My Life Volume II Part 12

One day, when I was watching young Stadl at the gambling-table in Wiesbaden, I thought he was rather like the poor servant-girl. I had taken coffee with him and Weisheimer in the Kur garden, and we had enjoyed one another's company, when Stadl disappeared for a time.

Weisheimer led me to the gambling-table to find him. Seldom have I witnessed a more horrible change of expression than that now stamped on the man who was a prey to the gambling mania. As a demon had possessed poor Lieschen, so now a demon possessed this man. As folk say, the devils 'pursued their evil l.u.s.ts in him.' No appeal, no humiliating admonitions could prevail upon the man tortured by his losses in the game to summon up his moral powers. As I remembered my own experiences of the gambling pa.s.sion, to which I had succ.u.mbed for a time when I was a youth, I spoke to young Weisheimer on the subject, and offered to show him how I was not afraid to make a stake on pure chance, but that I had no belief in my luck. When a new round of roulette began, I said to him in a voice of quiet certainty, 'Number 11 will win'; and it did.

I added fuel to the fire of his astonishment at this stroke of good luck by predicting Number 27 for the next round. Certainly I remember being overcome by a spell as I spoke, and my number was in fact again victorious. My young friend was now in a state of such astonishment, that he vehemently urged me to stake something on the numbers which I foretold. Again I cannot but call to mind the curious, quiet feeling of being spellbound which possessed me as I said, 'As soon as I introduce my own personal interests into the game, my gift of prophecy will disappear at once.' I then drew him away from the gambling-table, and we took our way back to Biebrich in a fine sunset.

I now came into very painful relations with poor Friederike Meyer. She wrote and told me of her recovery and requested me to visit her, because she felt it her duty to apologise to me for the trouble in which she had involved me. As the short drive to Frankfort often helped to entertain me and distract my thoughts, I gladly fulfilled her wishes, and found her in a state of convalescence but still weak, and obviously preoccupied with the effort to fortify my mind against all disagreeable surmises about herself. She said that Herr von Guaita was like an anxious, almost hypersensitive father to her. She told me that she was very young when she left her family, and that with her sister Luise in particular she had severed all connection. She had thus come quite friendless to Frankfort, where the chance protection of Herr von Guaita, a man of mature age, had been very welcome to her.

Unfortunately she had to suffer much that was painful under this arrangement, for she was most bitterly persecuted, chiefly on the score of her reputation, by her patron's family, who feared he might want to marry her. As she told me this, I could not refrain from drawing her attention to some of the consequences of the antagonism I had noticed, and I went so far as to speak of the house which people said had been given her as a present. This seemed to produce an extraordinary effect upon Friederike, who was still an invalid. She expressed the greatest annoyance at these rumours, although, as she admitted, she had long been obliged to suspect that slander of this kind would be disseminated about her; more than once she had considered the advisability of giving up the Frankfort stage, and now she was more determined than ever to do so. I saw nothing in her demeanour to shake my confidence in the truth of her story; moreover, as Herr von Guaita became more and more unintelligible to me both as a man and in the light of his incredible conduct on the occasion of Friederike's illness, my att.i.tude towards this highly gifted girl was henceforth unconditionally on the side of her interests, which were being prejudiced by an obvious injustice. To facilitate her recovery I advised her, without delay, to take a long holiday for a tour on the Rhine.

In accordance with the instructions conveyed to him by the Grand Duke, Eduard Devrient now addressed me in reference to the appointed performance of Lohengrin in Karlsruhe under my superintendence. The angry and arrogant disgust expressed in his letter at my desire to see that Lohengrin was produced without 'cuts,' served admirably to expose to me the profound antipathy of this man whom I had once so blindly overestimated. He wrote that one of the first things he had done was to have a copy of the score made for the orchestra with the 'cuts'

introduced by Conductor Rietz for the Leipzig performance, and that it would consequently be a tiresome business to put back all the pa.s.sages which I wished to have restored. He regarded my request in this particular as merely malicious. I now remembered that the only performance of Lohengrin, which had been taken off almost immediately on account of its complete failure, was the one in Leipzig produced by Conductor Rietz. Devrient, regarding Rietz as Mendelssohn's successor and the most solid musician of 'modern times,' had concluded that this mutilation of my work was a suitable one for production in Karlsruhe.

But I shuddered at the misguided light in which I had so long persisted in regarding this man. I informed him briefly of my indignation and of my decision to have nothing to do with Lohengrin in Karlsruhe. I also expressed my intention to make my excuses to the Grand Duke at a suitable time. Soon after this I heard that Lohengrin was, after all, to be produced in Karlsruhe in the usual way, and that the newly wedded Schnorrs had been specially engaged for it. A great longing at last filled me to make the acquaintance of Schnorr and his achievements.

Without announcing my intentions, I travelled to Karlsruhe, obtained a ticket through Kaliwoda, and heedless of all else went to the performance. In my published Memoirs I have described more accurately the impressions I received on this occasion, more particularly of Schnorr. I fell in love with him at once, and after the performance I sent him a message to come and see me in my room at the hotel and have a little chat. I had heard so much of his delicate state of health that I was genuinely delighted to see him enter the room with a lively step and a look of joy in his eyes. Although it was late at night, and he had undergone a considerable strain, he met my anxiety to avoid all dissipation out of regard to his welfare, by willingly accepting my offer to celebrate our new acquaintance with a bottle of champagne. We spent the greater part of the night in the best of spirits, and among our discussions those on Devrient's character were especially instructive to me. I undertook to stay another day, so as to avail myself of an invitation to lunch with Schnorr and his wife. As by this lengthy stay in Karlsruhe I knew my presence would become known to the Grand Duke, I took advantage on the following day to inform him of my arrival, and he made an appointment to meet me in the afternoon. After talking at lunch to Frau Schnorr, in whom I had recognised a great and well-developed theatrical talent, and after making the most astonishing discoveries about Devrient's behaviour in the Tristan affair, I had my interview at the ducal palace. It was marked by uneasiness on both sides. I openly stated my reasons for withdrawing my promise with regard to the Lohengrin performance, and also my unalterable conviction that a conspiracy to interfere with the production of Tristan originally proposed had been the work of Devrient. As Devrient, by his ingenious att.i.tude, had led the Grand Duke to believe in his profound and genuinely solicitous friendship for me, my communications obviously pained the Grand Duke a great deal. Still, he seemed eager to a.s.sume that the matter turned on artistic differences of opinion between me and his theatrical manager, and in bidding me good-bye he expressed the hope of seeing these apparent misunderstandings give way to a satisfactory explanation. I replied with indifference that I did not think it likely I should ever come to an agreement with Devrient. The Grand Duke now gave vent to genuine indignation; he had not thought, he said, that I could so easily treat an old friend with such ingrat.i.tude.

