In the meantime I am very happy to learn that you have not lost hold of your "Siegfried," which is sure to be una gran bella cosa, as the Italians say. I thank you for it in advance.
The day after tomorrow I start for Eilsen, where please address me until further notice. Do not fail to return the manuscript of my "Lohengrin" article, of which, if necessary, you might have a copy made at Zurich. I shall want it between the 5th and l0th of November.
Once more be thanked cordially for your "Wiland," and rest assured that, with or without the welded wings of genius, I always remain
Your truly devoted friend,
F. LISZT
WEYMAR, October 18th, 1850
50.
MY DEAREST FRIEND,
Do not be angry with me because I am so late in answering your last letter. I had to see to the return of the manuscript, entrusted to me, and this I was unable to do sooner. Your letter of October 22nd, together with the manuscript, did not reach me here till November 8th, via Berlin. As you wanted your manuscript back by November l0th, I must assume that some delay had taken place which you had not foreseen. I return herewith the French original, and in a few days I shall send the translation, which by then will have received its proper form.
Dear friend, your article has impressed me in a grand, elevating, stirring manner. That I have succeeded in thus acting upon you by my artistic work, that you are inclined to devote no small part of your extraordinary gift to opening, not only an external, but an internal, path to my movement—this fills me with the deepest and most joyous emotion. I feel as if in us two men had met who had proceeded from the two most distant points in order to penetrate to the core of art, and who now, in the joy of their discovery, fraternally clasped hands. This joy alone enables me to accept your admiring exclamations without bashfulness; for I feel that when you praise my gifts and my achievements you express thereby only your joy at having met me at the core of art. Be thanked for the pleasure you have thus given me.