This was quite enough for Heubner. He at once made out a summons for

the election of a representative assembly for Saxony, to be held at

Chemnitz. He thought that, with the assistance of the populace and of

the numerous insurgent bands who were arriving from all quarters, he

would be able to hold the town as the headquarters of a provisional

government until the general situation in Germany had become more

settled. In the midst of these discussions, Stephan Born walked into

the room to report that he had brought the armed bands right into

Freiberg, in good order and without any losses. This young man was a

compositor who had contributed greatly to Heubner’s peace of mind

during the last three days in Dresden by taking over the chief command.

His simplicity of manner made a very encouraging impression on us,

particularly when we heard his report. When, however, Heubner asked

whether he would undertake to defend Freiberg against the troops which

might be expected to attack at any moment, he declared that this was an

experienced officer’s job, and that he himself was no soldier and knew

nothing of strategy. Under these circumstances it seemed better, if

only to gain time, to fall back on the more thickly populated town of

Chemnitz. The first thing to be done, however, was to see that the

revolutionaries, who were assembled in large numbers at Freiberg, were

properly cared for, and Born went off immediately to make preliminary

arrangements. Heubner also took leave of us, and went to refresh his

tired brain by an hour’s sleep. I was left alone on the sofa with

Bakunin, who soon fell towards me, overcome by irresistible drowsiness,

and dropped the terrific weight of his head on to my shoulder. As I saw

that he would not wake if I shook off this burden, I pushed him aside

with some difficulty, and took leave both of the sleeper and of

Heubner’s house; for I wished to see for myself, as I had done for many

days past, what course these extraordinary events were taking. I

therefore went to the Town Hall, where I found the townspeople

entertaining to the best of their ability a blustering horde of excited

revolutionaries both within and without the walls. To my surprise, I

found Heubner there in the full swing of work. I thought he was asleep

at home, but the idea of leaving the people even for an hour without a

counsellor had driven away all thought of rest. He had lost no time in

superintending the organisation of a sort of commandant’s office, and

was again occupied with drafting and signing documents in the midst of

the uproar that raged on all sides. It was not long before Bakunin too

put in an appearance, principally in search of a good officer—who was

not, however, forthcoming. The commandant of a large contingent from

the Vogtland, an oldish man, raised Bakunin’s hopes by the impassioned

energy of his speeches, and he would have had him appointed

commandant-general on the spot. But it seemed as if any real decision

were impossible in that frenzy and confusion, and as the only hope of

mastering it seemed to be in reaching Chemnitz, Heubner gave the order

to march on towards that town as soon as every one had had food. Once

this was settled, I told my friends I should go on in advance of their

column to Chemnitz, where I should find them again next day; for I

longed to be quit of this chaos. I actually caught the coach, the

departure of which was fixed for that time, and obtained a seat in it.

But the revolutionaries were just marching off on the same road, and we

were told that we must wait until they had passed to avoid being caught

in the whirlpool. This meant considerable delay, and for a long while I

watched the peculiar bearing of the patriots as they marched out. I

noticed in particular a Vogtland regiment, whose marching step was

fairly orthodox, following the beat of a drummer who tried to vary the

monotony of his instrument in an artistic manner by hitting the wooden

frame alternately with the drumhead. The unpleasant rattling tone thus

produced reminded me in ghostly fashion of the rattling of the

skeletons’ bones in the dance round the gallows by night which Berlioz

had brought home to my imagination with such terrible realism in his

performance of the last movement of his Sinfonie Fantastique in Paris.

Suddenly the desire seized me to look up the friends I had left behind,

and travel to Chemnitz in their company if possible. I found they had

quitted the Town Hall, and on reaching Heubner’s house I was told that

he was asleep. I therefore went back to the coach, which, however, was

still putting off its departure, as the road was blocked with troops. I

walked nervously up and down for some time, then, losing faith in the

journey by coach, I went back again to Heubner’s house to offer myself

definitely as a travelling companion. But Heubner and Bakunin had

already left home, and I could find no traces of them. In desperation I

returned once more to the coach, and found it by this time really ready

to start. After various delays and adventures it brought me late at

night to Chemnitz, where I got out and betook myself to the nearest

inn. At five o’clock the next morning I got up (after a few hours’

sleep) and set out to find my brother-in-law Wolfram’s house, which was

about a quarter of an hour’s walk from the town. On the way I asked a

sentinel of the town guard whether he knew anything about the arrival

of the provisional government.

‘Provisional government?’ was the reply. ‘Why, it’s all up with that.’

I did not understand him, nor was I able to learn anything about the

state of things when I first reached the house of my relatives, for my

brother-in-law had been sent into the town as special constable. It was

only on his return home, lute in the afternoon, that I heard what had

taken place in one hotel at Chemnitz while I had been resting in

another inn. Heubner, Bakunin, and the man called Martin, whom I have

mentioned already, had, it seemed, arrived before me in a hackney-coach

at the gates of Chemnitz. On being asked for their names Heubner had

announced himself in a tone of authority, and had bidden the town

councillors come to him at a certain hotel. They had no sooner reached

the hotel than they all three collapsed from excessive fatigue.

Suddenly the police broke into the room and arrested them in the name

of the local government, upon which they only begged to have a few

hours’ quiet sleep, pointing out that flight was out of the question in

their present condition. I heard further that they had been removed to

Altenburg under a strong military escort. My brother-in-law was obliged

to confess that the Chemnitz municipal guard, which had been forced to

start for Dresden much against its will, and had resolved at the very

outset to place itself at the disposal of the royal forces on arriving

there, had deceived Heubner by inviting him to Chemnitz, and had lured

him into the trap. They had reached Chemnitz long before Heubner, and

had taken over the guard at the gates with the object of seeing him

arrive and of preparing for his arrest at once. My brother-in-law had

been very anxious about me too, as he had been told in furious tones by

the leaders of the town guard that I had been seen in close association

with the revolutionaries. He thought it a wonderful intervention of

Providence that I had not arrived at Chemnitz with them and gone to the

same inn, in which case their fate would certainly have been mine. The

recollection of my escape from almost certain death in duels with the

most experienced swordsmen in my student days flashed across me like a

flash of lightning. This last terrible experience made such an

impression on me that I was incapable of breathing a word in connection

with what had happened. My brother-in-law, in response to urgent

appeals—from my wife in particular, who was much concerned for my

personal safety—undertook to convey me to Altenburg in his carriage by

night. From there I continued my journey by coach to Weimar, where I

had originally planned to spend my holidays, little thinking that I

should arrive by such devious ways.

The dreamy unreality of my state of mind at this time is best explained

by the apparent seriousness with which, on meeting Liszt again, I at

once began to discuss what seemed to be the sole topic of any real

interest to him in connection with me—the forthcoming revival of

Tannhäuser at Weimar. I found it very difficult to confess to this

friend that I had not left Dresden in the regulation way for a

conductor of the royal opera. To tell the truth, I had a very hazy

conception of the relation in which I stood to the law of my country

(in the narrow sense). Had I done anything criminal in the eye of the

law or not? I found it impossible to come to any conclusion about it.

Meanwhile, alarming news of the terrible conditions in Dresden

continued to pour into Weimar. Genast, the stage manager, in

particular, aroused great excitement by spreading the report that

Röckel, who was well known at Weimar, had been guilty of arson. Liszt

must soon have gathered from my conversation, in which I did not take

the trouble to dissimulate, that I too was suspiciously connected with

these terrible events, though my attitude with regard to them misled

him for some time. For I was not by any means prepared to proclaim

myself a combatant in the recent fights, and that for reasons quite

other than would have seemed valid in the eyes of the law. My friend

was therefore encouraged in his delusion by the unpremeditated effect

of my attitude. When we met at the house of Princess Caroline of

Wittgenstein, to whom I had been introduced the year before when she

paid her flying visit to Dresden, we were able to hold stimulating

conversations on all sorts of artistic topics. One afternoon, for

instance, a lively discussion sprang up from a description I had given

of a tragedy to be entitled Jesus of Nazareth. Liszt maintained a

discreet silence after I had finished, whereas the Princess protested

vigorously against my proposal to bring such a subject on to the stage.

From the lukewarm attempt I made to support the paradoxical theories I

had put forward, I realised the state of my mind at that time. Although

it was not very evident to onlookers, I had been, and still was, shaken

to the very depths of my being by my recent experiences.

In due course an orchestral rehearsal of Tannhäuser took place, which

in various ways stimulated the artist in me afresh. Liszt’s conducting,

though mainly concerned with the musical rather than the dramatic side,

filled me for the first time with the flattering warmth of emotion

roused by the consciousness of being understood by another mind in full

sympathy with my own. At the same time I was able, in spite of my

dreamy condition, to observe critically the standard of capacity

exhibited by the singers and their chorus-master. After the rehearsal

I, together with the musical director, Stohr, and Götze the singer,

accepted Liszt’s invitation to a simple dinner, at a different inn from

the one where he lived. I thus had occasion to take alarm at a trait in

his character which was entirely new to me. After being stirred up to a

certain pitch of excitement his mood became positively alarming, and he

almost gnashed his teeth in a passion of fury directed against a

certain section of society which had also aroused my deepest

indignation. I was strongly affected by this strange experience with

this wonderful man, but I was unable to see the association of ideas

which had led to his terrible outburst. I was therefore left in a state

of amazement, while Liszt had to recover during the night from a

violent attack of nerves which his excitement had produced. Another

surprise was in store for me the next morning, when I found my friend

fully equipped for a journey to Karlsruhe—the circumstances which made

it necessary being absolutely incomprehensible to me. Liszt invited

Director Stohr and myself to accompany him as far as Eisenach. On our

way there we were stopped by Beaulieu, the Lord Chamberlain, who wished

to know whether I was prepared to be received by the Grand Duchess of

Weimar, a sister of the Emperor Nicolas, at Eisenach castle. As my

excuse on the score of unsuitable travelling costume was not admitted,

Liszt accepted in my name, and I really met with a surprisingly kind

reception that evening from the Grand Duchess, who chatted with me in

the friendliest way, and introduced me to her chamberlain with all due

ceremony. Liszt maintained afterwards that his noble patroness had been

informed that I should be wanted by the authorities in Dresden within

the next few days, and had therefore hastened to make my personal

acquaintance at once, knowing that it would compromise her too heavily

later on.

Liszt continued his journey from Eisenach, leaving me to be entertained

and looked after by Stohr and the musical director Kuhmstedt, a

diligent and skilful master of counterpoint with whom I paid my first

visit to the Wartburg, which had not then been restored. I was filled

with strange musings as to my fate when I visited this castle. Here I

was actually on the point of entering, for the first time, the building

which was so full of meaning for me; here, too, I had to tell myself

that the days of my further sojourn in Germany were numbered. And in

fact the news from Dresden, when we returned to Weimar the next day,

was serious indeed. Liszt, on his return on the third day, found a

letter from my wife, who had not dared to write direct to me. She

reported that the police had searched my house in Dresden, to which she

had returned, and that she had, moreover been warned on no account to

allow me to return to that city, as a warrant had been taken out

against me, and I was shortly to be served with a writ and arrested.