To meet the keenness of this reproach I could at first only tender my apologies for not having expressed my decision with the emphasis he had a right to expect, but as the Grand Duke had taken this matter so seriously and had thereby seemed to justify me in expressing my real opinion of this supposed friend with equal seriousness, I was bound, with all the earnestness at my command, to a.s.sure him that I did not wish to have anything more to do with Devrient. At this the Grand Duke told me, with renewed gentleness, that he declined to regard my a.s.surance as irrevocable, for it lay in his power to propitiate me by other means. I took my departure with an expression of serious regret that I could not help regarding as fruitless any effort made in the direction contemplated by my patron. Later on I ascertained that Devrient, who, of course, was informed by the Grand Duke of what had taken place, looked upon my behaviour as an attempt on my part to ruin and supplant him. The Grand Duke had not abandoned his desire to arrange for the performance of a concert consisting of selections from my most recent works. Devrient had afterwards to write to me again in his official capacity on this subject. In his letter he took occasion to make it clear that he regarded himself as victorious over the intrigues I had practised against him, a.s.suring me at the same time that his distinguished patron nevertheless wished to carry out the concert in question, as from his lofty point of view he knew very well how to distinguish 'the art from the artist.' My answer was a simple refusal.

I had many a conversation with the Schnorrs over the episode, and I made an arrangement with them to visit me soon in Biebrich. I returned there now, to be in time for Bulow's visit, of which I had already been informed. He arrived at the beginning of July to look for lodgings for himself and Cosima, who followed two days later. We were immensely pleased to meet again, and utilised the occasion to make excursions of all sorts for the benefit of our health in the pleasant Rheingau country. We took our meals together regularly in the public dining-room of the Europaischer Hof (where the Schnorrs also came to stay), and we were generally as merry as possible. In the evening we had music in my rooms. Alwine Frommann, on her way through Biebrich, also came to the reading of the Meistersinger. All present seemed to be struck with surprise on hearing my latest libretto, and especially by the vernacular gaiety of the style, of which until now I had not availed myself. Frau Dustmann also, who had a special engagement for a performance at Wiesbaden, paid me a visit. Unfortunately I noticed in her a lively antipathy to her sister Friederike, a fact which, among others, strengthened my conviction that it was high time for Friederike to dissociate herself from all ties in Frankfort. After I had been enabled, with Bulow's support, to play my friends the completed parts of the composition of the Meistersinger, I went through most of Tristan, and in this process the Schnorrs had an opportunity of showing the extent to which they had already made themselves acquainted with their task. I found that both were a good deal lacking in clearness of enunciation.

The summer now brought more visitors into our neighbourhood, and amongst them several of my acquaintances. David, the Leipzig concert director, called on me with his young pupil, August Wilhelmj, the son of a Wiesbaden lawyer. We now had music in the true sense of the word, and Conductor Alois Schmitt from Schwerin contributed an odd share by performing what he called a worthless old composition of his. One evening we had a crowded party, the Schotts joining the rest of my friends, and both the Schnorrs delighted us keenly with a performance of the so-called love-scene in the third act of Lohengrin. We were all deeply moved by the sudden apparition of Rockel in our common dining-room at the hotel. He had been released from Waldheimer prison after thirteen years. I was astounded to find absolutely no radical change in the appearance of my old acquaintance, except for the faded colour of his hair. He himself explained this to me by observing that he had stepped out of something like a sh.e.l.l in which he had been ensconced for his own preservation. As we were deliberating about the field of activity on which he ought now to enter, I advised him to seek some useful employment in the service of a benevolent and liberal-minded man like the Grand Duke of Baden. He did not think he would succeed in any ministerial capacity, owing to his want of legal knowledge; on the other hand, he was eminently qualified to undertake the supervision of a house of correction, as he had obtained not only the most accurate information on this subject, but at the same time had noted what reforms were necessary. He went off to the German shooting compet.i.tion taking place at Frankfort. There, in recognition of his martyrdom and his unwavering conduct, he was accorded a flattering ovation, and he stayed in Frankfort and its neighbourhood for some time.

Casar Willig, a painter who had received a commission from Otto Wesendonck to paint my portrait at his expense, worried me and my intimate friends at this time. Unfortunately the painter was utterly unsuccessful in his attempt to make a good likeness of me. Although Cosima was present at nearly all the sittings, and tried her utmost to put the artist on the right track, the end of it was that I had to sit for a sharp profile, to enable him to produce anything that could be in the least recognisable as a likeness. After he had performed this task to his satisfaction, he painted another copy for me out of grat.i.tude. I sent this at once to Minna in Dresden, through whom it ultimately went to my sister Louisa. It was a horrible picture, and I was confronted with it once afterwards when it was exhibited by the artist in Frankfort.

