On Monday evening I shall be back in Vienna - and will expect you
directly I reach home. If possible I shall start from Vienna on
Thursday evening - but at the latest on Saturday early. I have
written to Tausig to take my old rooms for me. Much as I should
like to come to you, yet this time it is simpler for me to stay
at an hotel.
To our speedy meeting, which, alas! will be a good deal clouded
for us by these various obstructions. But in Vienna it can't be
otherwise. On this account you must soon come again to Weymar,
where we can belong to ourselves.
Heartfelt greetings in sincere friendship and loving devotion
from
F. Liszt
Pest, April 7th, 1858
203. To Adolf Reubke, Organ-Builder at Hausneinsdorf in the Harz.
[Written on the death of his son Julius Reubke (died June 3rd,
1858), a favorite pupil of Liszt's.]
Dear Sir,
Allow me to add these few lines of deepest sympathy to the poem
by Cornelius, ["Bein Tode von Julius Reubke" ("On the Death of
Julius Reubke"). Cornelius, Poems. Leipzig, 1890.] which lends
such fitting words to our feelings of sorrow. Truly no one
could feel more deeply the loss which Art has suffered in your
Julius, than the one who has followed with admiring sympathy his
noble, constant, and successful strivings in these latter years,
and who will ever bear his friendship faithfully in mind - the one
who signs himself with great esteem
Yours most truly,
F. Liszt
Weymar, June 10th, 1858
204. To Prince Constantin von Hohenzollern-Hechingen
[Autograph in the possession of Herr Alexander Meyer Cohn in
Berlin. - This very musical Prince was for years Liszt's patron,
and often invited the latter to stay with him at his Silesian
residence at Lowenberg, where he kept up an orchestra.]
Monseigneur,
When Your Highness was kind enough to express your views to me
respecting your noble design of encouraging in an exceptional
manner the progress of musical Art, and to question me as to the
best mode of employing a certain sum of money for this object, I
think I mentioned to you Mr. Brendel, the editor of the Neue
Zeitschrift fur Musik, as the best man to make your liberal
intentions bear fruit. As much on account of the perfect
uprightness of his character, which is free from all reproach, as
for the important and continuous services which his paper and
other of his works have rendered to the good cause for many years
past, I consider Mr. Brendel entirely worthy of your confidence.
It is not lightly that I put forward this opinion - and I venture
to flatter myself that my antecedents will be a sufficient
guarantee to Your Highness that in this matter, as in any others
in which I may have the honor of submitting any proposition to
you, I could follow no other influences, no other counsels, than
those of a scrupulous conscience. Putting aside all
considerations of vanity or personal advantage foreign to the end
in view, my sincere and sole desire is to make Your Highness's
intentions and capital the most productive possible. It is with
this view that I have openly spoken of the matter to Brendel,
whose letter, which I venture to enclose herewith, corresponds,
as it seems to me, with the programme in question.
I venture to beg you, Monseigneur, to look into this attentively,
and to let me know whether you will grant permission to Brendel
to enter into these matters more explicitly by writing to you
direct. In the event of the propositions contained in his letter
meeting with the approval of Your Highness, as I trust they may
do, it would be desirable that you should let him know without
too much delay in what manner you would wish your kind intentions
carried out.
In order to fulfill its task of progress, the Neue Zeitschrift
fur Musik has not spared its editor either in efforts or
sacrifices. By the fact that it represents, in a talented and
conscientious manner, the opinions and sympathies of my friends
and myself, it is in the most advanced, and consequently the most
perilous, position of our musical situation; therefore our
adversaries lose no opportunity of raising difficulties for it.
Our opinions and sympathies will he sustained, I doubt not,
by their worth and conviction; but if Your Highness condescends
to come to our aid, we shall be both proud and happy - and it is
by spreading our ideas through the Press that we can best
strengthen our position.
In other words, I am convinced that, in granting your confidence
to Mr. Brendel, the sum that Your Highness is pleased to devote
to this matter will be employed in the most honest manner, and
that most useful to the progress of Art - and that all the honor
and gratitude which your munificence deserves will spring from
it - as is the earnest desire of him who has the honor to be,
Monseigneur, Your Highness's most devoted and humble servant,
F. Liszt
Weymar, August 18th, 1858
205. To Frau Rosa von Milde
[Court opera-singer in Weimar, nee Agthe; the first Elsa in
Lohengrin; a refined and poetical artist]
Weymar, August 25th, 1858
My honored and dear Friend,
If the outward circumstances which you mention in your kind
letter are not exactly of the kind that I could wish for you, yet
I am egotist enough to be much pleased at its friendly contents
towards myself. Accept my warmest thanks for them - and let me
tell you how anxious I am that you should like me very much, and
how desirous I am to deserve this - as far as it can be deserved;
for the best part of a harmonious intimacy must ever remain a
free gift.