Liszt, who was now solely concerned for my personal safety, called in a

friend who had some experience of law, to consider what should be done

to rescue me from the danger that threatened me. Von Watzdorf, the

minister whom I had already visited, had been of opinion that I should,

if required, submit quietly to being taken to Dresden, and that the

journey would be made in a respectable private carriage. On the other

hand, reports which had reached us of the brutal way in which the

Prussian troops in Dresden had gone to work in applying the state of

siege were of so alarming a nature that Liszt and his friends in

council urged my speedy departure from Weimar, where it would be

impossible to protect me. But I insisted on taking leave of my wife,

whose anxiety was great, before leaving Germany, and begged to be

allowed to stay a little longer at least in the neighbourhood of

Weimar. This was taken into consideration, and Professor Siebert

suggested my taking temporary shelter with a friendly steward at the

village of Magdala, which was three hours distant. I drove there the

following morning to introduce myself to this kind steward and

protector as Professor Werder from Berlin, who, with a letter of

recommendation from Professor Siebert, had come to turn his financial

studies to practical account in helping to administer these estates.

Here in rural seclusion I spent three days, entertainment of a peculiar

nature being provided by the meeting of a popular assembly, which

consisted of the remainder of the contingent of revolutionaries which

had marched off towards Dresden and had now returned in disorder. I

listened with curious feelings, amounting almost to contempt, to the

speeches on this occasion, which were of every kind and description. On

the second day of my stay my host’s wife came back from Weimar (where

it was market-day) full of a curious tale: the composer of an opera

which was being performed there on that very day had been obliged to

leave Weimar suddenly because the warrant for his arrest had arrived

from Dresden. My host, who had been let into my secret by Professor

Seibert, asked playfully what his name was. As his wife did not seem to

know, he came to her assistance with the suggestion that perhaps it was

Röckel whose name was familiar at Weimar.

‘Yes,’ she said, ‘Röckel, that was his name, quite right.’

My host laughed loudly, and said that he would not be so stupid as to

let them catch him, in spite of his opera.

At last, on 22nd May, my birthday, Minna actually arrived at Magdala.

She had hastened to Weimar on receiving my letter, and had proceeded

from there according to instructions, bent on persuading me at all

costs to flee the country immediately and for good. No attempt to raise

her to the level of my own mood was successful; she persisted in

regarding me as an ill-advised, inconsiderate person who had plunged

both himself and her into the most terrible situation. It had been

arranged that I should meet her the next evening in the house of

Professor Wolff at Jena to take a last farewell. She was to go by way

of Weimar, while I took the footpath from Magdala. I started

accordingly on my walk of about six hours, and came over the plateau

into the little university town (which now received me hospitably for

the first time) at sunset. I found my wife again at the house of

Professor Wolff, who, thanks to Liszt, was already my friend, and with

the addition of a certain Professor Widmann another conference was held

on the subject of my further escape. A writ was actually out against me

for being strongly suspected of participation in the Dresden rising,

and I could not under any circumstances depend on a safe refuge in any

of the German federal states. Liszt insisted on my going to Paris,

where I could find a new field for my work, while Widmann advised me

not to go by the direct route through Frankfort and Baden, as the

rising was still in full swing there, and the police would certainly

exercise praiseworthy vigilance over incoming travellers with

suspicious-looking passports. The way through Bavaria would be the

safest, as all was quiet there again; I could then make for

Switzerland, and the journey to Paris from there could be engineered

without any danger. As I needed a passport for the journey, Professor

Widmann offered me his own, which had been issued at Tubingen and had

not been brought up to date. My wife was quite in despair, and the

parting from her caused me real pain. I set off in the mail-coach and

travelled, without further hindrance, through many towns (amongst them

Rudolstadt, a place full of memories for me) to the Bavarian frontier.

From there I continued my journey by mail-coach straight to Lindau. At

the gates I, together with the other passengers, was asked for my

passport. I passed the night in a state of strange, feverish

excitement, which lasted until the departure of the steamer on Lake

Constance early in the morning. My mind was full of the Swabian

dialect, as spoken by Professor Widmann, with whose passport I was

travelling. I pictured to myself my dealings with the Bavarian police

should I have to converse with them in accordance with the

above-mentioned irregularities in that document. A prey to feverish

unrest, I spent the whole night trying to perfect myself in the Swabian

dialect, but, as I was amused to find, without the smallest success. I

had braced myself to meet the crucial moment early the next morning,

when the policeman came into my room and, not knowing to whom the

passports belonged, gave me three at random to choose from. With joy in

my heart I seized my own, and dismissed the dreaded messenger in the

most friendly way. Once on board the steamer I realised with true

satisfaction that I had now stepped on to Swiss territory. It was a

lovely spring morning; across the broad lake I could gaze at the Alpine

landscape as it spread itself before my eyes. When I stepped on to

Republican soil at Rorschach, I employed the first moments in writing a

few lines home to tell of my safe arrival in Switzerland and my

deliverance from all danger. The coach drive through the pleasant

country of St. Gall to Zürich cheered me up wonderfully, and when I

drove down from Oberstrass into Zürich that evening, the last day in

May, at six o’clock, and saw for the first time the Glarner Alps that

encircle the lake gleaming in the sunset, I at once resolved, though

without being fully conscious of it, to avoid everything that could

prevent my settling here.

I had been the more willing to accept my friends’ suggestion to take

the Swiss route to Paris, as I knew I should find an old acquaintance,

Alexander Muller, at Zürich. I hoped with his help to obtain a passport

to France, as I was anxious not to arrive there as a political refugee.

I had been on very friendly terms with Muller once upon a time at

Wurzburg. He had been settled at Zürich for a long time as a teacher of

music; this I learned from a pupil of his, Wilhelm Baumgartner, who had

called on me in Dresden some years back to bring me a greeting from

this old friend. On that occasion I entrusted the pupil with a copy of

the score of Tannhäuser for his master, by way of remembrance, and this

kind attention had not fallen on barren soil: Muller and Baumgartner,

whom I visited forthwith, introduced me at once to Jacob Sulzer and

Franz Hagenbuch, two cantonal secretaries who were the most likely,

among all their good friends, to compass the immediate fulfilment of my

desire. These two people, who had been joined by a few intimates,

received me with such respectful curiosity and sympathy that I felt at

home with them at once. The great assurance and moderation with which

they commented on the persecutions which had overtaken me, as seen from

their usual simple republican standpoint, opened to me a conception of

civil life which seemed to lift me to an entirely new sphere. I felt so

safe and protected here, whereas in my own country I had, without quite

realising it, come to be considered a criminal owing to the peculiar

connection between my disgust at the public attitude towards art and

the general political disturbances. To prepossess the two secretaries

entirely in my favour (one of them, Sulzer, had enjoyed an excellent

classical education), my friends arranged a meeting one evening at

which I was to read my poem on the Death of Siegfried. I am prepared to

swear that I never had more attentive listeners, among men, than on

that evening. The immediate effect of my success was the drawing up of

a fully valid federal passport for the poor German under warrant of

arrest, armed with which I started gaily on my journey to Paris after

quite a short stay at Zürich. From Strassburg, where I was enthralled

by the fascination of the world-famous minster, I travelled towards

Paris by what was then the best means of locomotion, the so-called

malle-poste. I remember a remarkable phenomenon in connection with this

conveyance. Till then the noise of the cannonade and musketry in the

fighting at Dresden had been persistently re-echoing in my ears,

especially in a half-waking condition; now the humming of the wheels,

as we rolled rapidly along the highroad, cast such a spell upon me that

for the whole of the journey I seemed to hear the melody of Freude,

schöner Götterfunken[17] from the Ninth Symphony being played, as it

were, on deep bass instruments.

[17] See note on page 486.

From the time of my entering Switzerland till my arrival in Paris my

spirits, which had sunk into a dreamlike apathy, rose gradually to a

level of freedom and comfort that I had never enjoyed before. I felt

like a bird in the air whose destiny is not to founder in a morass; but

soon after my arrival in Paris, in the first week of June, a very

palpable reaction set in. I had had an introduction from Liszt to his

former secretary Belloni, who felt it his duty, in loyalty to the

instructions received, to put me into communication with a literary

man, a certain Gustave Vaisse, with the object of being commissioned to

write an opera libretto for production in Paris. I did not, however,

make the personal acquaintance of Vaisse. The idea did not please me,

and I found sufficient excuse for warding off the negotiations by

saying I was afraid of the epidemic of cholera which was said to be

raging in the city. I was staying in the Rue Notre Dame de Lorette for

the sake of being near Belloni. Through this street funeral

processions, announced by the muffled drum boats of the National Guard,

passed practically every hour. Though the heat was stifling, I was

strictly forbidden to touch water, and was advised to exercise the

greatest precaution with regard to diet in every respect. Besides this

weight of uneasiness on my spirits, the whole outward aspect of Paris,

as it then appeared, had the most depressing effect on me. The motto,

liberte, egalite, fraternite was still to be seen on all the public

buildings and other establishments, but, on the other hand, I was

alarmed at seeing the first garcons caissiers making their way from the

bank with their long money-sacks over their shoulders and their large

portfolios in their hands. I had never met them so frequently as now,

just when the old capitalist regime, after its triumphant struggle

against the once dreaded socialist propaganda, was exerting itself

vigorously to regain the public confidence by its almost insulting

pomp. I had gone, as it were, mechanically into Schlesinger’s

music-shop, where a successor was now installed—a much more pronounced

type of Jew named Brandus, of a very dirty appearance. The only person

there to give me a friendly welcome was the old clerk, Monsieur Henri.

After I had talked to him in loud tones for some time, as the shop was

apparently empty, he at length asked me with some embarrassment whether

I had not seen my master (_votre maître_) Meyerbeer.

‘Is Monsieur Meyerbeer here?’ I asked.

‘Certainly,’ was the even more embarrassed reply; ‘quite near, over

there behind the desk.’

And, sure enough, as I walked across to the desk Meyerbeer came out,

covered with confusion. He smiled and made some excuse about pressing

proof-sheets. He had been hiding there quietly for over ten minutes

since first hearing my voice. I had had enough after my strange

encounter with this apparition. It recalled so many things affecting

myself which reflected suspicion on the man, in particular the

significance of his behaviour towards me in Berlin on the last

occasion. However, as I had now nothing more to do with him, I greeted

him with a certain easy gaiety induced by the regret I felt at seeing

his manifest confusion on becoming cognisant of my arrival in Paris. He

took it for granted that I should again seek my fortune there, and

seemed much surprised when I assured him, on the contrary, that the

idea of having any work there was odious to me.

‘But Liszt published such a brilliant article about you in the _Journal

des Débats_,’ he said.