I made a pleasant excursion with the Bulows and the Schnorrs to Bingen one evening, and availed myself of the opportunity to cross over to Rudesheim to bring back Friederike Meyer, who had been enjoying her holiday there. I introduced her to my friends, and Cosima especially took a friendly interest in this uncommonly gifted woman. Our gaiety as we sat over a gla.s.s of wine in the open air was heightened by our being unexpectedly accosted by a traveller who approached us respectfully from a distant table; he held his gla.s.s filled, and at once greeted me politely and with the utmost warmth. He was a native of Berlin and a great enthusiast of my work. He spoke not only for himself, but also on behalf of two of his friends, who joined us at our table; and our good-humour led us ultimately to champagne. A splendid evening with a wonderful moon-rise shed its influence over the gladness of our spirits as we returned home late in the evening after this delightful excursion. When we visited Schlangenbad (where Alwine Frommann was staying) in equally high spirits, our reckless humour beguiled us into making an even longer excursion to Rolandseck. We made our first halt at Remagen, where we visited the handsome church, in which a young monk was preaching to an immense crowd, and we afterwards lunched in a garden on the bank of the Rhine. We remained that night in Rolandseck, and next morning we went up the Drachenfels. In connection with this ascent, an adventure happened which had a merry sequel. On the return journey, after getting out of the train at the railway station and crossing the Rhine, I missed my letter-case containing a note for two hundred marks; it had slipped out of my overcoat pocket. Two gentlemen who had joined us on the way from the Drachenfels immediately offered to retrace their steps, a somewhat arduous undertaking, to hunt for the lost object. After a few hours they returned, and handed me the letter-case with its contents intact. Two stone-cutters at work on the summit of the mountain had found it. They restored it at once, and the honest fellows were presented with a handsome reward. The happy issue to this adventure had, of course, to be celebrated by a good dinner with the best wine. The story was not completed for me until a long time afterwards. In 1873, on my entering a restaurant in Cologne, the host introduced himself to me as the man who, eleven years previously, had catered for us at the inn on the Rhine, and had changed that very two-hundred-mark note for me. He then told me what had happened to that note. An Englishman, to whom he had related the adventure of the note on the same day, offered to buy it from him for double its value. The host declined any such transaction, but allowed the Englishman to have the note on the promise of the latter to stand champagne to all those present at the time. The promise was fulfilled to the letter.

An invitation to Osthofen from the Weisheimer family was the origin of a less satisfactory excursion than the one described above. We put up there for one night after being compelled on the previous day to take part at all hours in the frolics of a peasant wedding-feast which was simply interminable. Cosima was the only one who managed to keep in a good temper throughout the proceedings. I supported her to the best of my abilities. But Bulow's depression, which had increased during the preceding days, grew deeper and deeper, was aggravated by every possible incident, until at last it developed into an outbreak of fury.

We tried to console ourselves with the reflection that a similar infliction could never again fall to our lot. The following day, while I was preparing for my departure, and brooding over other sources of dissatisfaction at my position, Cosima induced Hans to continue the journey as far as Worms in the hope of finding something refreshing and cheering in a visit to the ancient cathedral there, and from that place they followed me later to Biebrich.

One little adventure we had at the gaming-table at Wiesbaden still lingers in my memory. Within the last few days I had received a royalty of twenty louis d'or from the theatre for an opera. Not knowing what to do with so small a sum (as my situation, on the whole, was growing worse and worse), I ventured to ask Cosima to risk half the sum at roulette in our joint interest. I observed with astonishment how, without even the smallest knowledge of the game, she staked one gold piece after another on the table, throwing it down so that it never definitely covered any particular number or colour. In this way it gradually disappeared behind the croupier's rake. I grew alarmed, and hurriedly went to another table in the hope of counteracting the effect of Cosima's unguided and misguided efforts. In this very economical pursuit luck befriended me so substantially, that I at once recovered the ten louis d'or which my fair friend had lost at the other table.

This soon put us into a very merry mood. Less cheering than this adventure was our visit to a performance of Lohengrin in Wiesbaden.

After we had been pretty well satisfied and put into a fairly good humour by the first act, the representation turned, as it proceeded, into a current of maddening misrepresentation such as I should never have believed possible. In a fury I left the theatre before the end, while Hans, urged by Cosima's reminder of the proprieties (though they were both as much infuriated as I was), endured the martyrdom of witnessing the performance to a close.

On another occasion I heard that the Metternichs had arrived at their Castle Johannisberg. Still preoccupied with my main anxiety to obtain a peaceful domicile in which to conclude the Meistersinger, I kept an eye on this castle, which was generally unoccupied, and announced my intention of calling on the Prince. An invitation soon followed, and the Bulows accompanied me to the railway station. I could not fail to be satisfied with the friendly reception accorded to me by my patrons.

They, too, had been considering the question of finding a temporary resting-place for me in the Johannisberg Castle, and found they could give me a small flat in the house of the keeper of the castle for my sole use, only they drew my attention to the difficulty of obtaining my board. The Prince, however, had busied himself more actively with another matter, that of creating a permanent position for me in Vienna.

He said that on his next stay in Vienna he would have a discussion about my affairs with Schmerling the minister, whom he thought it was most suitable to consult on such a matter. He was a man who would understand me, and perhaps be able to discover a proper position for me in the higher sense of the word, and arouse the Emperor's interest in me. If I went to Vienna again, I was simply to call on Schmerling, and he would receive me as a matter of course on account of the Prince's introduction. As the result of an invitation to the ducal court, the Metternichs had repaired without loss of time to Wiesbaden, to which city I accompanied them, and again fell in with the Bulows.

