Wilhelmsthal, August 15th, 1855

Here am I really on the road to Baden-Baden, dear friend; but that does not advance matters at all, and in spite of myself I must resign myself to remain en route. Tomorrow morning I return to Weymar, where I have promised to meet my two daughters, as well as Mr. Daniel [Liszt's son], who has pretty well distinguished himself at the general competition. After passing ten days or so with me the girls will take up their abode with Madame de Bulow at Berlin, who is good enough to take charge of them, and Daniel will return to Paris to continue his studies there. I was hoping also to be able to spend a week or two there- -but that cannot possibly be arranged, and on reflection I was obliged to limit myself to conducting the Princess W[ittgenstein] as far as Eisenach, whence she has continued her journey to Paris with her daughter (with the special view of seeing the exhibition of pictures there); and for my exhibition I shall content myself with that to the north, which I can enjoy from the windows of my room!—This picturesque solemnity is almost up to the height of the musical solemnities of Baden which you describe to me in such bright and lively colors, but with this difference, that at Wilhelmsthal we are very much favored by the element of damp, whereas at Baden the artists who give concerts are drained dry.

At Weymar all the world is out of doors, and the town is pretty full of nothing, offering to the curiosity of travelers only the trenches and practical circumvallations in honor of gas-lighting which they are going to start in October. Singer is bathing in the Danube (at Ofen), and tells me he shall be back by the roth of September; Raff is promenading amid the rose and myrtle shrubberies of his "Sleeping Beauty" at Wiesbaden; Stor is returning with his pockets full of new nuances which he has discovered at Ilmenau, where he has composed (as a pendant to my Symphonic Poem) "Ce qu'on entend dans la vallee"! ["What is heard in the valley." Liszt's work bears the title "Ce qu'on entend sur la montagne" ("What is heard on the mountain.")] Preller [Friedrich Preller, the celebrated painter of the Odyssey pictures] has found beautiful trees in the Duchy of Oldenburg which serve him as a recovery of the "Recovery" [Or a "recreation of the Recreation." I do not know which is meant. The original is "qui lui servent d'Erholung von der 'Erholung.'"—Translator's note.]; Martha Sabinin [A pupil of Liszt's, a Russian] is haunting the "Venusberg" in the neighborhood of Eisenach in company with Mademoiselle de Hopfgarten; Bronsart [Hans von Bronsart, Liszt's pupil, now General-Intendant at Weimar] is gone to a sort of family congress at Konigsberg; and Hoffman [Hoffmann von Fallersleben, the well-known poet] is running through Holland and Belgium to make a scientific survey of them; whilst Nabich is trying to gain the ears of England, Scotland, and Ireland with his trombone!

I, for my part, am in the midst of finishing the 13th Psalm (for tenor solo, chorus, and orchestra), "How long wilt Thou forget me, O Lord?" which you will hear this winter; and I shall not leave Weymar till November to go and pay a few days' visit to Wagner at Zurich. Don't altogether forget me, my dear Cossmann, in the midst of your solemnities——[The end of the letter was lost.]

143. To August Kiel, Court Conductor in Detmold

[Autograph (without address) in the possession of M. Alfred Bovet, of Valentigney. The contents lead to the conclusion that the above was the addressee (1813-71).]

I have been prevented until now, by a mass of work and little outings, from sending you my warmest thanks for your kind forwarding of the opera text of "Sappho," and I beg that you will kindly excuse this delay. The manner in which Rietz's composition to the Schiller dithyramb is to be interwoven with the poem I cannot venture fully to explain. I confess also that the dramatico-musical vivifying of the antique is for me a sublime, attractive problem, as yet undecided, in the solution of which even Mendelssohn himself has not succeeded in such a degree as to leave nothing further to be sought for. Some years ago "Sappho" (in three acts—text by Augier, music by Gounod) was given at the Paris Opera. This work contains much that is beautiful, and Berlioz has spoken of it very favorably in the Journal des Debats. Unfortunately it did not appear in print, and up to the present time no other theater has performed it, although it made a sensation in Paris and ensured a first-rate position to the composer. If it would interest you, dear sir, to get to know the score, I will willingly write to Gounod and beg him to give me the work to send to you.

I have repeatedly heard the most gratifying tidings of the sympathy and care which you bestow in Detmold upon the works of Wagner and Berlioz. Regardless of the many difficulties, opposition, and misunderstandings which meet these great creations, I cherish with you the conviction that "nothing truly good and beautiful is lost in the stream of Time," and that the pains taken by those who intend to preserve the higher and the divine in Art do not remain fruitless. In the course of this autumn (at the end of November at latest) I am going to see Wagner, and I promise to send you from Zurich a little autograph from his hand. I would gladly satisfy your wish sooner, but that the letters which Wagner writes to me are a perfectly inalienable benefit to me, and you will not take it amiss if I am more than avaricious with them.

Accept, my dear sir, the assurance of my highest esteem, with which I remain

Yours most truly,