‘Ah,’ I replied, ‘it really had not occurred to me that the

enthusiastic devotion of a friend should be regarded as a mutual

speculation.’

‘But the article made a sensation. It is incredible that you should not

seek to make any profit out of it.’

This offensive meddlesomeness roused me to protest to Meyerbeer with

some violence that I was concerned with anything rather than with the

production of artistic work, particularly just at that time when the

course of events seemed to indicate that the whole world was undergoing

a reaction.

‘But what do you expect to get out of the revolution?’ he replied. ‘Are

you going to write scores for the barricades?’

Whereupon I assured him that I was not thinking of writing any scores

at all. We parted, obviously without having arrived at a mutual

understanding.

In the street I was also stopped by Moritz Schlesinger, who, being

equally under the influence of Liszt’s brilliant article, evidently

considered me a perfect prodigy. He too thought I must be counting on

making a hit in Paris, and was sure that I had a very good chance of

doing so.

‘Will you undertake my business?’ I asked him. ‘I have no money. Do you

really think the performance of an opera by an unknown composer can be

anything but a matter of money?’

‘You are quite right,’ said Moritz, and left me on the spot.

I turned from these disagreeable encounters in the plague-stricken

capital of the world to inquire the fate of my Dresden companions, for

some of those with whom I was intimate had also reached Paris, when I

called on Desplechins, who had painted the scenery for Tannhäuser. I

found Semper there, who had, like myself, been deposited in this city.

We met again with no little pleasure, although we could not help

smiling at our grotesque situation. Semper had retired from the battle

when the famous barricade, which he in his capacity of architect kept

under close observation, had been surrounded. (He thought it impossible

for it to be captured.) All the same, he considered that he had exposed

himself quite sufficiently to make it state of siege and were occupying

Dresden. He considered himself lucky as a native of Holstein to be

dependent, not on the German, but on the Danish government for a

passport, as this had helped him to reach Paris without difficulty.

When I expressed my real and heartfelt regret at the turn of affairs

which had torn him from a professional undertaking on which he had just

started—the completion of the Dresden Museum—he refused to take it too

seriously, saying it had given him a great deal of worry. In spite of

our trying situation, it was with Semper that I spent the only bright

hours of my stay in Paris. We were soon joined by another refugee,

young Heine, who had once wished to paint my Lohengrin scenery. He had

no qualms about his future, for his master Desplechins was willing to

give him employment. I alone felt I had been pitched quite aimlessly

into Paris. I had a passionate desire to leave this cholera-laden,

atmosphere, and Belloni offered me an opportunity which I promptly and

joyfully seized. He invited me to follow himself and his family to a

country place near La Ferte-sous-Jouarre, where I could be refreshed by

pure air and absolute quiet, and wait for a change for the better in my

position. I made the short journey to Rueil after another week in

Paris, and took for the time being a poor lodging (one room, built with

recesses) in the house of Monsieur Raphael, a wine merchant, close by

the village mairie where the Belloni family were staying. Here I waited

further developments. During the period when all news from Germany

ceased I tried to occupy myself as far as possible with reading. After

going through Proudhon’s writings, and in particular his De la

propriete, in such a manner as to glean comfort for my situation in

curiously divers ways, I entertained myself for a considerable time

with Lamartine’s Histoire des Girondins, a most alluring and attractive

work. One day Belloni brought me news of the unfortunate rising in

Paris, which had been attempted on the 13th June by the Republicans

under Ledru-Rollin against the provisional government, which was then

in the full tide of reaction. Great as was the indignation with which

the news was received by my host and the mayor of the place (a relative

of his, at whose table we ate our modest daily meal), it made, on the

whole, little impression on me, as my attention was still fixed in

great agitation on the events which were taking place on the Rhine, and

particularly on the grand-duchy of Baden, which had been made forfeit

to a provisional government. When, however, the news reached me from

this quarter also that the Prussians had succeeded in subduing a

movement which had not at first seemed hopeless, I felt extraordinarily

downcast.

I was compelled to consider my position carefully, and the necessity of

conquering my difficulties helped to allay the excitement to which I

was a prey. The letters from my Weimar friends, as well as those from

my wife, now brought me completely to my senses. The former expressed

themselves very curtly about my behaviour with regard to recent events.

The opinion was, that for the moment there would be nothing for me to

do, and especially not in Dresden, or at the grand-ducal court, ‘as one

could not very well knock at battered doors’; ‘on ne frappe pas a des

portes enfoncees’ (Princess von Wittgenstein to Belloni).

I did not know what to reply, for I had never dreamt of expecting

anything to come from their intervening on my behalf in that quarter;

consequently I was quite satisfied that they sent me temporarily

financial assistance. With this money I made up my mind to leave for

Zürich and ask Alex Muller to give me shelter for a while, as his house

was sufficiently large to accommodate a guest. My saddest moment came

when, after a long silence, I at last received a letter from my wife.

She wrote that she could not dream of living with me again; that after

I had so unscrupulously thrown away a connection and position, the like

of which would never again present itself to me, no woman could

reasonably be expected to take any further interest in my future

enterprises.

I fully appreciated my wife’s unfortunate position; I could in no way

assist her, except by advising her to sell our Dresden furniture, and

by making an appeal on her behalf to my relatives in Leipzig.

Until then I had been able to think more lightly of the misery of her

position, simply because I had imagined her to be more deeply in

sympathy with what agitated me. Often during the recent extraordinary

events I had even believed that she understood my feelings. Now,

however, she had disillusioned me on this point: she could see in me no

more than what the public saw, and the one redeeming point of her

severe judgment was that she excused my behaviour on the score that I

was reckless. After I had begged Liszt to do what he could for my wife,

I soon began to regard her unexpected behaviour with more equanimity.

In reply to her announcement that she would not write to me again for

the present, I said that I had also resolved to spare her all further

anxiety about my very doubtful fate, by ceasing from communicating with

her. I surveyed the panorama of our long years of association

critically in my mind’s eye, beginning with that first stormy year of

our married life, that had been so full of sorrow. Our youthful days of

worry and care in Paris had undoubtedly been of benefit to us both. The

courage and patience with which she had faced our difficulties, while I

on my part had tried to end them by dint of hard work, had linked us

together with bonds of iron. Minna was rewarded for all these

privations by Dresden successes, and more especially by the highly

enviable position I had held there. Her position as wife of the

conductor (Frau Kapellmeisterin) had brought her the fulfilment of her

dearest wishes, and all those things which conspired to make my work in

this official post so intolerable to me, were to her no more than so

many threats directed against her smug content. The course I had

adopted with regard to Tannhäuser had already made her doubtful of my

success at the theatres, and had robbed her of all courage and

confidence in our future. The more I deviated from the path which she

regarded as the only profitable one, due partly to the change of my

views (which I grew ever less willing to communicate to her), and

partly to the modification in my attitude towards the stage, the more

she retreated from that position of close fellowship with me which she

had enjoyed in former years, and which she thought herself justified in

connecting in some way with my successes.

She looked upon my conduct with regard to the Dresden catastrophe as

the outcome of this deviation from the right path, and attributed it to

the influence of unscrupulous persons (particularly the unfortunate

Röckel), who were supposed to have dragged me with them to ruin, by

appealing to my vanity. Deeper than all these disagreements, however,

which, after all, were concerned only with external circumstances, was

the consciousness of our fundamental incompatibility, which to me had

become ever more and more apparent since the day of our reconciliation.

From the very beginning we had had scenes of the most violent

description: never once after these frequent quarrels had she admitted

herself in the wrong or tried to be friends again.

The necessity of speedily restoring our domestic peace, as well as my

conviction (confirmed by every one of her extravagant outbursts) that,

in view of the great disparity of our characters and especially of our

educations, it devolved upon me to prevent such scenes by observing

great caution in my behaviour, always led me to take the entire blame

for what had happened upon myself, and to mollify Minna by showing her

that I was sorry. Unfortunately, and to my intense grief, I was forced

to recognise that by acting in this way I lost all my power over her

affections, and especially over her character. Now we stood in a

position in which I could not possibly resort to the same means of

reconciliation, for it would have meant my being inconsistent in all my

views and actions. And then I found myself confronted by such hardness

in the woman whom I had spoilt by my leniency, that it was out of the

question to expect her to acknowledge the injustice done to myself.

Suffice it to say that the wreck of my married life had contributed not

inconsiderably to the ruin of my position in Dresden, and to the

careless manner in which I treated it, for instead of finding help,

strength, and consolation at home, I found my wife unwittingly

conspiring against me, in league with all the other hostile

circumstances which then beset me. After I had got over the first shock

of her heartless behaviour, I was absolutely clear about this. I

remember that I did not suffer any great sorrow, but that on the

contrary, with the conviction of being now quite helpless, an almost

exalted calm came over me when I realised that up to the present my

life had been built on a foundation of sand and nothing more. At all

events, the fact that I stood absolutely alone did much towards

restoring my peace of mind, and in my distress I now found strength and

comfort even in the fact of my dire poverty. At last assistance arrived

from Weimar. I accepted it eagerly, and it was the means of extricating

me from my present useless life and stranded hopes.

My next move was to find a place of refuge—one, however, which had but

little attraction for me, seeing that in it there was not the slightest

hope of my being able to make any further headway in the paths along

which I had hitherto progressed. This refuge was Zürich, a town devoid

of all art in the public sense, and where for the first time I met

simple-hearted people who knew nothing about me as a musician, but who,

as it appeared, felt drawn towards me by the power of my personality

alone. I arrived at Muller’s house and asked him to let me have a room,

at the same time giving him what remained of my capital, namely twenty

francs. I quickly discovered that my old friend was embarrassed by my

perfectly open confidence in him, and that he was at his wit’s end to

know what to do with me. I soon gave up the large room containing a

grand piano, which he had allotted to me on the impulse of the moment,

and retired to a modest little bedroom. The meals were my great trial,

not because I was fastidious, but because I could not digest thorn.

Outside my friend’s house, on the contrary, I enjoyed what, considering

the habits of the locality, was the most luxurious reception. The same

young men who had been so kind to me on my first journey through Zürich

again showed themselves anxious to be continually in my company, and

this was especially the case with one young fellow called Jakob Sulzer.

He had to be thirty years of age before he was entitled to become a

member of the Zürich government, and he therefore still had several

years to wait. In spite of his youth, however, the impression he made

on all those with whom he came in contact was that of a man of riper

years, whose character was formed. When I was asked long afterwards

whether I had ever met a man who, morally speaking, was the beau-ideal

of real character and uprightness, I could, on reflection, think of

none other than this newly gained friend, Jakob Sulzer.