Schnorr had left us after a fortnight's stay, and now the time had also come for the Bulows to depart. I accompanied them as far as Frankfort, where we spent two more days together to see a performance of Goethe's Ta.s.so. Liszt's symphonic poem Ta.s.so was to precede the play. It was with odd feelings that we witnessed this performance. Friederike Meyer as the Princess and Herr Schneider as Ta.s.so appealed to us greatly, but Hans could not get over the shameful execution of Liszt's work by the conductor, Ignaz Lachner. Before going to the theatre Friedrike gave us a luncheon at the restaurant in the Botanical Gardens. In the end the mysterious Herr von Guaita also joined us there. We now noticed with astonishment that all further conversation was carried on between them as a duologue which was quite unintelligible to us. All that we could make out was the furious jealousy of Herr von Guaita and Friederike's witty, scornful defence. But the excited man became more composed when he suggested I should arrange for a performance of Lohengrin in Frankfort under my own direction. I was favourably disposed to the suggestion, as I saw in it an opportunity for another meeting with the Bulows and the Schnorrs. The Bulows promised to come, and I invited the Schnorrs to be in the cast. This time we could take leave of one another cheerfully, although the increasing and often excessive ill-humour of poor Hans had drawn many an involuntary sigh from me. He seemed to be in perpetual torment. On the other hand, Cosima appeared to have lost the shyness she had evinced towards me when I visited Reichenhall in the previous year, and a very friendly manner had taken its place. While I was singing 'Wotan's Abschied' to my friends I noticed the same expression on Cosima's face as I had seen on it, to my astonishment, in Zurich on a similar occasion, only the ecstasy of it was transfigured into something higher. Everything connected with this was shrouded in silence and mystery, but the belief that she belonged to me grew to such certainty in my mind, that when I was under the influence of more than ordinary excitement my conduct betrayed the most reckless gaiety. As I was accompanying Cosima to the hotel across a public square, I suddenly suggested she should sit in an empty wheelbarrow which stood in the street, so that I might wheel her to the hotel. She a.s.sented in an instant. My astonishment was so great that I felt all my courage desert me, and was unable to carry out my mad project.

On returning to Biebrich I was at once confronted with grave difficulties, for Schott, after keeping me some time in suspense, now definitely refused to pay me any further subsidies. The advances I had already received from my publisher had, it is true, until quite recently, served to defray all my expenses since leaving Vienna, including my wife's removal to Dresden and my own migration to Biebrich by way of Paris, where I had to satisfy more than one lurking creditor.

But in spite of these initial difficulties, which, I suppose, took about half the money I was to have for the Meistersinger by agreement, I had counted upon finishing my work in peace with the remainder of the sum stipulated. But since then Schott had put me off with vain promises about a fixed date for balancing accounts with the bookseller. I had already been put to great straits, and now everything seemed to depend on my being able to hand over a complete act of the Meistersinger to Schott quickly. I had got as far as the scene where Pogner is about to introduce Walther von Stolzing to the meistersingers, when--about the middle of August, while Bulow was still there--an accident occurred which, though slight in itself, made me incapable of writing for two whole months.

My surly host kept a bulldog named Leo chained up, and neglected him so cruelly that it excited my constant sympathy. I therefore tried one day to have him freed from vermin, and held his head myself, so that the servant who was doing it should not be frightened. Although the dog had learned to trust me thoroughly, he snapped at me once involuntarily and bit me--apparently very slightly--in the upper joint of my right-hand thumb. There was no wound visible, but it was soon evident that the periosteum had become inflamed from the contusion. As the pain increased more and more with the use of the thumb, I was ordered to do no writing until my hand was quite healed. If my plight was not quite so terrible as the newspapers--which announced that I had been bitten by a mad dog--made out, it was still conducive to serious reflection on human frailty. To complete my task, therefore, I needed, not only a sound mind and good ideas, irrespective of any required skill, but also a healthy thumb to write with, as my work was not a libretto I could dictate, but music which no one but myself could write down.

On the advice of Raff, who considered a volume of my songs to be worth one thousand francs, I decided to offer my publisher, by way of temporary compensation, five poems by my friend Frau Wesendonck which I had set to music (consisting chiefly of studies for Tristan with which I was occupied at the time), so that he should at least have something on the market. The songs were accepted and published, but they seemed to have produced no softening effect on Schott's mood. I was obliged to conclude that he was acting on some one else's instigation, and I betook myself to Kissingen (where he was staying for his 'cure') in order to get to the bottom of it and shape my next moves accordingly.

An interview with him was obstinately denied me, and Frau Schott, who was posted outside his door in the role of guardian angel, informed me that a bad liver attack prevented him from seeing me. I now realised my position with regard to him. For the moment I drew on young Weisheimer for some money, which he gave me most willingly, supported as he was by a wealthy father, and then set to work to consider what I could do next. I could no longer count on Schott, and had in consequence lost all prospect of an unopposed performance of the Meistersinger.

At this juncture I was much surprised to receive a renewed official invitation to Vienna for the performance of Tristan at the Opera, where I was informed all obstacles had been removed, as Ander had completely recovered his voice. I was genuinely astonished to hear this, and on further inquiry arrived at the following elucidation of the transactions that had been taking place on my behalf in Vienna during the interval. Before I left there the last time Frau Luise Dustmann, who seemed to take a real pleasure in the part of Isolde, had tried to clear away the real impediment to my undertaking by persuading me to go to an evening party, where she intended to introduce me again to Dr.

Hanslick. She knew that unless this gentleman could be brought round to my side nothing could be accomplished in Vienna. As I was in a good temper that evening I found it easy to treat Hanslick as a superficial acquaintance, until he drew me aside for an intimate talk, and with sobs and tears a.s.sured me he could not bear to be misunderstood by me any longer. The blame for anything that might have been extraordinary in his judgment of me was to be laid, not on any malicious intention, but solely on the narrow-mindedness of an individual who desired nothing more ardently than to learn from me how to widen the boundaries of his knowledge. All this was said in such a burst of emotion that I could do nothing but soothe his grief and promise him my unreserved sympathy with his work in future. Just before leaving Vienna I actually heard that Hanslick had launched forth into unmeasured praise of myself and my amiability. This change had so affected both the singers at the Opera and also Councillor Raymond (the Lord High Steward's adviser) that at last, working from high circles downwards, it came to be regarded as a point of honour with the Viennese to have Tristan performed in their city. Hence my summons!

I heard at the same time from young Weisheimer, who had betaken himself to Leipzig, that he was sure he could arrange a good concert there if I could a.s.sist him by conducting my new prelude to the Meistersinger as well as the Tannhauser Overture. He believed it would make so great a sensation that the probable sale of all the tickets would enable him to place a not inconsiderable sum at my disposal after the bare expenses had been deducted. In addition to this, I could hardly go back on my promise to Herr von Guaita with respect to a performance of Lohengrin at Frankfort, although the Schnorrs had been obliged to decline to take part in it. After weighing all these offers I decided to put the Meistersinger aside, and try to earn enough by enterprises abroad to enable me in the following spring to take up and finish my interrupted work on the spot, unaffected by Schott's humours. I therefore decided at all costs to keep on the house at Biebrich, which I really liked.

