Everything contributed to the maintenance of this hope:  my wife returned to Brestenberg to complete the second part of her cure; the most glorious summer weather favoured my disposition to work at the second act of Tristan; the evenings with Tausig cheered me up, and my relations with my neighbours, who had never borne me any ill-will, seemed to me to favour the possibility of a dignified and desirable understanding in the future.  It was quite probable that if my wife went on a visit to her friends in Saxony after her cure, time would eventually cover the past with oblivion, and her own future conduct as well as the changed attitude of our deeply offended neighbour, would make it possible to renew our mutual intercourse in a dignified way.

I was still further cheered by the prospect of the arrival of an agreeable visitor, as well as by some satisfactory negotiations with two of the most important German theatres.

In June the Berlin manager approached me about Lohengrin, and we soon came to an agreement.  In Vienna, too, the forced intrusion of Tannhauser had produced its effect on the attitude of the management of the court theatre.  Just recently the well-known conductor, Karl Eckert, had been entrusted with the technical management of the Opera.  He seized the happy opportunity afforded by the possession of a very good company of singers, and by the closing of the theatre for much needed restoration, to give the company time to study Lohengrin, with the object of securing the acceptance of this new and difficult work by the court authorities.  He thereupon made me his offers.  I wanted to insist on the author’s rights on the same terms as those granted in Berlin, but he would not agree to this, because the takings of the house were very small, owing to the lack of space in the old theatre.  On the other hand, Conductor Esser called on me one day; he had come from Vienna to make all arrangements, and in the name of the management he offered me about two thousand marks, cash down, for the first twenty performances of Lohengrin, and promised me a further sum of two thousand marks on their completion.  The frank and genial manner of the worthy musician won me over, and I closed with him at once.  The result was that Esser went through the score of Lohengrin with me there and then, with great conscientiousness and zeal, and paid special attention to all my wishes.  With every confidence in a favourable result I bid him farewell, and he hurried back to Vienna to set to work at once.

I then completed the composition sketches for the second act of Tristan in excellent spirits, and began the more detailed execution of it, but I did not get quite through the first scene, as I was exposed to continual interruptions.  Tichatschek came to pay me another visit, and took up his abode in my little spare room, to recover, as he said, from the effects of his recent exertions.  He boasted that he had again introduced my operas, which had been repeatedly forbidden, into the repertoire of the Dresden theatre, and had also taken part in them himself with great success.