142 To Bernhard Cossmann in Baden-Baden
Wilhelmsthal, August 15th, 1855
Here am I really on the road to Baden-Baden, dear friend; but that does not advance matters at all, and in spite of myself I must resign myself to remain en route. Tomorrow morning I return to Weymar, where I have promised to meet my two daughters, as well as Mr. Daniel [Liszt’s son], who has pretty well distinguished himself at the general competition. After passing ten days or so with me the girls will take up their abode with Madame de Bulow at Berlin, who is good enough to take charge of them, and Daniel will return to Paris to continue his studies there. I was hoping also to be able to spend a week or two there- -but that cannot possibly be arranged, and on reflection I was obliged to limit myself to conducting the Princess W[ittgenstein] as far as Eisenach, whence she has continued her journey to Paris with her daughter (with the special view of seeing the exhibition of pictures there); and for my exhibition I shall content myself with that to the north, which I can enjoy from the windows of my room!—This picturesque solemnity is almost up to the height of the musical solemnities of Baden which you describe to me in such bright and lively colors, but with this difference, that at Wilhelmsthal we are very much favored by the element of damp, whereas at Baden the artists who give concerts are drained dry.
At Weymar all the world is out of doors, and the town is pretty full of nothing, offering to the curiosity of travelers only the trenches and practical circumvallations in honor of gas-lighting which they are going to start in October. Singer is bathing in the Danube (at Ofen), and tells me he shall be back by the roth of September; Raff is promenading amid the rose and myrtle shrubberies of his “Sleeping Beauty” at Wiesbaden; Stor is returning with his pockets full of new nuances which he has discovered at Ilmenau, where he has composed (as a pendant to my Symphonic Poem) “Ce qu’on entend dans la vallee”! [“What is heard in the valley.” Liszt’s work bears the title “Ce qu’on entend sur la montagne” (“What is heard on the mountain.”)] Preller [Friedrich Preller, the celebrated painter of the Odyssey pictures] has found beautiful trees in the Duchy of Oldenburg which serve him as a recovery of the “Recovery” [Or a “recreation of the Recreation.” I do not know which is meant. The original is “qui lui servent d’Erholung von der ‘Erholung.’”—Translator’s note.]; Martha Sabinin [A pupil of Liszt’s, a Russian] is haunting the “Venusberg” in the neighborhood of Eisenach in company with Mademoiselle de Hopfgarten; Bronsart [Hans von Bronsart, Liszt’s pupil, now General-Intendant at Weimar] is gone to a sort of family congress at Konigsberg; and Hoffman [Hoffmann von Fallersleben, the well-known poet] is running through Holland and Belgium to make a scientific survey of them; whilst Nabich is trying to gain the ears of England, Scotland, and Ireland with his trombone!
I, for my part, am in the midst of finishing the 13th Psalm (for tenor solo, chorus, and orchestra), “How long wilt Thou forget me, O Lord?” which you will hear this winter; and I shall not leave Weymar till November to go and pay a few days’ visit to Wagner at Zurich. Don’t altogether forget me, my dear Cossmann, in the midst of your solemnities——[The end of the letter was lost.]