He owed his early appointment as permanent Cantonal Secretary

(Staatsschreiber), one of the most excellent government posts in the

canton of Zürich, to the recently returned liberal party, led by Alfred

Escher. As this party could not employ the more experienced members of

the older conservative side in the public offices, their policy was to

choose exceptionally gifted young men for these positions. Sulzer

showed extraordinary promise, and their choice accordingly soon lighted

on him. He had only just returned from the Berlin and Bonn universities

with the intention of establishing himself as professor of philology at

the university in his native town, when he was made a member of the new

government. To fit himself for his post he had to stay in Geneva for

six months to perfect himself in the French language, which he had

neglected during his philological studies. He was quick-witted and

industrious, as well as independent and firm, and he never allowed

himself to be swayed by any party tactics. Consequently he rose very

rapidly to high positions in the government, to which he rendered

valuable and important services, first as Minister of Finance, a post

he held for many years, and later with particular distinction as member

of the School Federation. His unexpected acquaintance with me seemed to

place him in a sort of dilemma; from the philological and classical

studies which he had entered upon of his own choice, he suddenly found

himself torn away in the most bewildering manner by this unexpected

summons from the government. It almost seemed as if his meeting with me

had made him regret having accepted the appointment. As he was a person

of great culture, my poem, Siegfried’s Death, naturally revealed to him

my knowledge of German antiquity. He had also studied this subject, but

with greater philological accuracy than I could possibly have aspired

to. When, later on, he became acquainted with my manner of writing

music, this peculiarly serious and reserved man became so thoroughly

interested in my sphere of art, so far removed from his own field of

labour, that, as he himself confessed, he felt it his duty to fight

against these disturbing influences by being intentionally brusque and

curt with me. In the beginning of my stay in Zürich, however, he

delighted in being led some distance astray in the realms of art. The

old-fashioned official residence of the first Cantonal Secretary was

often the scene of unique gatherings, composed of people such as I

would be sure to attract. It might even be said that these social

functions occurred rather more frequently than was advisable for the

reputation of a civil servant of this little philistine state. What

attracted the musician Baumgartner more particularly to these meetings

was the product of Sulzer’s vineyards in Winterthur, to which our hosts

treated his guests with the greatest liberality. When in my moods of

mad exuberance I gave vent in dithyrambic effusions to my most extreme

views on art and life, my listeners often responded in a manner which,

more often than not, I was perfectly right in ascribing to the effects

of the wine rather than to the power of my enthusiasm. Once when

Professor Ettmuller, the Germanist and Edda scholar, had been invited

to listen to a reading of my Siegfried and had been led home in a state

of melancholy enthusiasm, there was a regular outburst of wanton

spirits among those who had remained behind. I conceived the absurd

idea of lifting all the doors of the state official’s house off their

hinges.

Herr Hagenbuch, another servant of the state, seeing what exertion this

cost me, offered me the help of his gigantic physique, and with

comparative ease we succeeded in removing every single door, and laying

it aside, a proceeding at which Sulzer merely smiled good-naturedly.

The next day, however, when we made inquiries, he told us that the

replacing of those doors (which must have been a terrible strain on his

delicate constitution) had taken him the whole night, as he had made up

his mind to keep the knowledge of our orgies from the sergeant, who

always arrived at a very early hour in the morning.

The extraordinary birdlike freedom of my existence had the effect of

exciting me more and more. I was often frightened at the excessive

outbursts of exaltation to which I was prone—no matter whom I was

with—and which led me to indulge in the most extraordinary paradoxes in

my conversation. Soon after I had settled in Zürich I began to write

down my various ideas about things at which I had arrived through my

private and artistic experiences, as well as through the influence of

the political unrest of the day. As I had no choice but to try, to the

best of my ability, to earn something by my pen, I thought of sending a

series of articles to a great French journal such as the National,

which in those days was still extant. In these articles I meant to

propound my ideas (in my revolutionary way) on the subject of modern

art in its relation to society. I sent six of them to an elderly friend

of mine, Albert Franck, requesting him to have them translated into

French and to get them published. This Franck was the brother of the

better-known Hermann Franck, now the head of the Franco-German

bookselling firm, which had originally belonged to my brother-in-law,

Avenarius. He sent me back my work with the very natural remark that it

was out of the question to expect the Parisian public to understand or

appreciate my articles, especially at such a critical moment.

I headed the manuscript Kunst und Revolution (‘Art and Revolution’) and

sent it to Otto Wigand in Leipzig, who actually undertook to publish it

in the form of a pamphlet, and sent me five louis d’or for it. This

unexpected success induced me to continue to exploit my literary gifts.

I looked among my papers for the essay I had written the year before as

the outcome of my historical studies of the ‘Nibelungen’ legend; I gave

it the title of Die Nibelungen Weltgeschichte aus der Sage, and again

tried my luck by sending it to Wigand.

The sensational title of Kunst und Revolution, as well as the notoriety

the ‘royal conductor’ had gained as a political refugee, had made the

radical publisher hope that the scandal that would arise on the

publication of my articles would redound to his benefit! I soon

discovered that he was on the point of issuing a second edition of

Kunst und Revolution, without, however, informing me of the fact. He

also took over my new pamphlet for another five louis d’or. This was

the first time I had earned money by means of published work, and I now

began to believe that I had reached that point when I should be able to

get the better of my misfortunes. I thought it over, and decided to

give public lectures in Zürich on subjects related to my writings

during the coming winter, hoping in that free and haphazard fashion to

keep body and soul together for a little while, although I had no fixed

appointment and did not intend to work at music.

It seemed necessary for me to resort to these means, as I did not know

how otherwise to keep myself alive. Shortly after my arrival in Zürich

I had witnessed the coming of the fragments of the Baden army,

dispersed over Swiss territory, and accompanied by fugitive volunteers,

and this had made a painful and uncanny impression upon me. The news of

the surrender near Villagos by Gorgey paralysed the last hopes as to

the issue of the great European struggle for liberty, which so far had

been left quite undecided. With some misgiving and anxiety I now turned

my eyes from all these occurrences in the outside world inwards to my

own soul.

I was accustomed to patronise the cafe litteraire, where I took my

coffee after my heavy mid-day meal, in a smoky atmosphere surrounded by

a merry and joking throng of men playing dominoes and ‘fast.’ One day I

stared at its common wall-paper representing antique subjects, which in

some inexplicable way recalled a certain water-colour by Genelli to my

mind, portraying ‘The education of Dionysos by the Muses.’ I had seen

it at the house of my brother-in-law Brockhaus in my young days, and it

had made a deep impression on me at the time. At this same place I

conceived the first ideas of my Kunstwerk der Zukunft (‘The Art-Work of

the Future’), and it seemed a significant omen to me to be roused one

day out of one of my post-prandial dreams by the news that

Schroder-Devrient was staying in Zürich. I immediately got up with the

intention of calling on her at the neighbouring hotel, ‘Zum Schwerte,’

but to my great dismay heard that she had just left by steamer. I never

saw her again, and long afterwards only heard of her painful death from

my wife, who in later years became fairly intimate with her in Dresden.

After I had spent two remarkable summer months in this wild and

extraordinary fashion, I at last received reassuring news of Minna, who

had remained in Dresden. Although her manner of taking leave of me had

been both harsh and wounding, I could not bring myself to believe I had

completely parted from her. In a letter I wrote to one of her

relations, and which I presumed they would forward, I made sympathetic

inquiries about her, while I had already done all that lay in my power,

through repeated appeals to Liszt, to ensure her being well cared for.

I now received a direct reply, which, in addition to the fact that it

testified to the vigour and activity with which she had fought her

difficulties, at the same time showed me that she earnestly desired to

be reunited with me. It was almost in terms of contempt that she

expressed her grave doubts as to the possibility of my being able to

make a living in Zürich, but she added that, inasmuch as she was my

wife, she wished to give me another chance. She also seemed to take it

for granted that I intended making Zürich only our temporary home, and

that I would do my utmost to promote my career as a composer of opera

in Paris. Whereupon she announced her intention of arriving at

Rorschach in Switzerland on a certain date in September of that year,

in the company of the little dog Peps, the parrot Papo, and her

so-called sister Nathalie. After having engaged two rooms for our new

home, I now prepared to set out on foot for St. Gall and Rorschach

through the lovely and celebrated Toggenburg and Appenzell, and felt

very touched after all when the peculiar family, which consisted half

of pet animals, landed at the harbour of Rorschach. I must honestly

confess that the little dog and the bird made me very happy. My wife at

once threw cold water on my emotions, however, by declaring that in the

event of my behaving badly again she was ready to return to Dresden any

moment, and that she had numerous friends there, who would be glad to

protect and succour her if she were forced to carry out her threat. Be

this as it may, one look at her convinced me how greatly she had aged

in this short time, and how much I ought to pity her, and this feeling

succeeded in banishing all bitterness from my heart.

I did my utmost to give her confidence and to make her believe that our

present misfortunes were but momentary. This was no easy task, as she

would constantly compare the diminutive aspect of the town of Zürich

with the more noble majesty of Dresden, and seemed to feel bitterly

humiliated. The friends whom I introduced to her found no favour in her

eyes. She looked upon the Cantonal Secretary, Sulzer, as a ‘mere town

clerk who would not be of any importance in. Germany’; and the wife of

my host Muller absolutely disgusted her when, in answer to Minna’s

complaints about my terrible position, she replied that my greatness

lay in the very fact of my having faced it. Then again Minna appeased

me by tolling me of the expected arrival of some of my Dresden

belongings, which she thought would be indispensable to our new home.

The property of which she spoke consisted of a Breitkopf and Hartel

grand-piano that looked better than it sounded, and of the ‘title-page’

of the Nibelungen by Cornelius in a Gothic frame that used to hang over

my desk in Dresden.

With this nucleus of household effects we now decided to take small

lodgings in the so-called ‘hinteren Escherhausern’ in the Zeltweg. With

great cleverness Minna had succeeded in selling the Dresden furniture

to advantage, and out of the proceeds of this sale she had brought

three hundred marks with her to Zürich to help towards setting up our

new home. She told me that she had saved my small but very select

library for me by giving it into the safe custody of the publisher,

Heinrich Brockhaus (brother of my sister’s husband and member of the

Saxon Diet), who had insisted upon looking after it. Great, therefore,

was her dismay when, upon asking this kind friend to send her the

books, he replied that he was holding them as security for a debt of

fifteen hundred marks which I had contracted with him during my days of

trouble in Dresden, and that he intended to keep them until that sum

was returned. As even after the lapse of many years I found it

impossible to refund this money, these books, collected for my own

special wants, were lost to me for ever.

Thanks more particularly to my friend Sulzer, the Cantonal Secretary,

whom my wife at first despised so much on account of his title which

she misunderstood, and who, although he was far from well-off himself,

thought it only natural that he should help me, however moderately, out

of my difficulties, we soon succeeded in making our little place look

so cosy that my simple Zürich friends felt quite at home in it. My

wife, with all her undeniable talents, hero found ample scope in which

to distinguish herself, and I remember how ingeniously she made a

little what-not out of the box in which she had kindly brought my music

and manuscript to Zürich.

