22, PORTLAND TERRACE, REGENT'S PARK, LONDON.



180

22, PORTLAND TERRACE, REGENT'S PARK, LONDON.

DEAREST FRANZ,

I am in the absurd position of having to demand of you a friendly
service of a peculiar kind. I CANNOT delay the Berlin
"Tannhauser" affair any longer; my pecuniary position is so
unfortunate that I cannot afford to forego the hope of Berlin
receipts. Hulsen has applied to me once more, through Alwine
Frommann, and, as he says, for the last time. He promises all
manner of things; the opera is to be given in the autumn, and the
preparations are to begin as early as the spring. I must adopt
the "trivial" view of this matter, the same view which
unfortunately I am compelled to take of the entire fate of my
operas. In spite of D. conducting, "Tannhauser" will probably
have the same kind of effect in Berlin which it has had every
where else; to connect higher hopes with it seems vain. Let the
matter therefore take the only course which apparently is open to
it, but I regret very much that you have wasted so much trouble
and submitted to so many stupid things in endeavouring to
accomplish the condition made by me. We are, as we now see,
powerless.

The fate which we must expect is, after all, the COMMON LOT. Our