Dear and valued Friend!
As you were kind enough to assume the temporary planting of my newly acquired building lot, and as there is no more time to be lost, I take the liberty of availing myself of your kindness, and disclosing to you my most casual plans in regard to the same.
I have indicated the desired position of my house on the accompanying photograph, and also a rough sketch of the division of the lot. A road will lead from the street to the court, which would best be an allée of chestnut trees. On either side of the allée are to be fruit and vegetable gardens, shut off by a hedge, the outer boundaries, however, to be planted with shrubbery and groups of pine trees in the corners.
Between the house and the castle park we shall lay out the real decorative garden. First of all, there will be a big round lawn in the middle which later can be intersected by flower-beds; in this space noble trees, such as plane trees, catalpa, etc., must be properly distributed. Here, again, the side toward the castle park demands much close shrubbery, with trees of various species and, in the corners, pine and fir trees.
On account of the season the most important thing is to see that a goodly number of trees and shrubs are planted in the manner indicated, and that too much, rather than too little, shall be expended upon it.
A clever gardener, whom you, dear friend, would choose for me, could possibly work out a tentative plan for the laying out of the entire piece of ground according to the appended approximate specifications; I should then be able from here to indicate my wishes more exactly, and in this way a beginning would have been made.
I feel sure that this cannot be entrusted to anyone more competent than yourself, in conjunction with our excellent friend Feustel. I expect the definite plans for my house any day; according to all promises made to me, they must soon be here, and even before the end of the month everything for further settlement shall be in your hands.
May God grant that our great undertaking may also soon come into an encouraging channel; I am of good courage, because I know that for the greater part it rests in the hands of my Bayreuth friends! My dear wife and I think with great satisfaction on the fact that we shall soon belong entirely to you; remain kindly disposed toward me!
With the most cordial greetings—also to our dear friend Feustel—I remain
Your grateful and faithful
Richard Wagner.
Source: The Story of Bayreuth as Told in the Bayreuth Letters of Richard Wagner, trans. and ed. Caroline V. Kerr (Small, Maynard and Company, 1912), No. 17