Minna, on the other hand, had been pressing me to send some of the furniture which I had kept, to complete her own establishment at Dresden, namely, my bed and a few other things to which I was accustomed, 'so that when I went to see her,' she said, 'I should find everything in proper order.' I did not want to act contrary to the established fiction which was to make the parting from me easier for her; I therefore sent her what she wanted, and bought new furniture for my home on the Rhine with the a.s.sistance of a Wiesbaden manufacturer, who allowed me fairly long credit.

At the end of September I went to Frankfort for a week to take over the rehearsals of Lohengrin. Here again I went through the same experience as I had so often done before. I no sooner came into contact with the members of the opera company than I felt a desire to throw up the undertaking on the spot; then the general consternation and the entreaties that I would persevere caused a reaction, under the influence of which I held out until I at last became interested in certain things for their own sake, and quite apart from any consideration of the wretched singers. The things that pleased me were the effect of an uncurtailed performance, and the employment of correct tempi and correct staging. Yet I suppose Friederike Meyer was the only one who completely realised these effects. The usual 'animation' of the audience was not lacking, but I was told later on that the subsequent performances fell off, so that the opera had to be curtailed in the old way to keep it going. (They were conducted by Herr Ignaz Lachner of Frankfort, a smart, sleek man, but a wretchedly bad, muddle-headed conductor.)

I was the more prostrated by the effect of all this because even the Bulows had failed to pay me their expected visit. Cosima, as I was now informed, had pa.s.sed me by in haste on her way to Paris to offer her support for a short time to her grandmother, who was suffering from a tedious illness, and had now received a most painful blow by the news of the death of Blandine after her confinement, which had taken place at St. Tropez.

I now shut myself up for some time in my house at Biebrich, the weather having suddenly turned cold, and prevailed on my thumb to prove itself capable of writing down the instrumentation of some extracts for immediate concert purposes from the Meistersinger, which was now complete. I sent the prelude to Weisheimer at once to be copied at Leipzig, and also set the Versammlung dor Meistersinger and Pogner's Anrede for orchestra.

By the end of October I was at last ready to start on my journey to Leipzig, in the course of which I was induced in a strange way to enter the Wartburg once more. I had alighted for a few minutes at Eisenach, and the train had just begun to move as I was hurriedly trying to catch it. I ran after the vanishing train involuntarily with a sharp cry to the guard, but naturally without being able to stop it. A considerable crowd, which had gathered on the station to watch the departure of a prince, thereupon broke into loud outbursts of laughter, and when I said to them, 'I suppose you are glad that this happened to me?' they replied, 'Yes, it was very funny.' On this incident I based my axiom that you can please the German public by your misfortunes if by nothing else. As there was no other train to Leipzig for five hours I telegraphed to my brother-in-law, Hermann Brockhaus (whom I had asked to put me up), telling him of my delay, and allowed a man who introduced himself as a guide to persuade me to visit the Wartburg.

There I saw the partial restoration made by the Grand Duke, and also the hall containing Schwind's pictures, to all of which I was quite indifferent. I then turned into the restaurant of this show-place of Eisenach, and found several women there engaged in knitting stockings.

The Grand Duke of Weimar a.s.sured me some time afterwards that Tannhauser enjoyed great popularity throughout the whole of Thuringia down to the lowest peasant boy, but neither the host nor my guide seemed to know anything about it. However, I signed the visitors' book with my full name, and described in it the pleasant greeting I had received at the station, though I have never heard that any one noticed it.

Hermann Brockhaus, who had aged rather and grown stout, gave me a most cheerful reception when I arrived, late at night, at Leipzig. He took me to his house, where I found Ottilie and her family, and was installed in comfort. We had much to talk about, and my brother-in-law's remarkably good-natured way of entering into our conversation often kept us up fascinated until all hours of the morning. My connection with Weisheimer, a young and quite unknown composer, aroused some misgivings. His concert programme was in fact filled with a great number of his own compositions, including a symphonic poem, just completed, ent.i.tled Der Ritter Toggenburg. I should probably have raised a protest against carrying out this programme in its entirety had I attended the rehearsals in an undisturbed frame of mind, but it so happened that the hours I spent in the concert-room proved to be among the most intimate and pleasant recollections of my life, for there I met the Bulows again. Hans seemed to have felt it his duty to join me in celebrating Weisheimer's debut, his contribution being a new pianoforte concerto by Liszt. To enter the old familiar hall of the Gewandhaus at Leipzig was enough in itself to cause me an uneasy feeling of depression, which was increased by my reception by the members of the orchestra--of whose estrangement I was keenly conscious--and to whom I had to introduce myself as an entire stranger. But I felt myself suddenly transported when I discovered Cosima sitting in a corner of the hall, in deep mourning and very pale, but smiling cheerfully at me. She had returned shortly before from Paris--where her grandmother now lay hopelessly bedridden--filled with grief at the inexplicably sudden death of her sister, and she now seemed, even to my eyes, to be leaving another world to approach me.