But it was soon time to think of how to earn enough money to provide

for us all. My idea of giving public lectures was treated with contempt

by my wife, who looked upon it as an insult to her pride. She could

acquiesce only in one plan, that suggested by Liszt, namely, that I

should write an opera for Paris. To satisfy her, and in view of the

fact that I could see no chance of a remunerative occupation close at

hand, I actually reopened a correspondence on this matter with my great

friend and his secretary Belloni in Paris. In the meantime I could not

be idle, so I accepted an invitation from the Zürich musical society to

conduct a classical composition at one of their concerts, and to this

end I worked with their very poor orchestra at Beethoven’s Symphony in

A major. Although the result was successful, and I received five

napoleons for my trouble, it made my wife very unhappy, for she could

not forget the excellent orchestra, and the much more appreciative

public, which a short time before in Dresden would have seconded and

rewarded similar efforts on my part. Her one and only ideal for me was

that, by hook or by crook, and with a total disregard of all artistic

scruples, I should make a brilliant reputation for myself in Paris.

While we were both absolutely at a loss to discover whence we should

obtain the necessary funds for our journey to Paris and our sojourn

there, I again plunged into my philosophical study of art, as being the

only sphere still left open to me.

Harrassed by the cares of a terrible struggle for existence, I wrote

the whole of Das Kunstwerk der Zukunft in the chilly atmosphere of a

sunless little room on the ground floor during the months of November

and December of that year. Minna had no objection to this occupation

when I told her of the success of my first pamphlet, and the hope I had

of receiving even better pay for this more extensive work.

Thus for a while I enjoyed comparative peace, although in my heart a

spirit of unrest had begun to reign, thanks to my growing acquaintance

with Feuerbach’s works. I had always had an inclination to fathom the

depths of philosophy, just as I had been led by the mystic influence of

Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony to search the deepest recesses of music. My

first efforts at satisfying this longing had failed. None of the

Leipzig professors had succeeded in fascinating me with their lectures

on fundamental philosophy and logic. I had procured Schelling’s work,

Transcendental Idealism, recommended to me by Gustav Schlesinger, a

friend of Laube’s, but it was in vain that I racked my brains to try

and make something out of the first pages, and I always returned to my

Ninth Symphony.

During the latter part of my stay in Dresden I had returned to these

old studies, the longing for which suddenly revived within me, and to

these I added the deeper historical studies which had always fascinated

me. As an introduction to philosophy I now chose Hegel’s Philosophy of

History. A good deal of this impressed me deeply, and it now seemed as

if I should ultimately penetrate into the Holy of Holies along this

path. The more incomprehensible many of his speculative conclusions

appeared, the more I felt myself desirous of probing the question of

the ‘Absolute’ and everything connected therewith to the core. For I so

admired Hegel’s powerful mind that it seemed to me he was the very

keystone of all philosophical thought.

The revolution intervened; the practical tendencies of a social

reconstruction distracted my attention, and as I have already stated,

it was a German Catholic priest and political agitator (formerly a

divinity student named Menzdorff, who used to wear a Calabrian hat)[18]

who drew my attention to ‘the only real philosopher of modern times,’

Ludwig Feuerbach. My new Zürich friend, the piano teacher, Wilhelm

Baumgartner, made me a present of Feuerbach’s book on Tod und

Unsterblichkeit (‘Death and Immortality’). The well-known and stirring

lyrical style of the author greatly fascinated me as a layman. The

intricate questions which he propounds in this book as if they were

being discussed for the first time by him, and which he treats in a

charmingly exhaustive manner, had often occupied my mind since the very

first days of my acquaintance with Lehrs in Paris, just as they occupy

the mind of every imaginative and serious man. With me, however, this

was not lasting, and I had contented myself with the poetic suggestions

on these important subjects which appear here and there in the works of

our great poets.

[18] A broad-rimmed, tall, white felt hat, tapering to a point,

originally worn by the inhabitants of Calabria, and in 1848 a sign of

Republicanism.—EDITOR.

The frankness with which Feuerbach explains his views on these

interesting questions, in the more mature parts of his book, pleased me

as much by their tragic as by their social-radical tendencies. It

seemed right that the only true immortality should be that of sublime

deeds and great works of art. It was more difficult to sustain any

interest in Das Wesen des Christenthums (‘The Essence of Christianity’)

by the same author, for it was impossible whilst reading this work not

to become conscious, however involuntarily, of the prolix and unskilful

manner in which he dilates on the simple and fundamental idea, namely,

religion explained from a purely subjective and psychological point of

view. Nevertheless, from that day onward I always regarded Feuerbach as

the ideal exponent of the radical release of the individual from the

thraldom of accepted notions, founded on the belief in authority. The

initiated will therefore not wonder that I dedicated my Kunstwerk der

Zukunft to Feuerbach and addressed its preface to him.

My friend Sulzer, a thorough disciple of Hegel, was very sorry to see

me so interested in Feuerbach, whom he did not even recognise as a

philosopher at all. He said that the best thing that Feuerbach had done

for me was that he had been the means of awakening my ideas, although

he himself had none. But what had really induced me to attach so much

importance to Feuerbach was the conclusion by means of which he had

seceded from his master Hegel, to wit, that the best philosophy was to

have no philosophy—a theory which greatly simplified what I had

formerly considered a very terrifying study—and secondly, that only

that was real which could be ascertained by the senses.

The fact that he proclaimed what we call ‘spirit’ to be an aesthetic

perception of our senses, together with his statement concerning the

futility of philosophy—these were the two things in him which rendered

me such useful assistance in my conceptions of an all-embracing work of

art, of a perfect drama which should appeal to the simplest and most

purely human emotions at the very moment when it approached its

fulfilment as Kunstwerk der Zukunft. It must have been this which

Sulzer had in his mind when he spoke deprecatingly of Feuerbach’s

influence over me. At all events, after a while I certainly could not

return to his works, and I remember that his newly published book, Uber

das Wesen der Religion (‘Lectures on the Essence of Religion’), scared

me to such an extent by the dullness of its title alone, that when

Herwegh opened it for my benefit, I closed it with a bang under his

very nose.

At that time I was working with great enthusiasm upon the draft of a

connected essay, and was delighted one day to receive a visit from the

novelist and Tieckian scholar, Eduard von Billow (the father of my

young friend Billow), who was passing through Zürich. In my tiny little

room I read him my chapter on poetry, and could not help noticing that

he was greatly startled at my ideas on literary drama and on the advent

of the new Shakespeare. I thought this all the more reason why Wigand

the publisher should accept my new revolutionary book, and expected him

to pay me a fee which would be in proportion to the greater size of the

work. I asked for twenty louis d’or, and this sum he agreed to pay me.

The prospect of receiving this amount induced me to carry out the plan,

which need had forced upon me, of travelling to Paris and of trying my

luck there as a composer of opera. This plan had very serious

drawbacks; not only did I hate the idea, but I knew that I was doing an

injustice to myself by believing in the success of my enterprise, for I

felt that I could never seriously throw myself into it heart and soul.

Everything, however, combined to make me try the experiment, and it was

Liszt in particular who, confident of this being my only way to fame,

insisted upon my reopening the negotiations into which Belloni and I

had entered during the previous summer. To show with what earnestness I

tried to consider the chances of carrying out my plan, I drafted out

the plot of the opera, which the French poet would only have to put

into verse, because I never for a moment fancied that it would be

possible for him to think out and write a libretto for which I would

only need to compose the music. I chose for my subject the legend of

Wieland der Schmied, upon which I commented with some stress at the end

of my recently finished Kunstwerk der Zukunft, and the version of which

by Simrock, taken from the Wilkyna legend, had greatly attracted me.

I sketched out the complete scenario with precise indication of the

dialogue for three acts, and with a heavy heart decided to hand it over

to my Parisian author to be worked out. Liszt thought he saw a means of

making my music known through his relations with Seghers, the musical

director of a society then known as the ‘Concerts de St. Cecile.’ In

January of the following year the Tannhäuser Overture was to be given

under his baton, and it therefore seemed advisable that I should reach

Paris some time before this event. This undertaking, which appeared to

be so difficult owing to my complete lack of funds, was at last

facilitated in a manner quite unexpected.

I had written home for help, and had appealed to all the old friends I

could think of, but in vain. By the family of my brother Albert in

particular, whose daughter had recently entered upon a brilliant

theatrical career, I was treated in much the same way as one treats an

invalid by whom one dreads to become infected. In contrast to their

harshness I was deeply touched by the devotion of the Ritter family,

who had remained in Dresden; for, apart from my acquaintance with young

Karl, I scarcely knew these people at all. Through the kindness of my

old friend Heine, who had been informed of my position, Frau Julie

Ritter, the venerable mother of the family, had thought it her duty to

place, through a business friend, the sum of fifteen hundred marks at

my disposal. At about the same time I received a letter from Mme.

Laussot, who had called upon me in Dresden the year before, and who now

in the most affecting terms assured me of her continued sympathy.

These were the first signs of that new phase in my life upon which I

entered from this day forth, and in which I accustomed myself to look

upon the outward circumstances of my existence as being merely

subservient to my will. And by this means I was able to escape from the

hampering narrowness of my home life.

For the moment the proffered financial assistance was very distasteful

to me, for it seemed to forbid my raising any further objections to the

realisation of the detested Paris schemes. When, however, on the

strength of this favourable change in my affairs, I suggested to my

wife that we might, after all, content ourselves with remaining in

Zürich, she flew into the most violent passion over my weakness and

lack of spirit, and declared that if I did not make up my mind to

achieve something in Paris, she would lose all faith in me. She said,

moreover, that she absolutely refused to be a witness of my misery and

grief as a wretched literary man and insignificant conductor of local

concerts in Zürich.

We had entered upon the year 1850; I had decided to go to Paris, if

only for the sake of peace, but had to postpone my journey on account

of ill-health. The reaction following upon the terrible excitement of

recent times had not failed to have its effect on my overwrought

nerves, and a state of complete exhaustion had followed. The continual

colds, in spite of which I had been obliged to work in my very

unhealthy room, had at last given rise to alarming symptoms. A certain

weakness of the chest became apparent, and this the doctor (a political

refugee) undertook to cure by the application of pitch plasters. As the

result of this treatment and the irritating effect it had upon my

nerves, I lost my voice completely for a while; whereupon I was told

that I must go away for a change. On going out to buy my ticket for the

journey, I felt so weak and broke out into such terrible perspiration

that I hastened to return to my wife in order to consult her as to the

advisability, in the circumstances, of abandoning the idea of the

expedition altogether. She, however, maintained (and perhaps rightly)

not only that my condition was not dangerous, but that it was to a

large extent due to imagination, and that, once in the right place, I

would soon recover.

