbadeners have despatched the Rienzi fee to Tichatscheck (for you). In any case I shan't omit to. —
And now bear up bravely, good Minna! If I no longer wished to press you (after the falling through of the Carlsruhe undertaking), it was simply to let you start at leisure, and not set you in a flurry with it. Otherwise, the sooner you come, the better I shall like it: rest assured of that! I'm longing heartily for household order, and looking forward to the capability of being something to you poor tormented wife again. Everything will come right, and you soon shall thrive with me! Adieu!
Thy Rich.
If you haven't sent the bird-cage off already, please send it by grande vitesse now, as the petite vitesse takes at least 3 weeks. Do as I say!
Source: Richard to Minna Wagner: Letters to His First Wife, trans. William Ashton Ellis, Vol. 2 (Charles Scribner's Sons, 1909), No. 197