Our emotions were so genuinely deep and sincere that only an unconditional surrender to the enjoyment of meeting again could bridge the chasm. All the incidents of the rehearsal affected us like a magic-lantern show of peculiarly enlivening character, at which we looked on like merry children. Hans, who was in an equally happy mood--for we all seemed to each other to be embarked on some Quixotic adventure--called my attention to Brendel, who was sitting not far from us, and seemed to be expecting me to recognise him. I found it entertaining to prolong this suspense thus occasioned, by pretending not to know him, whereat, as it appears, the poor man was much offended. Recalling my unjust behaviour on this occasion, I therefore made a point of alluding specially to Brendel's services when speaking in public some time afterwards on Judaism in Music, by way of atonement, as it were, to this man, who had died in the meantime. The arrival of Alexander Ritter with my niece Franziska helped to enliven us. My niece, indeed, found constant entertainment and excitement in the enormity of Weisheimer's compositions, while Ritter, who was acquainted with the text of my Meistersinger, described a highly unintelligible melody given to the ba.s.ses in Ritter Toggenburg as 'the lonely gormandiser mode.' [Footnote: Meistersinger (English version), Act 1, scene ii.] Our good-humour might have failed us in the end, however, had we not been refreshed and uplifted by the happy effect which the prelude to the Meistersinger (which had at last been successfully rehea.r.s.ed) and Bulow's glorious rendering of Liszt's new work produced. The actual concert itself gave a final ghostly touch to an adventure to which we had looked forward so contentedly till then.

To Weisheimer's horror the Leipzig public stayed away en ma.s.se, in response apparently to a sign from the leaders of the regular subscription concerts. I have never seen any place so empty on an occasion of this sort; besides the members of my family--among whom my sister Ottilie was conspicuous in a very eccentric cap--there was no one to be seen but a few visitors, who had come into town for the occasion, occupying one or two benches. I noticed in particular my Weimar friends, Conductor La.s.sen, Councillor Franz Muller, the never-failing Richard Pohl, and Justizrath Gille, who had all n.o.bly put in an appearance. I also recognised with a shock of surprise old Councillor Kustner, the former manager of the Court Theatre in Berlin, and I had to respond amiably to his greeting and his astonishment at the incomprehensible emptiness of the hall. The people of Leipzig were represented solely by special friends of my family, who never went to a concert in the ordinary way, among them being my devoted friend, Dr.

Lothar Muller, the son of Dr. Moritz Muller, an allopath whom I had known very well in my earliest youth. In the middle of the hall there were only the concert-giver's fiancee and her mother. At a little distance away, and facing this lady, I took a seat next to Cosima while the concert was in progress. My family, observing us from a distance, were offended by the almost incessant laughter which possessed us, as they themselves were in the depths of depression.

As regards the prelude to the Meistersinger, its successful performance affected the few friends who formed the audience so favourably that we had to repeat it there and then--to the satisfaction even of the orchestra. Indeed, their artificially nurtured distrust of me, which had been like a coating of ice, now seemed to have melted, for when I brought the concert to a close with the Tannhauser Overture the orchestra celebrated my recall with a tremendous flourish of instruments. This delighted my sister Ottilie beyond measure, as she maintained that such an honour had never been accorded before except to Jenny Lind. My friend Weisheimer, who had really tired every one's patience in the most inconsiderate way, afterwards developed a feeling of dissatisfaction towards me which dated from this period. He felt bound to confess to himself that he would have done much better without my brilliant orchestral pieces, in which case he might have offered the public a concert at a cheaper rate, consisting exclusively of his own works. As it was, he had to bear the costs--to his father's great disappointment--and also to overcome the unnecessary humiliation of being unable to give me any profits.

My brother-in-law was not to be deterred by these painful impressions from carrying out the household festivities, which had been arranged beforehand in celebration of my expected triumphs. The Bulows were also invited to one of the banquets, and there was an evening party at which I read the Meistersinger to an imposing array of professors, and met with much appreciation. I renewed my acquaintance with Professor Weiss, too, who interested me very much, for I remembered him from my young days as a friend of my uncle's. He expressed himself as particularly surprised by my skill in reading aloud.

The Bulows had now unfortunately returned to Berlin. We had met once more on a very cold day in the street (under unpleasant conditions, for they were paying duty calls), but the general depression which had settled on us seemed more noticeable, during our short leave-taking, than the fleeting good-humour of the last few days. My friends were well aware of the terrible and utterly forlorn condition in which I found myself. I had been idiotic enough to count on the proceeds from the Leipzig concert to provide at least the needs of the moment, and I was, in the first place, put into the awkward position of being unable to pay my landlord punctually (the house rent at Biebrich being now due). But I was ready to stake everything on keeping this asylum for another year, and I had to deal with an obstinate, bad-tempered creature whom I thought it necessary to pay in advance for the sake of securing the place. As I had just then to supply Minna with her quarterly allowance also, the money which Regierungsrath Muller forwarded to me from the Grand Duke seemed, indeed, a heaven-sent windfall. For after giving up Schott entirely I had, in my distress, turned to this old acquaintance and begged him to explain my situation to the Grand Duke and induce him to send me some help--to be regarded possibly as payment in advance for my new operas. In response to this I received the startling and unexpected sum of fifteen hundred marks through Muller's instrumentality. It was not until some time after that I accounted for this generosity by the supposition that the Grand Duke's amiable behaviour towards me had been a deliberate attempt to make an impression upon his friend Liszt, whom he wished to entice back to Weimar at all costs. He was certainly not mistaken in counting on the excellent effect his binding generosity to me would have on our common friend.

I was therefore in a position to go to Dresden for a few days at once, to renew my provision for Minna, and at the same time to honour her with one of the visits deemed necessary to support her in her difficult situation. Minna conducted me from the station to the flat which she had taken and furnished in Walpurgisstra.s.se, a street which had not been built at the time I left Dresden. She had as usual arranged her home very tastefully, and with the aim evidently of making me comfortable. I was greeted on the threshold by a little mat embroidered with the word Salve, and I recognised our Paris drawing-room at once in the red silk curtains and the furniture. I was to have a majestic bedroom, an exceedingly comfortable study on the other side, as well as the drawing-room at my entire disposal, while she installed herself in one little room with recesses looking on to the yard. The study was adorned by the magnificent mahogany bureau which had originally been made for my house when I was conductor at Dresden. It had been bought in by the Ritter family, after my flight from that city, and presented to k.u.mmer, the son-in-law, from whom Minna had hired it temporarily, leaving me the option of buying it back for one hundred and eighty marks. As I showed no desire to do so her mood became gloomier.