An inexpressible feeling of bitterness stimulated my nerves as in anger

and despair I quickly left the house to buy the confounded ticket for

the journey, and in the beginning of February I actually started on the

road to Paris. I was filled with the most extraordinary feelings, but

the spark of hope which was then kindled in my breast certainly had

nothing whatever to do with the belief that had been imposed upon me

from without, that I was to make a success in Paris as a composer of

operas.

I was particularly anxious to find quiet rooms, for peace had now

become my first necessity, no matter where I happened to be staying.

The cabman who drove me from street to street through the most isolated

quarters, and whom I at last accused of keeping always to the most

animated parts of the city, finally protested in despair that one did

not come to Paris to live in a convent. At last it occurred to me to

look for what I wanted in one of the cites through which no vehicle

seemed to drive, and I decided to engage rooms in the Cite de Provence.

True to the plans which had been forced upon me, I at once called on

Herr Seghers about the performance of the Tannhäuser Overture.

It turned out that in spite of my late arrival I had missed nothing,

for they were still racking their brains as to how to procure the

necessary orchestral parts.

I therefore had to write to Liszt, asking him to order the copies, and

had to wait for their arrival. Belloni was not in town, things were

therefore at a standstill, and I had plenty of time to think over the

object of my visit to Paris, while an unceasing accompaniment was

poured out to my meditations by the barrel-organs which infest the

cites of Paris.

I had much difficulty in convincing an agent of the government, from

whom I received a visit soon after my arrival, that my presence in

Paris was due to artistic reasons, and not to my doubtful position as a

political refugee.

Fortunately he was impressed by the score, which I showed him, as well

as by Liszt’s article on the Tannhäuser Overture, written the year

before in the Journal des Debats, and he left me, politely inviting me

to continue my avocations peacefully and industriously, as the police

had no intention of disturbing me.

I also looked up my older Parisian acquaintances. At the hospitable

house of Desplechins I met Semper, who was trying to make his position

as tolerable as possible by writing some inferior artistic work. He had

left his family in Dresden, from which town we soon received the most

alarming news. The prisons were gradually filling there with the

unfortunate victims of the recent Saxon movement Of Röckel, Bakunin,

and Heubner, all we could hear was that they had been charged with high

treason, and that they were awaiting the death sentence.

In view of the tidings which continually arrived concerning the cruelty

and brutality with which the soldiers treated the prisoners, we could

not help considering our own lot a very happy one.

My intercourse with Semper, whom I saw frequently, was generally

enlivened by a gaiety which was occasionally of rather a risky nature;

he was determined to rejoin his family in London, where the prospect of

various appointments was open to him. My latest attempts at writing,

and the thoughts expressed in my work, interested him greatly, and gave

rise to animated conversations in which we were joined by Kietz, who

was at first amusing, but evidently boring Semper considerably. I found

the former in the identical position in which I had left him many years

ago: he had made no headway with his painting, and would have been glad

if the revolution had taken a more decided turn, so that, under cover

of the general confusion, he might have escaped from his embarrassing

position with his landlord. He made at this time quite a good pastel

portrait of me in his very best and earliest style. While I was sitting

I unfortunately spoke to him about my Das Kunstwerk der Zukunft, and

thereby laid the foundation for him of troubles that lasted many years,

as he tried to instil my new ideas into the Parisian bourgeoisie at

whose tables he had hitherto been a welcome guest. Notwithstanding, he

remained as of old a good, obliging, true-hearted fellow, and even

Semper could not help putting up with him cheerfully. I also looked up

my friend Anders. It was a difficult matter to find him at any hour of

the day, since out of sleeping hours he was closeted in the library,

where he could receive no one, and afterwards retired to the

reading-room to spend his hours of rest, and generally went to dine

with certain bourgeois families where he gave music lessons. He had

aged considerably, but I was glad to find him, comparatively speaking,

in better health than the state in which I had last seen him had

allowed me to hope, as when I left Paris before he had seemed to be in

a decline. Curiously enough, a broken leg had been the means of

improving his health, the treatment necessary for it having taken him

to a hydro, where his condition had much improved. His one idea was to

see me achieve a great success in Paris, and he wished to secure a seat

in advance for the first performance of my opera, which he took for

granted was to appear, and kept repeating that it would be so very

trying for him to occupy a place in any part of the theatre where there

would be likely to be a crush. He could not see the use of my present

literary work; in spite of this I was again engaged on it exclusively,

as I soon ascertained there was no likelihood of my overture to

Tannhäuser being produced. Liszt had shown the greatest zeal in

obtaining and forwarding the orchestral parts; but Herr Seghers

informed me that as far as his own orchestra was concerned, he found

himself in a republican democracy where each instrument had an equal

right to voice its opinion, and it had been unanimously decided that

for the remainder of the winter season, which was now drawing to a

close, my overture could be dispensed with. I gathered enough from this

turn of affairs to realise how precarious my position was.

It is true, the result of my writings was hardly less discouraging. A

copy of the Wigand edition of my Kunstwerk der Zukunft was forwarded to

me full of horrible misprints, and instead of the expected remuneration

of twenty louis d’or, my publisher explained that for the present he

could only pay me half this sum, as, owing to the fact that at first

the sale of the Kunst und Revolution had been very rapid, he had been

led to attach too high a commercial value to my writings, a mistake he

had speedily discovered when he found there was no demand for Die

Nibelungen.

On the other hand, I received an offer of remunerative work from Adolph

Kolatschek, who was also a fugitive, and was just going to bring out a

German monthly journal as the organ of the progressive party. In

response to this invitation I wrote a long essay on Kunst und Klima

(‘Art and Climate’), in which I supplemented the ideas I had already

touched upon in my Kunstwerk der Zukunft. Besides this I had, since my

arrival in Paris, worked out a more complete sketch of Wieland der

Schmied. It is true that this work had no longer any value, and I

wondered with apprehension what I could write home to my wife, now that

the last precious remittance had been so aimlessly sacrificed. The

thought of returning to Zürich was as distasteful to me as the prospect

of remaining any longer in Paris. My feelings with regard to the latter

alternative were intensified by the impression made upon me by

Meyerbeer’s opera The Prophet, which had just been produced and which I

had not heard before. Rearing itself on the ruins of the hopes for new

and more noble endeavour which had animated the better works of the

past year—the only result of the negotiations of the provisional French

republic for the encouragement of art—I saw this work of Meyerbeer’s

break upon the world like the dawn heralding this day of disgraceful

desolation. I was so sickened by this performance, that though I was

unfortunately placed in the centre of the stalls and would willingly

have avoided the disturbance necessarily occasioned by one of the

audience moving during the middle of an act, even this consideration

did not deter me from getting up and leaving the house. When the famous

mother of the prophet finally gives vent to her grief in the well-known

series of ridiculous roulades, I was filled with rage and despair at

the thought that I should be called upon to listen to such a thing, and

never again did I pay the slightest heed to this opera.

But what was I to do next? Just as the South American republics had

attracted me during my first miserable sojourn in Paris, so now my

longing was directed towards the East, where I could live my life in a

manner worthy of a human being far away from this modern world. While I

was in this frame of mind I was called upon to answer another inquiry

as to my state of health from Mme. Laussot in Bordeaux. It turned out

that my answer prompted her to send me a kind and pressing invitation

to go and stay at her house, at least for a short time, to rest and

forget my troubles. In any circumstances an excursion to more southerly

regions, which I had not yet seen, and a visit to people who, though

utter strangers, showed such friendly interest in me, could not fail to

prove attractive and flattering. I accepted, settled my affairs in

Paris, and went by coach via Orleans, Tours, and Angouleme, down the

Gironde to the unknown town, where I was received with great courtesy

and cordiality by the young wine merchant Eugene Laussot, and presented

to my sympathetic young friend, his wife. A closer acquaintance with

the family, in which Mrs. Taylor, Mme. Laussot’s mother, was now also

included, led to a clearer understanding of the character of the

sympathy bestowed upon me in such a cordial and unexpected manner by

people hitherto unknown to me. Jessie, as the young wife was called at

home, had, during a somewhat lengthy stay in Dresden, become very

intimate with the Ritter family, and I had no reason to doubt the

assurance given me, that the Laussots’ interest in me and my work was

principally owing to this intimacy. After my flight from Dresden, as

soon as the news of my difficulties had reached the Ritters, a

correspondence had been carried on between Dresden and Bordeaux with a

view to ascertaining how best to assist me. Jessie attributed the whole

idea to Frau Julie Ritter who, while not being well enough off herself

to make me a sufficient allowance, was endeavouring to come to an

understanding with Jessie’s mother, the well-to-do widow of an English

lawyer, whose income entirely supported the young couple in Bordeaux.

This plan had so far succeeded, that shortly after my arrival in

Bordeaux Mrs. Taylor informed me that the two families had combined,

and that it had been decided to ask me to accept the help of three

thousand francs a year until the return of better days. My one object

now was to enlighten my benefactors as to the exact conditions under

which I should be accepting such assistance. I could no longer reckon

upon achieving any success as a composer of opera either in Paris or

elsewhere; what line I should take up instead I did not know; but, at

all events, I was determined to keep myself free from the disgrace

which would reflect upon my whole life if I used such means as this

offer presented to secure success. I feel sure I am not wrong in

believing that Jessie was the only one who understood me, and though I

only experienced kindness from the rest of the family, I soon

discovered the gulf by which she, as well as myself, was separated from

her mother and husband. While the husband, who was a handsome young

man, was away the greater part of the day attending to his business,

and the mother’s deafness excluded her to a great extent from our

conversations, we soon discovered by a rapid exchange of ideas that we

shared the same opinions on many important matters, and this led to a

great feeling of friendship between us. Jessie, who was at that time

about twenty-two, bore little resemblance to her mother, and no doubt

took after her father, of whom I heard most flattering accounts. A

large and varied collection of books loft by this man to his daughter

showed his tastes, for besides carrying on his lucrative profession as

a lawyer, he had devoted himself to the study of literature and

science. From him Jessie had also learned German as a child, and she

spoke that language with great fluency. She had been brought up on

Grimm’s fairy-tales, and was, moreover, thoroughly acquainted with

German poetry, as well as with that of England and France, and her

knowledge of them was as thorough as the most advanced education could

demand. French literature did not appeal to her much. Her quick powers

of comprehension were astonishing. Everything which I touched upon she

immediately grasped and assimilated. It was the same with music: she

read at sight with the greatest facility, and was an accomplished

player. During her stay in Dresden she had been told that I was still

in search of the pianist who could play Beethoven’s great Sonata in B

flat major, and she now astonished me by her finished rendering of this

most difficult piece. The emotion aroused in me by finding such an

exceptionally developed talent suddenly changed to anxiety when I heard

her sing. Her sharp, shrill voice, in which there was strength but no

real depth of feeling, so shocked me that I could not refrain from

begging her to desist from singing in future. With regard to the

execution of the sonata, she listened eagerly to my instructions as to

how it should be interpreted, though I could not feel that she would

succeed in rendering it according to my ideas. I read her my latest

essays, and she seemed to understand even the most extraordinary

descriptions perfectly. My poem on Siegfried’s Tod moved her deeply,

but she preferred my sketch of Wieland der Schmied. She admitted

afterwards that she would prefer to imagine herself filling the role of

Wieland’s worthy bride than to find herself in the position and forced

to endure the fate of Gutrune in Siegfried. It followed inevitably that

the presence of the other members of the family proved embarrassing

when we wanted to talk over and discuss these various subjects. If we

felt somewhat troubled at having to confess to ourselves that Mrs.

