[Written in English.]
"Leipzig, July 28, 1846.[44]
"My dear Sir,—Here are the metronomes, which I beg you will give the director of the choruses; but tell him that I cannot promise they will be exactly the same, but nearly so, I think.
"Many thanks for your last letter, with the remarks about the song ['O rest in the Lord']. I do not recollect having heard the Scotch ballad to which you allude, and certainly did not think of it, and did not choose to imitate it; but as mine is a song to which I always had an objection (of another kind), and as the ballad seems much known, and the likeness very striking, and before all, as you wish it, I shall leave it out altogether (I think), and have altered the two last bars of the preceding recitative, so that the chorus in F may follow it immediately. Perhaps I shall bring another song in its stead, but I doubt it, and even believe it to be an improvement if it is left out.
"You receive here Nos. 36, 38, and 39. The only piece which is not now in your hands is No. 37, a song of Elijah ['For the mountains shall depart']. And this (and perhaps one song to be introduced in the first part) I shall either send or bring myself, for they will require only few words, and it will be plenty of time to copy the vocal parts, and the instrumental ones I bring over with me. I hope to be in London on the 17th, and beg you will let us have a grand meeting on the 18th, to settle all the questions and the copies of the solo parts.
"Always yours very truly,
"Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy."
It may perhaps be as well to complete the history of "O rest in the Lord" before proceeding farther, even at the risk of a little repetition. Mendelssohn does not seem to have liked the implied plagiarism of "Auld Robin Gray," although he says he had an "objection" to his song "O rest in the Lord" "of another kind." He repeated his request that it "must be left out" (see next letter). Bartholomew, however, wrote to him saying: "Why omit the song 'O rest,' when merely a note or two of the melody being changed would completely obliterate the identity, and I think not spoil the song as a whole? If you omit it, and especially upon such a reason as my hint may have afforded, I shall be very much pained."
This last sentence must have so touched Mendelssohn's feelings that he somewhat relented from his former decision. He wrote to Bartholomew: "About the song 'O rest in the Lord,' we will settle everything when we meet." Bartholomew strongly urged him to retain the now familiar air; but even at the eleventh hour (at the rehearsal in London) Mendelssohn still wished to delete it from the oratorio. However, the advice of his friends ultimately prevailed, and "O rest in the Lord" was thereby spared the fate of utter oblivion. Mendelssohn altered the fifth note of the melody (taking it down to C instead of up to G) in order to destroy the supposed "Auld Robin Gray" likeness; but it is amusing to notice that he retained his original note in the coda of the song, where, in two places, the fifth note goes up to G![45]
This break in the continuity of the correspondence may afford an opportunity of mentioning a phrase used by Bartholomew in one of his letters to Mendelssohn, which he calls "Irish Echoes." He says: "We must mind that any notation which may be altered shall not affect the band parts. Excuse my naming this. You do not write Irish Echoes—but yet by altering the notation they may inadvertently arise. Lest you should not know what I mean by an 'Irish Echo,' this may explain it. An Irishman, boasting of his country, said: 'It had an Echo, which, if you said 'How d'ye do?' replied, 'Pretty well, I thank you!'"