I am to leave Hamburg by the Saturday steamer for Bergen. This
coming Wednesday I am to give a concert in the Theatre, for the
benefit of the actors’ fund, and leave Thursday, going direct to
Hamburg. I long to see you again, and to pass two months in quiet
at Valestrand. I am much benefited by the baths, and it was well
that I could give the time, as the same old symptoms of chills and
fever had returned. I am now almost well, and hope, with the
friendly action of the fine Valestrand air, to be entirely quit of
this oppressive burden. I have in hand a work on the violin, which
I hope to finish during my summer rest—and to go out again in the
autumn with new vigor. I trust you will think that I look better.
I passed some days with the Duke of Nassau, at his palace in
Weilburg, and he courteously gave me the Adolf cross; he claims a
special value for it, since it was never before given to an
artist.
But think, Alexander! I have been so foolish as to buy a
delightful Gaspar da Salo,[21] which is now my favorite. It has a
much more majestic and noble tone than my other violins, and is
adapted for concert purposes.
[21] This instrument was used by him in his concerts from that time.
After invitations and messages to friends and relatives to visit the new
house which he had built, but had not yet seen, he continues:—
I sent 2000 willows from Amsterdam. You have planted them by the
stream, the best place for them? Have you bridged the brook and
filled the slope, and remembered the poor birch–trees, which must
have lived only on hope and air? You have papered some of the
walls; we can pother and putter about these for a change, can we
not? Serious conferences shall be held, and furnish us
amusement....
I hope the low land by the lake looks well with its crop of oats.
Their movement is so light and billowy as they are swayed by the
wind, that they remind me of
[Illustration: [22]]
[22] A Norwegian melody.
and they break the monotony of a
space without trees near the water....
I am now going to the musical festival at Coblentz, and am to
return this evening. I breakfast with the Prince of Holstein (the
highest in command), and am to sup with Mayor Schott in
Biebrich....
P. S.—We should make some excursions to the interior of the island
this summer, with the fiddle on our back.
This extract from a letter to his son, in Paris, dated at Bergen,
September 4, 1866, is interesting for its prescience of political
events:—
Take care, Alexander! political events are following closely on
one another; the French have an enemy in the United States not to
be ignored [since the affair in Mexico]; they must also beware of
Germany; their fleets and finance would soon be ruined by a war.
The times have changed, and the turn has come for Prussia to play
the master in Europe. She has a solid basis, a sound exchequer;
while in France all is unsettled and can easily fall out of
equilibrium. The French are to be banished from Rome, too; and
they must create new surprises and new _gloires_ in time, or fail.
The great man [Napoleon III.] is seriously ill; France knows it,
and is silent; but events will speak. Be careful,—never take part
in political discussions, I pray you!
Ole Bull was an eager reader of the newspapers, and kept up always with
the daily telegraphic news. In the war between Germany and France he was
an enthusiastic advocate of the German cause as against the imperialism
of Napoleon. A fortnight before the event, he predicted to a friend in
Wisconsin the compulsory resignation of McMahon as president of the
republic and the election of Grévy, and, with almost faultless accuracy,
the members of Grévy’s cabinet. He had a personal acquaintance with
leading men and workers in every country of Europe, and this, together
with his profound sympathy with the thoughts and aspirations of the
people as a whole, enabled him to arrive at his own conclusions.