Taylor would certainly never be able to understand why I was being

offered assistance, I was still more disconcerted at realising after a

time the complete want of harmony between the young couple,

particularly from an intellectual point of view. The fact that Laussot

had for some time been well aware of his wife’s dislike for him was

plainly shown when he one day so far forgot himself as to complain

loudly and bitterly that she would not even love a child of his if she

had one, and that he therefore thought it fortunate that she was not a

mother. Astonished and saddened, I suddenly gazed into an abyss which

was hidden here, as is often the case, under the appearance of a

tolerably happy married life. About this time, and just as my visit,

which had already lasted three weeks, was drawing to a close, I

received a letter from my wife that could not have had a more

unfortunate effect on my state of mind. She was, on the whole, pleased

at my having found new friends, but at the same time explained that if

I did not immediately return to Paris, and there endeavour to secure

the production of my overture with the results anticipated, she would

not know what to think of me, and would certainly fail to understand me

if I returned to Zürich without having effected my purpose. At the same

time my depression was intensified in a terrible way by a notice in the

papers announcing that Röckel, Bakunin, and Heubner had been sentenced

to death, and that the date of their execution was fixed. I wrote a

short but stirring letter of farewell to the two first, and as I saw no

possibility of having it conveyed to the prisoners, who were confined

in the fortress of Konigstein, I decided to send it to Frau von

Lüttichau, to be forwarded to them by her, because I thought she was

the only person in whose power it might lie to do this for me, while at

the same time she had sufficient generosity and independence of mind to

enable her to respect and carry out my wishes, in spite of any possible

difference of opinion she might entertain. I was told some time

afterwards that Lüttichau had got hold of the letter and thrown it into

the fire. For the time being this painful impression helped me to the

determination to break with every one and everything, to lose all

desire to learn more of life or of art, and, even at the risk of having

to endure the greatest privations, to trust to chance and put myself

beyond the reach of everybody. The small income settled upon me by my

friends I wished to divide between myself and my wife, and with my half

go to Greece or Asia Minor, and there, Heaven alone knew how, seek to

forget and be forgotten. I communicated this plan to the only

confidante I had left to me, chiefly in order that she might be able to

enlighten my benefactors as to how I intended disposing of the income

they had offered me. She seemed pleased with the idea, and the resolve

to abandon herself to the same fate seemed to her also, in her

resentment against her position, to be quite an easy matter. She

expressed us much by hints and a word dropped here and there. Without

clearly realising what it would lead to, and without coming to any

understanding with her, I left Bordeaux towards the end of April, more

excited than soothed in spirit, and filled with regret and anxiety. I

returned to Paris, for the time being, stunned and full of uncertainty

as to what to do next. Feeling very unwell, exhausted, and at the same

time excited from want of sleep, I reached my destination and put up at

the Hotel Valois, where I remained a week, struggling to gain my

self-control and to face my strange position. Even if I had wished to

resume the plans which had been instrumental in bringing me to Paris, I

soon convinced myself that little or nothing could be done. I was

filled with distress and anger at being called upon to waste my

energies in a direction contrary to my tastes, merely to satisfy the

unreasonable demands made upon me. I was at length obliged to answer my

wife’s last pressing communication, and wrote her a long and detailed

letter in which I kindly, but at the same time frankly, retraced the

whole of our life together, and explained that I was fully determined

to set her free from any immediate participation in my fate, as I felt

quite incapable of so arranging it so as to meet with her approval. I

promised her the half of whatever means I should have at my disposal

now or in the future, and told her she must accept this arrangement

with a good grace, because the occasion had now arisen to take that

step of parting from me which, on our first meeting again in

Switzerland, she had declared herself ready to do. I ended my letter

without bidding her a final farewell. I thereupon wrote to Bordeaux

immediately to inform Jessie of the step I had taken, though my means

did not as yet allow of my forming any definite plan which I could

communicate to her for my complete flight from the world. In return she

announced that she was determined to do likewise, and asked for my

protection, under which she intended to place herself when once she had

set herself free. Much alarmed, I did all in my power to make her

realise that it was one thing for a man, placed in such a desperate

situation as myself, to cut himself adrift in the face of

insurmountable difficulties, but quite another matter for a young

woman, at least to all outward appearances, happily settled, to decide

to break up her home, for reasons which probably no one except myself

would be in a position to understand. Regarding the unconventionality

of her resolve in the eyes of the world, she assured me that it would

be carried out as quietly as possible, and that for the present she

merely thought of arranging to visit her friends the Ritters in

Dresden. I felt so upset by all this that I yielded to my craving for

retirement, and sought it at no great distance from Paris. Towards the

middle of April I went to Montmorency, of which I had heard many

agreeable accounts, and there sought a modest hiding-place. With great

difficulty I dragged myself to the outskirts of the little town, where

the country still bore a wintry aspect, and turned into the little

strip of garden belonging to a wine merchant, which was filled with

visitors only on Sundays, and there refreshed myself with some bread

and cheese and a bottle of wine. A crowd of hens surrounded me, and I

kept throwing them pieces of bread, and was touched by the

self-sacrificing abstemiousness with which the cock gave all to his

wives though I aimed particularly at him. They became bolder and

bolder, and finally flew on to the table and attacked my provisions;

the cock flew after them, and noticing that everything was topsy-turvy,

pounced upon the cheese with the eagerness of a craving long

unsatisfied. When I found myself being driven from the table by this

chaos of fluttering wings, I was filled with a gaiety to which I had

long been a stranger. I laughed heartily, and looked round for the

signboard of the inn. I thereby discovered that my host rejoiced in the

name of Homo. This seemed a hint from Fate, and I felt I must seek

shelter here at all costs. An extraordinarily small and narrow bedroom

was shown me, which I immediately engaged. Besides the bed it held a

rough table and two cane-bottomed chairs. I arranged one of these as a

washhand-stand, and on the table I placed some books, writing

materials, and the score of Lohengrin, and almost heaved a sigh of

content in spite of my extremely cramped accommodation. Though the

weather remained uncertain and the woods with their leafless trees did

not seem to offer the prospect of very enticing walks, I still felt

that here there was a possibility of my being forgotten, and being also

in my turn allowed to forget the events that had lately filled me with

Midi desperate anxiety. My old artistic instinct awoke again. I looked

over my Lohengrin score, and quickly decided to send it to Liszt and

leave it to him to bring it out as best he could. Now that I had got

rid of this score also, I felt as free as a bird and as careless as

Diogenes about what might befall me. I even invited Kietz to come and

stay with me and share the pleasures of my retreat. He did actually

come, as he had done during my stay in. Mendon; but he found me even

more modestly installed than I had been there. He was quite prepared to

take pot-luck, however, and cheerfully slept on an improvised bed,

promising to keep the world in touch with me upon his return to Paris.

I was suddenly startled from my state of complacency by the news that

my wife had come to Paris to look me up. I had an hour’s painful

struggle with myself to settle the course I should pursue, and decided

not to allow the step I had taken in regard to her to be looked upon as

an ill-considered and excusable vagary. I left Montmorency and betook

myself to Paris, summoned Kietz to my hotel, and instructed him to tell

my wife, who had already been trying to gain admittance to him, that he

knew nothing more of me except that I had left Paris. The poor fellow,

who felt as much pity for Minna as for me, was so utterly bewildered on

this occasion, that he declared that he felt as though he were the axis

upon which all the misery in the world turned. But he apparently

realised the significance and importance of my decision, as it was

necessary he should, and acquitted himself in this delicate matter with

intelligence and good feeling. That night t left Paris by train for

Clermont-Tonnerre, from whence I travelled on to Geneva, there to await

news from Frau Ritter in Dresden. My exhaustion was such that, even had

I possessed the necessary means, I could not as yet have contemplated

undergoing the fatigue of a long journey. By way of gaining time for

further developments I retired to Villeneuve, at the other end of the

Lake of Geneva, where I put up at the Hotel Byron, which was quite

empty at the time. Here I learned that Karl Ritter had arrived in

Zürich, as he said he would, with the intention of paying me a visit.

Impressing upon him the necessity for the strictest secrecy, I invited

him to join me at the Lake of Geneva, and in the second week in May we

met at the Hotel Byron. The characteristic which pleased me in him was

his absolute devotion, his quick comprehension of my position and the

necessity of my resolutions, as well as his readiness to submit without

question to all my arrangements, even where he himself was concerned.

He was full of my latest literary efforts, told me what an impression

they had made on his acquaintances, and thereby induced me to spend the

few days of rest I was enjoying in preparing my poem of Siegfried’s Tod

for publication.

I wrote a short preface dedicating this poem to my friends as a relic

of the time when I had hoped to devote myself entirely to art, and

especially to the composition of music. I sent this manuscript to Herr

Wigand in Leipzig, who returned it to me after some time with the

remark, that if I insisted on its being printed in Latin characters he

would not be able to sell a single copy of it. Later on I discovered

that he deliberately refused to pay me the ten louis d’or due to me for

Das Kunstwerk der Zukunft, which I had directed him to send to my wife.

Disappointing as all this was, I was nevertheless unable to engage in

any further work, as only a few days after Karl’s arrival the realities

of life made themselves felt in an unexpected manner, most upsetting to

my tranquillity of mind. I received a wildly excited letter from Mme.

Laussot to tell me that she had not been able to resist telling her

mother of her intentions, that in so doing she had immediately aroused

the suspicion that I was to blame, and in consequence of this her

disclosure had been communicated to M. Laussot, who vowed he would

search everywhere for me in order to put a bullet through my body. The

situation was clear enough, and I decided to go to Bordeaux immediately

in order to come to an understanding with my opponent I at once wrote

fully to M. Eugene, endeavouring to make him see matters in their true

light, but at the same time declared myself incapable of understanding

how a man could bring himself to keep a woman with him by force, when

she no longer wished to remain. I ended by informing him that I should

reach Bordeaux at, the same time as my letter, and immediately upon my

arrival there would let him know at what hotel to find me; also that I

would not tell his wife of the step I was taking, and that he could

consequently act without restraint. I did not conceal from him, what

indeed was the fact, that I was undertaking this journey under great

difficulties, as under the circumstances I considered it impossible to

wait to have my passport endorsed by the French envoy. At the same time

I wrote a few lines to Mme. Laussot, exhorting her to be calm and

self-possessed, but, true to my purpose, refrained from even hinting at

any movement on my part. (When, years afterwards, I told Liszt this

story, he declared I had acted very stupidly in not, telling Mme.

