Address care of Erard, 18, Great Marlborough Street.
Need I again assure you that any question will not be a question between us?
28. To Franz von Schober
Stonehenge, Salisbury, August 29th, 1840
It is with an unspeakable feeling of sadness and vexation that I write to you today, my dear good friend! Your letter had done me so much good; I was so happy at the thought of our meeting at the end of the autumn at latest; I wanted so to feel that I could rest on your arm, and that your heart, so full of kindness and brotherly help, was near me,—and, lo and behold! I am obliged to give it up, or at least to put it off…
An unfortunate engagement which I have just renewed, and which will keep me in England till the end of January, makes it impossible for me to say to you the one word which I wish to say, "Come!"—
England is not like any other country; the expenses are enormous. I really dare not ask you to travel with me here, for it would almost ruin us. Moreover we should hardly be able to be together, for I have three or four compulsory companions, from whom it is impossible for me to separate. I hoped to have done with all that by the beginning of October, but now I have to begin again in the middle of November. If I have time to make my journey to Russia this year it will be the utmost I can do, but it is a journey that I am in a way obliged to make after the gracious invitation of Her Majesty the Empress at Ems. On the 15th of next May I return again to London, probably by the steamer coming direct from St. Petersburg.
Where shall I find you in a year—fifteen months? It is very possible that I shall come and look for you in Vienna, but then I shall assuredly not leave without taking you with me.
I have some thoughts of spending the following winter at Constantinople. I am tired of the West; I want to breathe perfumes, to bask in the sun, to exchange the smoke of coal for the sweet smoke of the narghileh [Turkish pipe]. In short, I am pining for the East! O my morning land! O my Aborniko!—
My uncle writes that you have been very good and obliging to him. I thank you warmly.—Do you meet Castelli from time to time? When you see him beg him from me to translate the article I published in the Paris "Revue Musicale" (of August 23rd) on Paganini, and to get it put into the "Theater-Zeitung". I should be very glad also if it could be translated into Hungarian, for the Hirnok (excuse me if I make a mess of the word!), but I do not know who could do it.