Oppressed by the fearful embarra.s.sment which she experienced on being alone with me, she had invited my sister Clara to come on a visit from Chemnitz, and was now sharing the small room at her disposal with Her.

Clara proved herself extraordinarily wise and sympathetic on this as on former occasions. She pitied Minna of course, and was anxious to help her at this difficult period, though always with a view to strengthening her in the conviction that our parting was unavoidable.

An exact knowledge of my extremely awkward position now seemed called for. My financial difficulties were so crushing that the only excuse for telling Minna was to silence her uneasy suspicions about me. I did, however, succeed in avoiding all explanations with her--the more easily as my meetings with Fritz Brockhaus and his family (including the married daughter Clara Kessinger), the Pusinellis, old Heine, and lastly the two Schnorrs, provided a pretext for our spending most of the time in the society of others.

I filled the mornings by making calls, and it was when I set out to pay my respects and thanks to Minister Bar for my amnesty that I trod the familiar streets of Dresden again. My first impression was one of extraordinary boredom and emptiness, for I had last seen them filled with barricades, in which fantastic condition they had looked so unusually interesting. I did not see a single familiar face on the way.

Even the glover, whom I had always patronised and whose shop I now had occasion to revisit, did not seem to know me, until an oldish man rushed across the street to me and greeted me with great excitement and tears in his eyes. It turned out to be Karl k.u.mmer of the court orchestra (looking much older), the most inspired oboist I ever met. I had taken him almost tenderly to my heart on account of his playing, and we embraced joyfully. I asked whether he still played his instrument as beautifully as before, whereupon he a.s.sured me that since I had left his oboe had failed to give real satisfaction, and it was now a long time since he had had himself pensioned off. He told me in response to my inquiries that all my old military bandsmen--including Dietz, the tall double-ba.s.s player--were either dead or pensioned off.

Our manager Luttichau and Conductor Reissiger were among those who had died, Lipinsky had returned to Poland long before, Schubert, the leader, was unfit for work, and everything seemed to me sad and strange. Minister Bar expressed to me the grave qualms he still felt about the amnesty granted me. True, he had ventured to sign it himself, but was still troubled to think that my great popularity as a composer of opera would make it easy for me to raise annoying demonstrations. I comforted him at once by promising only to remain a few days and to refrain from visiting the theatre, upon which he dismissed me with a deep sigh and an exceedingly grave face.

Very different was my reception from Herr von Beust, who with smiling elegance of manner implied by his conversation that I was perhaps not so innocent after all as I now seemed to think myself. He drew my attention to a letter of mine which had been found in Rockel's pocket, at the time. This was new to me, and I willingly gave him to understand that I felt myself bound to look on the amnesty accorded me as a pardon for my incautious behaviour in the past, and we parted with the liveliest manifestations of friendship.

We invited some friends one evening in Minna's drawing-room, where I read out the Meistersinger once more to the people who did not know it.

After Minna had been provided with enough money to last some time, she accompanied me back to the station on the fourth day; but she was filled with such fearful presentiments of never seeing me again that her farewell was made in positive anguish.

At Leipzig I put up at an inn for one day. There I met Alexander Ritter, and we spent a pleasant evening together over our punch. The reason that had induced me to make this short stay was the a.s.surance given me that if I gave a concert of my own it would not be one of the regular series. I had weighed this information with reference to the much-needed money it might bring in, but I now realised that the undertaking rested on no security. I returned in haste to Biebrich, where I had to get my household affairs into order. To my great annoyance I found my landlord in a more impossible temper than ever. He seemed unable to forget my having blamed him for his treatment of the dog, and also of my servant, whom I had been obliged to protect against him when she had had a love-affair with a tailor. In spite of receiving payment and promises he remained peevish, and insisted that he would have to move into my part of the house on account of his health in the coming spring. So while I forced him, by paying advance, to leave my household goods untouched until Easter at least, I went about trying to find a suitable house for the following year, visiting various places in the Rheingau under the guidance of Dr. Schuler and Mathilde Maier. I had no success, however, the time being so short, but my friends promised to search untiringly for what I wanted.

At Mayence I met Friederike Meyer again. Her situation in Frankfort seemed to have grown more and more difficult. When she heard that I had turned away Herr von Guaita's manager, who had been sent to Biebrich with instructions to pay me fifteen louis d'or for conducting Lohengrin, she upheld my action strongly. As for herself, she had broken with that gentleman entirely, insisting on being released from her contract, and was now about to enter upon a special engagement at the Burgtheater. She won my sympathy once more by her conduct and determination, which I had to consider as a powerful refutation of the calumnies brought up against her. As I too was in the act of starting for Vienna, she was glad to be able to make part of the journey in my company. She proposed to stop a day at Nuremberg, where I could pick her up for the next stage of the journey. This we did and arrived in Vienna together, where my friend went to Hotel Munsch, while I chose the Kaiserin Elizabeth, where I now felt at home. This was on the 15th of November. I went to see Conductor Esser at once, and heard from him that Tristan was really being studied vigorously. With Frau Dustmann, on the other hand, I became immediately involved in very unpleasant disagreements through my relation to her sister Friederike, which it was easy to misunderstand. It was impossible to make her see how things really stood. In her eyes her sister was involved in a liaison, and had been cast off by her family, so that her arrival in Vienna was compromising to them. In addition to this Friederike's own condition soon caused me the greatest anxiety. She had made an engagement to appear three times at the Burgtheater without considering that just then she was not likely to make a good appearance on the stage, particularly before the Viennese public. Her serious illness, the recovery from which had been attended by the most exciting circ.u.mstances, had disfigured her and made her very thin. She had also gone almost entirely bald, but nevertheless persisted in her great objection to wearing a wig. Her sister's hostility had estranged her colleagues at the theatre, and as a result of all this, and also on account of her unfortunate choice of a role, her appearance was a failure. There could be no question of her being taken on at that theatre. Although her weakness increased, and she suffered from constant insomnia, she still tried, in her magnanimity and her shame, to hide from me the awkwardness of her situation. She went to a cheaper inn, the 'Stadt Frankfurt,' where she intended to wait and see the result of sparing her nerves as far as possible. She seemed to be in no embarra.s.sment as far as money was concerned, but at my request consulted Standhartner, who did not seem to know how to help her much.

