My wife suffers, and is embittered; for her I hope everything from time. I asked you yesterday to inquire of her as to the pecuniary aid she may need; I ask you today not to do so-not now. If you will do me a kindness, send me a little money, so that I can get away,—anywhere, perhaps after all to Zurich, to my old friend Mueller. I should like to be at rest, so as to write the scenario for Paris; I don't feel up to much just now. What should I do in London? I am good for nothing, except perhaps writing operas, and that I cannot do in London.
Best greetings to any one who will accept them from me; there will not be many. Farewell, dear, much-troubled friend. Could I but make you returns!
Your most faithful
RICHARD WAGNER
REUIL, June 19th, 1849
21.
DEAR FRIEND,
With the contents of your letter No. 2 I agree more than with No. 1. For the present it would not be very diplomatic to knock at battered doors. Later on, when you stand revealed as a made fellow, even as you are a created one, protectors will easily be found; and if I can serve you then as a connecting and convenient instrument, I shall be quite at your disposal with my whole heart and with a certain slight savoir-faire. But a period of transition you cannot avoid, and Paris is for everything and before everything a necessity to you. Try to make it possible that your "Rienzi" (with a few modifications intended for the Paris public) is performed in the course of next winter. Pay a little court to Roger and Madame Viardot. Roger is an amiably intelligent man, who will probably fall in love with the part. I think, however, that in any case you will have to spare him a little more than Tichatschek, and will have to ease his task by some abbreviations. Also do not neglect Janin, who, I feel sure, will give you a helping hand, and whose influence in the press can secure the early performance of the opera.
In a word, very dear and very great friend, make yourself possible in possible conditions, and success will assuredly not fail you. Vaez and A. Royer will be of great assistance to you both for the translation and rearrangement of "Rienzi" and for the design of your new work. Associate and concur with them strictly for the realization of that plan from which you must not swerve:—
1. To give "Rienzi" during the winter of 1850 at the Paris Opera, whence it will take its flight to all the theatres of Germany, and perhaps of Italy. For Europe wants an opera which for our new revolutionary epoch will be what "La Muette de Portici" was for the July revolution, and "Rienzi" is conceived and written for those conditions. If you succeed in introducing into it a slight element of relief, were it only by means of stage machinery or of the ballet, success is certain.