DLA002-0010  Translation

Vienna VII Neustiftgasse 19

Honoured Master,

I have just received a Circular from the Art [illegible] from which I learned your address. I have been wanting to have this for a long time.

It was in the year 1869 that I (then a lieutenant) and my youngest brother (at that time a lawyer) were at Schloss Petris, in the County of Arad, with the Countess Stadion Gourieff, who got married shortly afterwards. One day – it was in high summer – we were visited by two young tourists; one was a son of the editor of the German newspaper in Arad, I think his name was Goldscheider. The other was a painter by the name of László, who painted a sketch of the puszta at Petris, which I still have at my Schloss Reifenstein near Cilli, where I am presently residing. Now you are the best person who could tell me whether this sketch was done by the painter László who has since become famous – that is, yourself. A faint memory tells me that there was a third young man at Petris at the time – the former – of the Ravitsky estate. My first wife (the Countess Gourieff) died 12 years ago. I married, secondly, the authoress Marie von Berks.^[1] The exhibition at the Künstlerhaus which will open in March and the portrait of my present wife – will be brought from Vlaho Bukovac [illegible words] who brought it to my estate Reifenstein near Cilli.

Yours sincerely,

Hugo Reichsritter von Berks

Member of the Imperial Parliament and Landowner.

Editorial Notes: 

Hugo Reichsritter von Berks was Knight of the Empire. Part of this letter may be missing.

Pd’O

15/01/2006