My relationship with Kajanus was really extraordinary, “full of pathos”. He was a good composer himself and he said to me: “I could hate you as I could hate no one else.”
However, he did not understand all of my compositions. For example, he did not understand my fourth symphony at all, because we were so different. But time after time, you could say “a thousand and one nights”, we were together and then we talked about everything. He always conducted my compositions with great enthusiasm and esteem; but the composer in him envied me [The final phrase, “but…envied me”, has been struck out.] (…)
He was a great character; he had many admirers, and he could defend me against them when they tried to do me down in their reviews.
(To Jussi Snellman, 1943)

He is a swindler, but I like him.(About Sigurd Wettenhovi-Aspa. Diary, 8th October 1916)