'The publishers here, especially Spina and Levi, have been pressing me for things since the quartet, but much pleases me better in North Germany and particularly the publishers, and I would rather go without the two or three extra Louis-d'ors that these would perhaps pay.
'Does Avé often go to see you? Has he told you anything particular about Stockhausen?
'How about the photograph of the girls' quartet? Am I not to have it? N.B. Every time I write I forget to ask about Fritz.... Is he very industrious? He ought to make up his mind to give Trio concerts in Hamburg next winter. I would help him in every way....
'Write soon and have love
'from your
'Johannes.
'Hearty greetings to Herr Marxsen, and do not forget about Börsendorfer.'[4]
The two Pianoforte Quartets were despatched to Simrock, and were published by the firm early in 1863—the first one in G minor, being dedicated to Baron Reinhard von Dalwigk, Court Intendant to the Grand-Duke of Oldenburg, a really musical amateur and a warm supporter of Brahms; and the second, in A major, to Frau Dr. Elisabeth Rösing of Hamm, in whose house it was written.
The tone of the above extracts tells how lovingly the composer's thoughts turned to his home at the moment he was feeling conscious of a real success; and the question about Stockhausen may be taken as an indication of the clinging wistfulness with which he was bringing himself to resign the hope of being able to settle near his family as conductor of the Philharmonic—a position he would at the time have been proud to accept. The decision of the committee was now almost a foregone conclusion, though it was not formally arrived at till the following year. What it was may be told in the following extract from a letter written to Avé Lallement on January 31, 1863, by Joachim, whose influence with the committee had been energetically exerted in favour of his Johannes:
'... What can I say further about your plan with Stockhausen? You know how highly I esteem his talent, and he is certainly the best musician among the singers, but how anyone, having to choose the director of a concert institution between him and Johannes, can decide for the former, I, with my limited musical understanding, cannot comprehend! It is precisely as a man upon whom one can rely that I regard Johannes so highly, with his gifts and his will! There is nothing he cannot undertake, and, with his earnestness, overcome! You know that as well as I, and if all of you in the committee and orchestra had met him with confidence and affection (as you, his friend, always do in private) instead of with doubt and airs of protection, it would have removed the asperity from his nature; whereas it must constantly make him more bitter, with his touching, almost childlike patriotism for Hamburg, to see himself put second. I dare not dwell on the thought, it would make me too unhappy, that his narrow compatriots have deprived themselves of the means of making him more contented and gentle, and happier in the exercise of his genius. I should like to give the committee a moral cudgelling (and a bodily one too!) for having left you in the lurch with your plan. The slight to Johannes will not be forgotten in the history of art! But basta!'[5]