Dear good Friend!
Still filled with gratitude for yesterday, I come to make another claim upon you to-day. I wished to inform you that 818 thalers (for Fliegender Holländer) have reached me to-day from Berlin; the entire sum I have kept for myself, for well-known outlay (for example, Kietz in Dresden for the marble bust, etc.), as well as for the calamities of the Christmas and New Year season. . . .
If for any reason you prefer another modus, and if you would rather have my cash go through your bureau, I beg of you to let me know your opinion.
Not until January shall I have any income worth speaking of, and then I shall incorporate this with our conto corrente. The chief impulse to “Forwards” in my finances I do not expect until April of this year, when, in addition to the presumably good receipts from the profitable quarterly payments, come those promised me by Schott.
So—one swims and wades! One hopes finally, however, to reach the shore—at least, when someone stands by you who has a resemblance to my friend Feustel! . . .
From his whole heart greets you
Your ever grateful and faithful
Richard Wagner.
P.S. The sgraffito did cost something, after all!
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. 64