As open-air exercise had been strongly recommended, and as the weather was at present bitterly cold (from the end of November to the beginning of December), I hit on the idea of advising her to go to Venice for a prolonged stay. Once again there seemed no lack of means, and she followed my advice. One icy morning I accompanied her to the station, and there for the present I left her, as I hoped, to a kinder fate. She had a faithful maid with her, and I soon had the satisfaction of receiving rea.s.suring accounts--of her health especially--from Venice.

While my relations with her had brought me troublesome complications, I still kept up my old Viennese acquaintances. A curious incident occurred at the very beginning of my visit. I had to read the Meistersinger aloud to the Standhartner family, as I had done everywhere else. As Dr. Hanslick was now supposed to be well disposed towards me, it was considered the right thing to invite him too. We noticed that as the reading proceeded the dangerous critic became more and more pale and depressed, and it was remarked by everyone that it was impossible to persuade him to stay on at the close, but that he took his leave there and then in an unmistakably vexed manner. My friends all agreed in thinking that Hanslick looked on the whole libretto as a lampoon aimed at himself, and had felt an invitation to the reading to be an insult. And undoubtedly the critic's att.i.tude towards me underwent a very remarkable change from that evening. He became uncompromisingly hostile, with results that were obvious to us at once.

Cornelius and Tausig had again been to see me, but I had to work off my resentment against them both for the fit of real ill-humour their behaviour had caused me in the previous summer. This had happened when I expected the Bulows and the Schnorrs to stay with me together at Biebrich, and my warm interest in these two young friends, Cornelius and Tausig, led me to invite them too. I received Cornelius's acceptance immediately, and was the more surprised to get a letter from Geneva, whither Tausig (who appeared to have funds at his disposal all of a sudden) had carried him off on a summer excursion--no doubt of a more important and pleasanter nature. Without the least mention of any regret at not being able to meet me that summer, they simply announced to me that 'a glorious cigar had just been smoked to my health.' And now, when I met them again in Vienna, I found it impossible to refrain from pointing out to them the insulting nature of their behaviour; but they seemed unable to understand how I could object to their preferring the beautiful tour into French Switzerland to paying me a visit at Biebrich. I was obviously a tyrant to them. Besides this, I thought Tausig's curious conduct at my hotel suspicious. I was told that he took his meals in the downstairs restaurant, after which he climbed up past my floor to the fourth storey, to pay long visits to Countess Krockow. When I asked him about it, and learned that the lady in question was also a friend of Cosima's, I expressed my surprise at his not introducing me. He continued to evade this suggestion with singularly vague phrases, and when I ventured to tease him by the supposition of a love-affair, he said there could be no question of such a thing, as the lady was old. So I let him alone, but the amazement which his peculiar behaviour then caused me was intensified some years later when I at last learned to know Countess Krockow very well, and was a.s.sured of her deep interest in me. It seemed that she had desired nothing more than to make my acquaintance also at that time, but that Tausig had always refused to find an opportunity, and had made the excuse that I did not care about women's society.

But we eventually resumed our lively and sociable habits when I began seriously to carry out my project of giving concerts in Vienna.

Although the piano rehearsals for the princ.i.p.al solo parts of Tristan had been put in hand diligently--I had left them to Conductor Esser, who took them zealously in hand--my mistrust as to the real success of these studies was unshaken, and the point which I doubted most was not so much the capabilities of the singers as their goodwill. Moreover, Frau Dustmann's absurd behaviour disgusted me on my frequent attendance at the rehearsals. On the other hand, I now set my hopes on making a good impression, on the score of novelty alone, by performing selections from my own works still unknown to the Viennese public. In this way I could show my secret enemies that there were other means open to me of bringing my more recent compositions before the public than by the medium of the stage, where they could so easily stop me.

For all the practical details of the performance Tausig now proved himself particularly useful. We agreed to hire the Theatre on the Wien for three evenings, the idea being to give one concert at the end of December and to repeat the experiment twice after a week's interval.

The first thing was to copy out the orchestral parts from the sections which I cut out from my scores for the concert. There were two selections from Rheingold and two from the Walkure and the Meistersinger, but I kept back the prelude to Tristan for the present, so as not to clash with the performance of the whole work at the Opera which was still being advertised. Cornelius and Tausig, with some a.s.sistant copyists, now started on the work, which could only be carried out by experienced score-readers if it was to be done correctly. They were joined by Weisheimer, who had arrived in Vienna, having in the end decided to come to the concert. Tausig also mentioned Brahms to me, recommending him as a 'very good fellow,' who, although he was so famous himself, would willingly take over a part of their work, and a selection from the Meistersinger was accordingly allotted to him. And, indeed, Brahms's behaviour proved una.s.suming and good-natured, but he showed little vivacity and was often hardly noticed at our gatherings. I also came across Friedrich Uhl again, an old acquaintance who was now editing a political paper called Der Botschafter with Julius Frobel under Schmerling's auspices. He placed his journal at my disposal, and made me give him the first act of the libretto of Meistersinger for his feuilleton. Whereupon my friends chose to think that Hanslick grew more and more venomous.

While I and my companions were overwhelmed by the preparations for the concert, there came in one day a certain Herr Moritz, whom Bulow had introduced to me in Paris as a ridiculous person. His clumsy and importunate behaviour and the idiotic messages--evidently of his own invention--which he brought me from Bulow drove me in the end to show him the door with great emphasis, for I too was carried away by Tausig's lively annoyance at this very officious intruder. He reported on this to Cosima in a manner so insulting to Bulow that she in return found it necessary to express to me in writing her intense indignation at my inconsiderate behaviour towards my best friends. I was really so surprised and dumbfounded by this strange and inexplicable event that I handed Cosima's letter to Tausig without comment, merely asking him.