Dear Friend,
I beg you to send me by return of post a copy of the intricate biography ("Liszt's Life and Work"—if I am not mistaken) by Gustav Schilling. Siegel and Stoll in Leipzig have taken the work from the Stuttgart publisher, and there will surely be some way of getting a copy in Leipzig. Ask Kahnt to be so good as to see after one and to send it me immediately by post, for I require the work in connection with a special and pressing question which I can best answer by a quotation from Schilling's book.
With friendliest greetings, your
F. Liszt
Weymar, September 8th, 1859
Why does not Schuberth send me my dedicatory copy of Draeseke's
Ballade "Koenig Helge"?
220. To Johann von Herbeck
Dear Friend,
Warmest thanks for your persevering and well-wishing sympathy. It is a great pleasure to me that you are bringing about the performance of the Mass for men's voices on the 23rd October, and I hope that, as you have once "made your way through it," we shall also not succeed ill.
The "sneaking brood" (as you well name the people) can henceforth growl as much as they like. What does that matter to us, so long as we remain true and faithful to our task? In the performance last year at Jena (at the secular celebration of the University) I had the opportunity of convincing myself how capital your instrumentation of the Mass sounds, and I especially beg that you will not leave out one iota of it in the oboes or trombones. The organ alone is not sufficient, especially if there is a large chorus, and the completion of the accompaniment could not have been better accomplished than you have done it.