Vienna, Sept. 13, 61. I have really had three lovely hours ; so Lady-friend shall hear about them : — The other day I was driven to the country-seat of a Hungarian family, Graf Naho [Nako], which boasts of having been the first and red-hottest devotee of my music in Vienna. An amiable young man — Prince Rudolph Liechtenstein, who picked up his equally estimable and very gentle wife en route — conducted me to the foot of the chain of hills, where Schwarzau lies. A wonderful site : were the plain filled up with water, it might easily pass for a Swiss lake. The equipment of the castle, of extraordinary taste, betrayed the rarest sense of fantasy in choice, arrangement and invention. The countess, a lady verging on the end of her thirties, with large, surprisingly intellectual black eyes, is celebrated for her singular natural talent in music ; she maintains a private orchestra of Gipsies, in whose midst she sits down to the piano and they improvise the most marvellous stuff for hours together. I feared I might find her stuck-up, perhaps affected : her mien soon reassured me. The seriousness of her sense of beauty was still better taught me by some astonishingly well-executed copies of the finest Vandyck portraits, as to which she remarked that they had cost her much trouble since she unfortunately had had no regular instruction in painting either ; anything like her studio I have never seen. At lunch we touched on books ; she was reading Tschudi's " Fauna of the Alps " at present. Then in came a magnificent light buckhound, followed by a spendid raven-black Newfoundland of gigantic size ; both were indescribably delighted by their mistress's caresses. We fell discussing the bearings of the animal world to man ; I propounded my pet theme, and found a most sympathetic audience, even to the full height of my articles of faith. The Gipsy band was in Hungary at the moment, so the countess tried to give us an idea of the way she improvised with them, alone at the piano, and very original and fascinating it was. Soon she dropped in motives from Lohengrin, and that ended in its being my turn to go to the piano. I was gratified by the beautiful hush with which it was all received. Only the Graf, a fine tall thoroughbred Hungarian, thought needful to keep telling me about my works' impression ; I bore it with much patience, however, as the scraps of conversation he had heard about me were related with an inexpressible goodnature. Young Liechtenstein I found a prey to touching melancholy : he had entered the diplomatic (Jolitischen) career after having chosen naval service in first youth, but was growing more and more aware how little he was made for politics. — The day passed in just enough walking and driving to induce an agreeable fatigue. Next morning I had to be called very early, as I had a rendezvous with my singer Ander at Modling, which lies on the road from Schwarzau to Vienna. Everybody assembled again for breakfast on the terrace in the freshest morning air, and with two other Hungarian magnates — Zichy and Almasy, who incessantly spoke of their horse-breeding — I began my journey back, as far as Modling ; where I was set down at 8 o'clock, in glorious weather. It was still too early to make a call on Ander ; moreover I was tired of so much talking, and finally of hearing others talk; so I determined to belong all to myself for a while first. I took a chaise and drove into the lovely ravine of the Briihl [the Liechtensteins' property]. There stands a place of entertainment, deserted at that hour of day. Behind the house lies a garden with an outlook on lush fields and hanging woods, magnificently lighted by the early sun. There I sat down, and passed —alone, in silence — that first fair hour whereof I wished to tell you. I left the spot profoundly comforted, beatified, at peace ! The second fair hour was that when Lady-friend expressed to me the very thoughts which I had felt in that first hour. That Ulrich v. Hutten was guiding her pen, but made her prophecy the more significant. The whole full soul of my existence stepped to me, interpreted that hour's silence, and the angel breathed its kiss of blessing on my brow. — That was the second fair hour. And what of the third ? — It was an unawaitedly fine success. The Flying Dutchman (the only opera of mine that can be given during Ander's continued indisposition) was set down for yesterday. I had heard this opera again a little while ago, when it left me very discontented, annoying me in particular by some very grave misunderstandings in the interpretation and the musical tempo, as also by a good many crudities in the rendering of the female chorus. So I had the two principal singers, the chorus, and the Kapellmeister called together yesterday morning for a little talk. It chiefly concerned the big scene between the Holländer and Senta, to whom I briefly but definitely explained the needful ; they seemed to be struck at having missed such obvious points. Chorus and Kapellmeister were similarly instructed. — As the representation had become a matter of routine already, and it was impossible to call the band together too, it would have been easy for these renovations to throw the whole thing out : the greater was my joy at the performance. A new spirit had entered into all. The Kapellmeister himself was astonished at the precision with which the amendments were executed ; my two singers were positively sublime in those particular places, but from beginning to end it all was seizing, ay, overwhelming to myself ! I can't help saying it : I have experienced many a beauteous thing, and yet must call last night my third fair hour ! — Let that be enough for to-day ! The happiness of those three hours ought not to be alloyed ; and therefore — nothing more from me to-day ! Out of mist and grey I stretch my hand to thee and cry : This has been possible. — Courage, then, courage ! The fairest hour is still to come ! — R. W.
Richard Wagner
Source: Richard Wagner to Mathilde Wesendonck, translated by Ellis, No. 122