"Felix Mendelssohn."
"Leipzig, March 3, 1847.
"My dear Sir,—I have just received your letter of the 24th, and hasten to reply. I like all the passages of the translation you send me with but two exceptions. In No. 30, 'that Thou would'st please destroy me' sounds so odd to me—is it scriptural? If it is, I have no objection, but if not, pray substitute something else. And then in the new No. 8 [the widow scene]—the words from Psalm vi. which you hesitated to adopt are, of course, out of the question; but I also object to the second part of the sentence which you propose to add to the words of Psalm xxxviii. {6}, viz.: 'I water my couch,' etc. [Psalm vi., 6.]—I do dislike this so very much, and it is so poetical in the German version. So if you could substitute something in which no 'watering of the couch' occurred, but which gave the idea of the tears, of the night, of all that in its purity. Pray try!
"But what is this? Does Staudigl not come? Mr. Buxton told me last autumn he was sure to be there. I heard it since from all sides. And now he does not come? What is to become of my 'Elijah' then? I cannot write to Staudigl and persuade him to come, but I really do not know how the performance could match that of Birmingham without him—indeed I do not know how it could go. Of course Lockey would be quite sufficient for all the Tenor solos! But Staudigl! That word of yours has given me a great deal to think of.
"Always very sincerely and gratefully yours,
"Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy."
"Leipzig, March 10, 1847.
"My dear Sir,—Many thanks for your letter of the 1st. I really do not know what a synopsis of the oratorio should be good for—on the other hand, I do not see the harm it could do—and, therefore, leave it to you to decide this point as you think best. I shall send you the metronomes in a few days; the organ part I do not forget.
"But tell me, should the whole series of performances not be better postponed till autumn? What with your uncertainty about Staudigl, and with all this uproar in London about the two opera parties, and with Jenny Lind coming or not coming, and with the 'Tempest' or not the 'Tempest,' and with the difficulty you and Mr. Buxton have to make the parts ready—would not such a delay be beneficial to all of us, especially to the old prophet himself? Not to me certainly, who like to shake my English friends by the hand the sooner the better—but to all others?
"And now many thanks for your friendly advice in the opera affair. Some time before you wrote your letter to me, I had already informed Mr. Lumley that I should not be able to produce an opera of the 'Tempest' in the season 1847; and, according to the advice my friend Klingemann gave me some days before your letter came, I have since again written to Mr. Lumley (about the same words as you suggest), have asked Klingemann to take care of seeing the letter safely delivered, and have sent to him a duplicate of it. So that the whole of your advice, the same which my friend Kl. gave, has been followed literally, and I should be very glad if thus the affair would come to an end. Of this I think I may be sure, that Mr. Lumley will not continue his advertisements of my opera after he heard that I had taken the resolution not to write the 'Tempest' for the season 1847....