After much hesitation I had sent the articles to Wagner—then at Lucerne—and with them a letter in which I begged him to forgive and to correct whatever errors there might be. Then, with what trepidation I looked and longed for a reply! Would he write?—I could hardly hope for that. Yet I suffered a pang of disappointment each morning when the postman came and went, leaving no longed-for letter. One day, at last, I saw an envelope bearing a Lucerne stamp and an unfamiliar handwriting which I nevertheless knew at once. With what emotions, and in what fear and trembling I opened it. Could it be possible?—Four whole pages of fine, close writing, clear and elegant, and below the last line the magic signature!... Here is the letter:—
"MADAME,—You cannot imagine the kindly and touching impression that your letter and your beautiful articles have made upon me. Permit me to thank you and to count you among the very few true friends whose far-seeing sympathy makes my only glory. I have found nothing to correct or to alter in your articles; only I see that you do not yet know the Meistersinger very intimately. The introduction to the third act has really appealed to our public. My barber told me the other day that this part pleased him most of all, which led me to reflect that the instincts of the people can neither be measured nor comprehended.
"As the curtain rises upon this third act, Hans Sachs, the cobbler, is seen in his workshop, early in the morning, seated in his arm-chair, entirely absorbed by his reading of the 'Chronicle' of the world. He speaks to his young apprentice, without interrupting the profound concentration of his mind upon his book.
"After the departure of the boy, he remains with head bowed over his enormous volume, and his meditation, silent up to this point, finally finds expression in these words spoken aloud, 'Wahn, Wahn! überall Wahn!' I do not know how to translate this, because 'Vanity, Vanity! All is vanity!' does not give the exact meaning of Wahn, which is much more general, and expresses the object of the folly as well as the folly itself.
"God only knows how my public divined, from the instrumental introduction to the third act, the situation that followed and the spiritual state of my Hans Sachs.
"It is true that in the second act, during the third verse of the shoemaker's song, the first motif of the stringed instruments had been introduced, suggesting there the hidden bitterness of the all-enduring man who reveals to the world only a cheerful and energetic front.
"Eva had comprehended this secret grief, and, moved to the depth of her soul, she had longed to fly where she could no longer hear that song with its pretence of joy.
"Here[1] this motif is played alone and developed fully, to die away at last in the sadness of renunciation, but, at the same time, the horns take up, softly, as if heard from a distance, the solemn chant with which Hans Sachs saluted Luther and the Reformation, and which brought to the poet a supreme popularity. After the first strophe the stringed instruments retake softly, and in a very slow movement, the themes of the true song of the shoemaker, as if the man raised his head from the work of his trade to look upward and lose himself in sweet and tender reveries. Then the horns, with their most exalted tone, break in triumphantly with that hymn of the Master with which Hans Sachs, on his appearance at the Fête in the third act, is saluted by all the people of Nuremberg in one unanimous thunder of applause.
"Again, the first motif of the stringed instruments enters, expressing with vigour the natural emotion of a soul profoundly moved. Gradually it grows calmer and more serene, and finally arrives at the supreme peace of a sweet and beautiful resignation.
"It is the real meaning of this short instrumental part that so impressed the worthy Pasdeloup that he essayed to perform it at your concerts as an illustration of this unusual music.