“DEAR SIR--PETER ILICH,--Your kind answer to my letter proved a greater joy than I have experienced for a long while, but--you know human nature: the more we have of a good thing, the more we want. Although I promised not to be a nuisance, I already doubt my own powers of refraining, because I am going to ask you a favour which may seem to you very strange; but anyone who lives the life of an anchorite--as I do--must naturally end by regarding all that relates to society and the conventionalities of life as empty and meaningless terms. I do not know how you look upon these matters, but--judging from our short acquaintance--I do not think you will be disposed to criticise me severely; if I am wrong, however, I want you to say so frankly, without circumlocution, and to refuse my request, which is this: give me one of your photographs. I have already two, but I should like one from you personally; I want to read in your face the inspiration, the emotions, under the influence of which you write the music which carries us away to that world of ideal feelings, aspirations and desires which cannot be satisfied in life. How much joy, but how much pain is there in this music! Nor would we consent to give up this suffering, for in it we find our highest capacities; our happiness, our hopes, which life denies us. _The Tempest_ was the first work of yours I ever heard. I cannot tell you the impression it made upon me! For several days I was half out of my mind. I must tell you that I cannot separate the man from the musician, and, as the high priest of so lofty an art, I expect to find in him, more than in ordinary men, the qualities I most reverence. Therefore after my first impression of _The Tempest_ I was seized with the desire to know something of the man who created it. I began to make inquiries about you, took every opportunity of hearing what was said of you, stored up every remark, every fragment of criticism, and I must confess that just those things for which others blamed you were charms in my eyes--everyone to his taste! Only a few days ago--in casual conversation--I heard one of your opinions, which delighted me, and was so entirely in accordance with my own that I felt suddenly drawn to you by more intimate and friendly ties. It is not intercourse that draws people together, so much as affinities of opinion, sentiment, and sympathy, so that one person may be closely united to another, although in some respects they remain strangers.