In fact, I am feeling now as calm and serene as a baby in swaddling-clothes; and if somebody wished to put me in leading- strings, I should be very glad—nota bene, with a cap thickly lined with wadding on my head, for I feel that at every moment I should stumble and turn upside down. Unfortunately, instead of leading-strings there are probably awaiting me crutches, if I approach old age with my present step. I once dreamt that I was dying in a hospital, and this is so strongly rooted in my mind that I cannot forget it—it is as if I had dreamt it yesterday. If you survive me, you will learn whether we may believe in dreams.
And now I often dream with my eyes open what may be said to have neither rhyme nor reason in it.
That is why I write you such a foolish letter, is it?
Send me soon a letter from my people, and love your old
FREDERICK.
[6.] Nohant [1841].
Thanks for your very kind letter. Unseal all you judge necessary.
Do not give the manuscripts to Troupenas till Schubert has informed you of the day of publication. The answer will very likely come soon through Leo.
What a pity that the Tarantella is gone to Berlin, for, as you know from Schubert's letter, Liszt is mixed up in this monetary affair, and I may have some unpleasantness. He is a thin-skinned Hungarian, and may think that I do not trust him because I directed that the manuscripts should not be given otherwise than for cash. I do not know, but I have a presentiment of a disagreeable mess. Do not say anything about it to the ailing Leo; go and see him if you think it necessary, give him my compliments and thanks (although undeserved), and ask pardon for troubling him so much. After all, it is kind of him to take upon him the forwarding of my things. Give my compliments, also to Pleyel, and ask him to excuse my not writing to him (do not say anything about his sending me a very inferior piano).
I beg of you to put into the letter-box at the Exchange yourself the letter to my parents, but I say do it yourself, and before 4 o'clock. Excuse my troubling you, but you know of what great importance my letter is to my people.