diff options
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 3 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-8.txt | 2969 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-8.zip | bin | 0 -> 65279 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h.zip | bin | 0 -> 1005619 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/18138-h.htm | 3774 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-006.jpg | bin | 0 -> 41813 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-016.jpg | bin | 0 -> 34262 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-022.jpg | bin | 0 -> 37060 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-028.jpg | bin | 0 -> 36351 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-040.jpg | bin | 0 -> 56132 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-048.jpg | bin | 0 -> 34408 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-054.jpg | bin | 0 -> 45258 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-058.jpg | bin | 0 -> 44472 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-064.jpg | bin | 0 -> 36368 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-080.jpg | bin | 0 -> 34103 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-086.jpg | bin | 0 -> 44581 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-094.jpg | bin | 0 -> 25235 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-098.jpg | bin | 0 -> 34227 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-106.jpg | bin | 0 -> 45670 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-110.jpg | bin | 0 -> 48873 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-116.jpg | bin | 0 -> 37585 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-120.jpg | bin | 0 -> 46134 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-124.jpg | bin | 0 -> 30986 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-130.jpg | bin | 0 -> 42106 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-140.jpg | bin | 0 -> 39856 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-146.jpg | bin | 0 -> 26084 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-152.jpg | bin | 0 -> 36475 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-156.jpg | bin | 0 -> 66713 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138-h/images/img-front.jpg | bin | 0 -> 10414 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138.txt | 2969 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18138.zip | bin | 0 -> 65218 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 |
33 files changed, 9728 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/18138-8.txt b/18138-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8d188e9 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2969 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Loves of Great Composers, by Gustav Kobbé + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Loves of Great Composers + + +Author: Gustav Kobbé + + + +Release Date: April 10, 2006 [eBook #18138] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LOVES OF GREAT COMPOSERS*** + + +E-text prepared by Al Haines + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustrations. + See 18138-h.htm or 18138-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/1/3/18138/18138-h/18138-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/1/3/18138/18138-h.zip) + + + + + +THE LOVES OF GREAT COMPOSERS + +by + +GUSTAV KOBBÉ + + + + + + + +[Frontispiece: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (photogravure)] + + + + + +Thomas Y. Crowell & Co. +New York +Copyright, 1904 and 1905 +By The Butterick Publishing Co. (Limited) +Copyright, 1905, by Thomas Y. Crowell & Co. +Published September, 1905 +Composition and electrotype plates by +D. B. Updike, The Merrymount Press, Boston + + + + + +To Charles Dwyer + + + + +Table of Contents + + + Mozart and his Constance + + Beethoven and his "Immortal Beloved" + + Mendelssohn and his Cécile + + Chopin and the Countess Delphine Potocka + + The Schumanns: Robert and Clara + + Franz Liszt and his Carolyne + + Wagner and Cosima + + + + +List of Illustrations + + + Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (photogravure) . . . . Frontispiece + + Mozart at the Age of Eleven + + Constance, Wife of Mozart + + Ludwig van Beethoven + + Countess Therese von Brunswick + + "Beethoven at Heiligenstadt" + + Félix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy + + Fanny Hensel, Sister of Mendelssohn + + Cécile, Wife of Mendelssohn + + The Mendelssohn Monument in Leipsic + + Frédéric Chopin [missing from book] + + Countess Potocka + + The Death of Chopin + + Robert Schumann + + Robert and Clara Schumann, in 1847 + + Clara Schumann at the Piano + + The Schumann Monument in the Bonn Cemetery + + Franz Liszt + + Liszt at the Piano + + The Princess Carolyne, in her Latter Years at Rome + + The Altenburg, Weimar, where Liszt and Carolyne lived + + Richard Wagner + + Cosima, Wife of Wagner + + Richard and Cosima Wagner + + Richard and Cosima Wagner entertaining in their Home + Wahnfried, Liszt and Hans von Wolzogen + + + + +Mozart and His Constance + + +Nearly eight years after Mozart's death his widow, in response to a +request from a famous publishing house for relics of the composer, +sent, among other Mozartiana, a packet of letters written to her by her +husband. In transmitting these she wrote: + +"Especially characteristic is his great love for me, which breathes +through all the letters. Is it not true--those from the last year of +his life are just as tender as those written during the first year of +our marriage?" She added that she would like to have this fact +especially mentioned "to his honor" in any biography in which the data +she sent were to be used. This request was not prompted by vanity, but +by a just pride in the love her husband had borne her and which she +still cherished. The love of his Constance was the solace of Mozart's +life. + +The wonder-child, born in Salzburg in 1756, and taken by his father +from court to court, where he and his sister played to admiring +audiences, did not, like so many wonder-children, fade from public +view, but with manhood fulfilled the promise of his early years and +became one of the world's great masters of music. But his genius was +not appreciated until too late. The world of to-day sees in Mozart the +type of the brilliant, careless Bohemian, whom it loves to associate +with art, and long since has taken him to its heart. But the world of +his own day, when he asked for bread, offered him a stone. + +Mozart died young; he was only thirty-five. His sufferings were +crowded into a few years, but throughout these years there stood by his +side one whose love soothed his trials and brightened his life,--the +Constance whom he adored. What she wrote to the publishers was +strictly true. His last letters to her breathed a love as fervent as +the first. + +Some six months before he died, she was obliged to go to Baden for her +health. "You hardly will believe," he writes to her, "how heavily time +hangs on my hands without you. I cannot exactly explain my feelings. +There is a void that pains me; a certain longing that cannot be +satisfied, hence never ceases, continues ever, aye, grows from day to +day. When I think how happy and childlike we would be together in +Baden and what sad, tedious hours I pass here! I take no pleasure in +my work, because I cannot break it off now and then for a few words +with you, as I am accustomed to. When I go to the piano and sing +something from the opera ["The Magic Flute"], I have to stop right +away, it affects me so. _Basta_!--if this very hour I could see my way +clear to you, the next hour wouldn't find me here." In another letter +written at this time he kisses her "in thought two thousand times." + +When Mozart first met Constance, she was too young to attract his +notice. He had stopped at Mannheim on his way to Paris, whither he was +going with his mother on a concert tour. Requiring the services of a +music copyist, he was recommended to Fridolin Weber, who eked out a +livelihood by copying music and by acting as prompter at the theatre. +His brother was the father of Weber, the famous composer, and his own +family, which consisted of four daughters, was musical. Mozart's visit +to Mannheim occurred in 1777, when Constance Weber was only fourteen. + +[Illustration: Mozart at the age of eleven. From a painting by Van der +Smissen in the Mozarteum, Salzburg.] + +Of her two older sisters the second, Aloysia, had a beautiful voice and +no mean looks, and the young genius was greatly taken with her from the +first. He induced his mother to linger in Mannheim much longer than +was necessary. Aloysia became his pupil; and under his tuition her +voice improved wonderfully. She achieved brilliant success in public, +and her father, delighted, watched with pleasure the sentimental +attachment that was springing up between her and Mozart. Meanwhile +Leopold Mozart was in Salzburg wondering why his wife and son were so +long delaying their further journey to Paris. + +When he received from Wolfgang letters full of enthusiasm over his +pupil, coupled with a proposal that instead of going to Paris, he and +his mother should change their destination to Italy and take the Weber +family along, in order that Aloysia might further develop her talents +there, he got an inkling of the true state of affairs and was furious. +He had large plans for his son, knew Weber to be shiftless and the +family poor, and concluded that, for their own advantage, they were +endeavoring to trap Wolfgang into a matrimonial alliance. Peremptory +letters sent wife and son on their way to Paris, and the elder Mozart +was greatly relieved when he knew them safely beyond the confines of +Mannheim. + +Mozart's stay