186 To Countess Rosalie Sauerma, Nee Spohr
Your letter gave me great pleasure, dear Countess and admirable artist, and, though still obliged to keep my bed (which I have been able to leave so little during the whole winter), I hasten to reassure you entirely about my state of health. As a fact, I have never done my obstinate illness the honor of considering it serious, and now less than ever, for I hope to have entirely got over it by the end of the week. So do not let us talk about it any more, and let me tell you at once how sincerely I rejoice in your projects of being, so to say, in the neighborhood of Dresden, for it seems to me that, among the towns of Germany, it is the one in which you will find most charm. I shall certainly come and pay you my visit there in the course of the winter, and I hope also that you will not altogether forget your friends of Weymar.
When you come back here, you will find very little change, but simply three more Weymarers—Goethe, Schiller, and Wieland—whose statues will be inaugurated next September, on the occasion of the celebration of the Jubilee fetes of the Grand Duke Carl August. They are also planning music for the occasion; and I predict to you beforehand that you will be able to read all sorts of unflattering things on this subject, as the music in question will be in great part my composition. However that may be, I shall try to have always something better to do than to trouble myself with what is said or written about me.
How delighted I shall be to hear you again, and to rock myself as in a hammock to the sound of your arpeggi. You have not, I am sure, broken off your good habits of work, and your talent is certain to be more magnificent than ever. Quite lately Madame Pohl, who played Parish Alvars’ Oberon Fantaisie charmingly, recalled most vividly the remembrance of the delightful hours at Eilsen and Weymar, which I hope soon to resume at Dresden…Be so kind as to present my best compliments to your husband and all your dear ones, and pray accept, dear Countess, the expression of most affectionate homage from yours very sincerely,
F. Liszt
Weymar, June 22nd, 1857
The Princess W. has been very seriously ill for more than two months; she is only just convalescent, and bids me give her best remembrances to you.