into the world in different fashion from that which would be possible to the good people there.  With regard to this, I am busy with wishes and plans which, at first look, seem chimerical, yet these alone give me the heart to finish Siegfried.  To realize the best, the most decisive, the most important work which, under the present circumstances, I can produce—­in short, the accomplishment of the conscious mission of my life—­needs a matter of perhaps 10,000 thalers.  If I could ever command such a sum I would arrange thus:—­here, where I happen to be, and where many a thing is far from bad—­I would erect, after my own plans, in a beautiful field, near the town, a rough theatre of planks and beams, and merely furnish it with the decorations and machinery necessary for the production of Siegfried.  Then I would select the best singers to be found anywhere, and invite them for six weeks to Zurich.  I would try to form a chorus here, consisting, for the most part, of amateurs; there are splendid voices here, and strong, healthy people.  I should invite in the same way my orchestra.  At the new year announcements and invitations to all the friends of the musical drama would appear in all the German newspapers, with a call to visit the proposed dramatic musical festival.  Any one giving notice, and travelling for this purpose to Zurich, would receive a certain entree—­naturally, like all the entrees, gratis.  Besides, I should invite to a performance the young people here, the university, the choral unions.  When everything was in order I should arrange, under these circumstances, for three performances of Siegfried in one week.  After the third the theatre would be pulled down, and my score burnt.  To those persons who had been pleased with the thing I should then say, ‘Now do likewise.’  But if they wanted to hear something new from me, I should say, ‘You get the money.’  Well, do I seem quite mad to you?  It may be so, but I assure you to attain this end is the hope of my life, the prospect which alone can tempt me to take in hand a work of art.  So—­get me 10,000 thalers—­that’s all!”

His friends, I say, did their best; but Liszt, though his generosity had no bounds, still clung to the odd idea that Wagner should do something for himself; also he could not get it out of his head that the something could only be done in Paris.  So, in another of the Uhlig letters, dated more than six months anterior to the above, we find him writing, half wearily, half defiantly—­

“I have never felt the consciousness of freedom so beneficent as now, nor have I ever been so convinced that only a loving communion with others procures freedom.  If, through the assistance of X., I should be enabled to look firmly at the immediate future without any necessity to earn a living, those years would be the most decisive of my life, and especially of my artistic career; for now I could look at Paris with calmness and dignity; whereas, before, the fear of being