in Paris was tragically brought to an end by his mother's +death. He set out for his return to Salzburg, intending, however, to +stop at Mannheim, for he still remembered Aloysia affectionately. +Finding that the Weber family had moved to Munich, he went there. But +as soon as he came into the presence of the beautiful young singer her +manner showed that her feelings toward him had cooled. Thereupon, his +ardor was likewise chilled, and he continued on his way to Salzburg, +where he arrived, much to his father's relief, still "unattached." + +When Mozart departed from Munich, he probably thought that he was +leaving behind him forever, not only the fickle Aloysia, but the rest +of the Weber family as well. How slight our premonition of fate! For, +if ever the inscrutable ways of Providence brought two people together, +those two were Mozart and Constance Weber. Nor was Aloysia without +further influence on his career. She married an actor named Lange, +with whom she went to Vienna, where she became a singer at the opera. +There Mozart composed for her the rôle of Constance in his opera, "The +Elopement from the Seraglio." For the eldest Weber girl, Josepha, who +had a high, flexible soprano, he wrote one of his most brilliant rôles, +that of the Queen of the Night in "The Magic Flute." I am anticipating +somewhat in the order of events that I may correct an erroneous +impression regarding Mozart's marriage, which I find frequently +obtains. He composed the rôle of Constance for Aloysia shortly before +he married the real Constance; and this has led many people to believe +that he took the younger sister out of pique, because he had been +rejected by Aloysia. Whoever believes this has a very superficial +acquaintance with Mozart's biography. Five years had passed since he +had parted from Aloysia at Munich. The youthful affair had blown over; +and when they met again in Vienna she was Frau Lange. Mozart's +marriage with Constance was a genuine love-match. It was bitterly +opposed by his father, who never became wholly reconciled to the woman +of his son's choice, and met with no favor from her mother. Fridolin +Weber had died. Altogether the omens were unfavorable, and there were +obstacles enough to have discouraged any but the most ardent couple. +So much for the pique story. + +Mozart went to Vienna in 1781 with the Archbishop of Salzburg, by whom, +however, he was treated with such indignity that he left his service. +Whom should he find in Vienna but his old friends the Webers! Frau +Weber was glad enough of the opportunity to let lodgings to Mozart, +for, as in Mannheim and Munich, the family was in straitened +circumstances. As soon as the composer's father heard of this +arrangement, he began to expostulate. Finally Mozart changed his +lodgings; but this step had the very opposite effect hoped for by +Leopold Mozart, for separation only increased the love that had sprung +up between the young people since they had met again in Vienna, and +Mozart had found the little fourteen-year-old girl of his Mannheim +visit grown to young womanhood. + +There seems little doubt that the Webers, with the exception of +Constance, were a shiftless lot. They had drifted from place to place +and had finally come to Vienna, because Aloysia had moved there with +her husband. When Mozart finally decided to marry Constance, come what +might, he wrote his father a letter which shows that his eyes were wide +open to the faults of the family, and by the calm, almost judicial, +manner in which he refers to the virtues of his future wife, that his +was no hastily formed attachment, based merely on superficial +attractions. + +He does not spare the family in his analysis of their traits. If he +seems ungallant in his references to his future Queen of the Night and +to the prima donna of his "Elopement from the Seraglio," to say nothing +of his former attachment for her, one must remember that this is a +letter from a son to a father, in which frankness is permissible. He +admits the intemperance and shrewishness of the mother; characterizes +Josepha as lazy and vulgar; calls Aloysia a malicious person and +coquette; dismisses the youngest, Sophie, as too young to be anything +but simply a good though thoughtless creature. Surely not an +attractive picture and not a family one would enter lightly. + +What drew him to Constance? Let him answer that question himself. +"But the middle one, my good, dear Constance," he writes to his father, +"is a martyr among them, and for that reason, perhaps, the best +hearted, cleverest, and, in a word, the best among them. . . . She is +neither homely nor beautiful. Her whole beauty lies in two small, dark +eyes and in a fine figure. She is not brilliant, but has common sense +enough to perform her duties as wife and mother. She is not +extravagant; on the contrary, she is accustomed to go poorly dressed, +because