Laussot of my intentions.) I took leave of Karl the same day, in order

to set out next morning from Geneva on my tedious journey across

France. But I was so exhausted by all this that I could not help

thinking I was going to die. That same night I wrote to Frau Ritter in

Dresden, to this effect, giving her a short account of the incredible

difficulties I had been drawn into. As a matter of fact, I suffered

great inconvenience at the French frontier on account of my passport; I

was made to give my exact place of destination, and it was only upon my

assuring them that pressing family affairs required my immediate

presence, that the authorities showed exceptional leniency and allowed

me to proceed.

I travelled by Lyons through Auvergne by stage-coach for three days and

two nights, till at length I reached Bordeaux. It was the middle of

May, and as I surveyed the town from a height at early dawn I saw it

lit up by a fire that had broken out. I alighted at the Hotel Quatre

Soeurs, and at once sent a note to M. Laussot, informing him that I

held myself at his disposal and would remain in all day to receive him.

It was nine o’clock in the morning when I sent him this message. I

waited in vain for an answer, till at last, late in the afternoon, I

received a summons from the police-station to present myself

immediately. There I was first of all asked whether my passport was in

order. I acknowledged the difficulty I found myself in with regard to

it, and explained that family matters had necessitated my placing

myself in this position.

I was thereupon informed that precisely this family matter, which had

no doubt brought me there, was the cause of their having to deny me the

permission to remain in Bordeaux any longer. In answer to my question,

they did not conceal the fact that these proceedings against me were

being carried out at the express wish of the family concerned. This

extraordinary revelation immediately restored my good-humour. I asked

the police inspector whether, after such a trying journey, I might not

be allowed a couple of days’ rest before returning; this request he

readily granted, and told me that in any case there could be no chance

of my meeting the family in question, as they had left Bordeaux at

mid-day. I used these two days to recover from my fatigue, and also

wrote a letter to Jessie, in which I told her exactly what had taken

place, without concealing my contempt at the behaviour of her husband,

who could expose his wife’s honour by a denunciation to the police. I

also added that our friendship could certainly not continue until she

had released herself from so humiliating a position. The next thing was

to get this letter safely delivered. The information furnished me by

the police officials was not sufficient to enlighten me as to what had

exactly taken place in the Laussot family, whether they had left home

for some length of time or merely for a day, so I simply made up my

mind to go to their house. I rang the bell and the door sprang open;

without meeting any one I walked up to the first-floor flat, the door

of which stood open, and went from room to room till I reached Jessie’s

boudoir, where I placed my letter in her work-basket and returned the

way I had come. I received no reply, and set out upon my return journey

as soon as the term of rest granted me had expired. The fine May

weather had a cheering effect upon me, and the clear water, as well as

the agreeable name of the Dordogne, along whose banks the post-chaise

travelled for some distance, gave me great pleasure.

I was also entertained by the conversation of two fellow-travellers, a

priest and an officer, about the necessity of putting an end to the

French Republic. The priest showed himself much more humane and

broad-minded than his military interlocutor, who could only repeat the

one refrain, ‘Il faut en finir.’ I now had a look at Lyons, and in a

walk round the town tried to recall the scenes in Lamartine’s Histoire

des Girondins, where he so vividly describes the siege and surrender of

the town during the period of the Convention Nationale. At last I

arrived at Geneva, and returned to the Byron hotel, where Karl Ritter

was awaiting me. During my absence he had heard from his family, who

wrote very kindly concerning me. His mother had at once reassured him

as to my condition, and pointed out that with people suffering from

nervous disorders the idea of approaching death was a frequent symptom,

and that there was consequently no occasion to feel anxious about me.

She also announced her intention of coming to visit us in Villeneuve

with her daughter Emilie in a few days’ time. This news made me take

heart again; this devoted family, so solicitous for my welfare, seemed

sent by Providence to lead me, as I so longed to be led, to a new life.

Both ladies arrived in time to celebrate my thirty-seventh birthday on

the twenty-second of May. The mother, Frau Julie, particularly made a

deep impression upon me. I had only met her once before in Dresden,

when Karl had invited me to be present at the performance of a

quartette of his own composition, given at his mother’s house. On this

occasion the respect and devotion shown me by each member of the family

had delighted me. The mother had hardly spoken to me, but when I was

leaving she was moved to tears as she thanked me for my visit. I was

unable to understand her emotion at the time, but now when I reminded

her of it she was surprised, and explained that she had felt so touched

at my unexpected kindness to her son.

She and her daughter remained with us about a week. We sought diversion

in excursions to the beautiful Valais, but did not succeed in

dispelling Frau Ritter’s sadness of heart, caused by the knowledge of

recent events of which she had now been informed, as well as by her

anxiety at the course my life was taking. As I afterwards learned, it

had cost the nervous, delicate woman a great effort to undertake this

journey, and when I urged her to leave her house to come and settle in

Switzerland with her family, so that we might all be united, she at

last pointed out to me that in proposing what seemed to her such an

eccentric undertaking, I was counting upon a strength and energy she no

longer possessed. For the present she commended her son, whom she

wished to leave with me, to my care, and gave me the necessary means to

keep us both for the time being. Regarding the state of her fortune,

she told me that her income was limited, and now that it was impossible

to accept any help from the Laussots, she did not know how she would be

able to come to my assistance sufficiently to assure my independence.

Deeply moved, we took leave of this venerable woman at the end of a

week, and she returned to Dresden with her daughter, and I never saw

her again.

Still bent upon discovering a means of disappearing from the world, I

thought of choosing a wild mountain spot where I could retire with

Karl. For this purpose we sought the lonely Visper Thal in the canton

Valais, and not without difficulty made our way along the impracticable

roads to Zermatt. There, at the foot of the colossal and beautiful

Matterhorn, we could indeed consider ourselves cut off from the outer

world. I tried to make things as comfortable as I could in this

primitive wilderness, but discovered only too soon that Karl could not

reconcile himself to his surroundings. Even on the second day he owned

that he thought it horrid, and suggested that it would be more pleasant

in the neighbourhood of one of the lakes. We studied the map of

Switzerland, and chose Thun for our next destination. Unfortunately I

again found myself reduced to a state of extreme nervous fatigue, in

which the slightest effort produced a profuse and weakening

perspiration. Only by the greatest strength of will was I able to make

my way out of the valley; but at last we reached Thun, and with renewed

courage engaged a couple of modest but cheerful rooms looking out on to

the road, and proposed to wait and see how we should like it. In spite

of the reserve which still betrayed his shyness of character, I found

conversation with my young friend always pleasant and enlivening. I now

realised the pitch of fluent and overflowing vivacity to which the

young man could attain, particularly at night before retiring to rest,

when he would squat down beside my bed, and in the agreeable, pure

dialect of the German Baltic provinces, give free expression to

whatever had excited his interest. I was exceedingly cheered during

these days by the perusal of the Odyssey, which I had not read for so

long and which had fallen into my hands by chance. Homer’s

long-suffering hero, always homesick yet condemned to perpetual

wandering, and always valiantly overcoming all difficulties, was

strangely sympathetic to me. Suddenly the peaceful state I had scarcely

yet entered upon was disturbed by a letter which Karl received from

Mme. Laussot. He did not know whether he ought to show it to me, as he

thought Jessie had gone mad. I tore it out of his hand, and found she

had written to say that she felt obliged to let my friend know that she

had been sufficiently enlightened about me to make her drop my

acquaintance entirely. I afterwards discovered, chiefly through the

help of Frau Ritter, that in consequence of my letter and my arrival in

Bordeaux, M. Laussot, together with Mrs. Taylor, had immediately taken

Jessie to the country, intending to remain there until the news was

received of my departure, to accelerate which he had applied to the

police authorities. While they were away, and without telling her of my

letter and my journey, they had obtained a promise from the young woman

to remain quiet for a year, give up her visit to Dresden, and, above

all, to drop all correspondence with me; since, under these conditions,

she was promised her entire freedom at the end of that time, she had

thought it better to give her word. Not content with this, however, the

two conspirators had immediately set about calumniating me on all

sides, and finally to Mme. Laussot herself, saying that I was the

initiator of this plan of elopement. Mrs. Taylor had written to my wife

complaining of my intention to commit adultery, at the same time

expressing her pity for her and offering her support; the unfortunate

Minna, who now thought she had found a hitherto unsuspected reason for

my resolve to remain separated from her, wrote back complaining of me

to Mrs. Taylor. The meaning of an innocent remark I had once made had

been strangely misinterpreted, and matters wore now aggravated by

making it appear as though I had intentionally lied. In the course of

playful conversation Jessie had once told me that she belonged to no

recognised form of religion, her father Having teen a member of a

certain sect which did not baptise either according to the Protestant

or the Roman Catholic ritual; whereupon I had comforted her by assuring

her that I had come in contact with much more questionable sects, as

shortly after my marriage in Königsberg I had learned that it had been

solemnised by a hypocrite. God alone knows in what form this had been

repeated to the worthy British matron, but, at all events, she told my

wife that I had said I was ‘not legally married to her.’ In any case,

my wife’s answer to this had no doubt furnished further material with

which to poison Jessie’s mind against me, and this letter to my young

friend was the result. I must admit that, seen by this light, the

circumstance at which I felt most indignant was the way my wife had

been treated, and while I was perfectly indifferent as to what the rest

of the party thought of me, I immediately accepted Karl’s offer to go

to Zürich and see her, so as to give her the explanation necessary to

her peace of mind. While awaiting his return, I received a letter from

Liszt, telling me of the deep impression made upon him by my Lohengrin

score, which had caused him to make up his mind as to the future in

store for me. He at the same time announced that, as I had given him

the permission to do so, he intended doing all in his power to bring

about the production of my opera at the forthcoming Herder festival in

Weimar. About this time I also heard from Frau Ritter, who, in

consequence of events of which she was well aware, thought herself

called upon to beg me not to take the matter too much to heart. At this

moment Karl also returned from Zürich, and spoke with great warmth of

my wife’s attitude. Not having found me in Paris, she had pulled

herself together with remarkable energy, and in pursuance of an earlier

wish of mine, had rented a house on the lake of Zürich, installed

herself comfortably, and remained there in the hope of at last hearing

from me again. Besides this, he had much to tell me of Sulzer’s good

sense and friendliness, the latter having stood by, my wife and shown

her great sympathy. In the midst of his narrative Karl suddenly

exclaimed, ‘Ah! these could be called sensible people; but with such a

mad Englishwoman nothing could be done.’ To all this I said not a word,

but finally with a smile asked him whether he would like to go over to

Zürich? He sprang up exclaiming, ‘Yes, and as soon as possible.’ ‘You

shall have your way,’ said I; ‘let us pack. I can see no sense in

anything either here or there.’ Without breathing another syllable

about all that had happened, we left the next day for Zürich.