what little her mother can do for her children she does for the +others, but never for her. It is true that she would like to be +tastefully and becomingly dressed, but never expensively; and most of +the things a woman needs she can make for herself. She does her own +coiffure every day [head-dress must have been something appalling in +those days]; understands housekeeping; has the best disposition in the +world. We love each other with all our hearts. Tell me if I could ask +a better wife for myself?" + +The letter is so touchingly frank and simple that whoever reads it must +feel that the portrait Mozart draws of his Constance is absolutely true +to life. He makes no attempt to paint her as a paragon of beauty and +intellect. It is a picture of the neglected member of a +household--neglected because of her homely virtues, the one fair flower +blooming in the dark crevice of this shiftless menage. And at the end +of the letter is the one cry which, since the world was young, has +defied and brought to naught the doubting counsels of wiser heads: "We +love each other with all our hearts." + +The elder Mozart, fearful for his son's future, had kept himself +informed of what was going on in Vienna. He knew that when his son's +attentions to Constance became marked, her guardian had compelled him +to sign a promise of marriage. In this the father again saw a trap +laid for his son, who in worldly matters was as unversed as a child. +But Leopold Mozart did not know how the episode ended, and little +suspected that future generations would see in it one of the most +charming incidents in the love affairs of great men. For, when her +guardian had left the house, Constance asked her mother for the paper, +and as soon as she had it in her hands, tore it up, exclaiming: "Dear +Mozart, I do not need a written promise from you. I trust your words." + +Frau Weber saw in Mozart, the suitor, a possible contributor to the +household expenses, and as soon as she learned that he and Constance +intended to set up for themselves, she became bitterly opposed to the +match. Finally a titled lady, Baroness von Waldstadter, took the young +people under her protection, and Constance went to live with her to +escape her mother's nagging. Frau Weber then planned to force her +daughter to return to her by legal process. Immediate marriage was the +only method of escape from the scandal this would entail; and so, +August 4, 1782, Mozart and his Constance were married in the Church of +St. Stephen, Vienna. When at last they had all obstacles behind them +and stood at the altar as one, they were so overcome by their feelings +that they began to cry; and the few bystanders, including the priest, +were so deeply affected by their happiness that they too were moved to +tears. + +[Illustration: Constance, wife of Mozart. From an engraving by Nissen.] + +Although poor, Mozart, through his music, had become acquainted with +titled personages and was known at court. He and Constance, shortly +after their wedding, were walking in the Prater with their pet dog. To +make the dog bark, Mozart playfully pretended to strike Constance with +his cane. At that moment the Emperor, chancing to come out of a summer +house and seeing Mozart's action, which he misinterpreted, began +chiding him for abusing his wife so shortly after they had been +married. When his mistake was explained to him, he was highly amused. +Later he could not fail to hear of the couple's devotion. "Vienna was +witness to these relations," wrote a contemporary of Mozart's and +Constance's love for each other; and when Aloysia and her husband +quarrelled and separated, the Emperor, meeting Constance and referring +to her sister's troubles, said, "What a difference it makes to have a +good husband." + +In spite of poverty and its attendant struggles, Mozart's marriage was +a happy one, because it was a marriage of love. Like every child of +genius, he had his moods, but Constance adapted herself to them and +thereby won his confidence and gained an influence over him which, +however, she brought into play only when the occasion demanded. When +he was thinking out a work, he was absent-minded, and at such times she +always was ready to humor him, and even cut his meat for him at table, +as he was apt during such periods of abstraction to injure himself. +But when he had a composition well in mind, to put it on paper seemed +little more to him than copying; and then he loved to have her sit by +him and tell him stories--yes, regular fairy tales and children's +stories, as if he himself still were a child. He would write and +listen, drop his pen and laugh, and then go on with work again. The +day before the first performance of "Don Giovanni," when the final +rehearsal already had been held, the overture still remained unwritten. +It had to be written overnight, and it was she who sat by him and +relieved the rush and strain of work with her cheerful prattle. It is +said that, among other things, she read to him the story of "Aladdin +and the Wonderful Lamp." Be that as it may;--she rubbed the lamp, and +the overture to "Don Giovanni" appeared. + +Would that their life could be portrayed in a series of such charming +pictures! but grinding poverty was there also, and the bitterness of +disappointed hopes. His sensitive nature could not withstand the +repeated material shocks to which it was subjected. And the pity is, +that it gave way just when there seemed a prospect of a change. "The +Magic Flute" had been produced with great success, and that in the face +of relentless opposition from envious rivals; and orders from new +sources and on better terms were coming to him. But the turn of the +tide was too late. When he received an order for a Requiem from a +person who wished his identity to remain unknown--he was subsequently +discovered to be a nobleman, who wanted to produce the work as his +own--Mozart already felt the hand of death upon him and declared that +he was composing the Requiem for his own obsequies. Even after he was +obliged to take to his bed, he worked at it, saying it was to be _his_ +Requiem and must be ready in time. The afternoon before he died, he +went over the completed portions with three friends, and at the +Lachrymosa burst into tears. In the evening he lost consciousness, and +early the following morning, December 5, 1791, he passed away. The +immediate cause of death was rheumatic fever with typhoid +complications, and his distracted widow, hoping to catch the same +disease and be carried away by it, threw herself upon his bed. She was +too prostrated to attend his funeral, which, be it said to the shame of +his friends, was a shabby affair. The day was stormy, and after the +service indoors they left before the actual burial, which was in one of +the "common graves," holding ten or twelve bodies and intended to be +worked over every few years for new interments. When, as soon as +Constance was strong enough, she visited the cemetery there was a new +grave-digger, who upon being questioned could not locate her husband's +grave, and to this day Mozart's last resting-place is unknown. + +It must not be reckoned against Constance that, eighteen years after +Mozart's death, she married again. For she did not forget the man on +whom her heart first was set. Her second husband, Nissen, formerly +Danish chargé d'affaires in Vienna, is best known by the biography of +Mozart which he wrote under her guidance. They removed to Mozart's +birthplace, Salzburg, where Nissen died in 1826. Constance's death was +strangely associated with Mozart's memory. It was as if in her last +moments she must go back to him who was her first love. For she died +in Salzburg, on March 6, 1842, a few hours after the model for the +Mozart monument, which adorns one of the spacious squares of the city +where the composer was born, was received there. She had been the +life-love of a child of genius and, without being singularly gifted +herself, had understood how to humor his whims and adapt herself to his +moods in which sunshine often was succeeded by shadow. It was +singularly appropriate that, surviving him many years, she yet died +under circumstances which formed a new link between her and his memory. + + + + +Beethoven and his "Immortal Beloved" + +One day when Baron Spaun, an old Viennese character and a friend of +Beethoven's, entered the composer's lodgings, he found the man, every +line of whose face denoted, above all else, strength of character, +bending over a portrait of a woman and weeping, as he muttered, "You +were too good, too angelic!" A moment later, he had thrust the +portrait into an old chest and, with a toss of his well-set head, was +his usual self again. + +As Spaun was leaving, he said to the composer, "There is nothing evil +in your face to-day, old fellow." + +"My good angel appeared to me this morning," was Beethoven's reply. + +[Illustration: Ludwig van Beethoven] + +After the composer's death, in 1827, the portrait was found in the old +chest, and also a letter, in his handwriting and evidently written to a +woman, whose name, however, was not given, but who was addressed by +Beethoven as his "Immortal Beloved." The letter was regarded as a +great find, and biographer after biographer has stated that it must +have been written to the Countess Giulietta Guicciardi, to whom he +dedicated the famous "Moonlight Sonata." There was, however, one +woman, who survived Beethoven more than thirty years, and who, during +that weary stretch of time, knew whose was the portrait that had been +found in the old chest and the identity of the woman who had returned +to him the letter addressed to his "Immortal Beloved," after the +strange severance of relations which both had continued to hold sacred. +But she suffered in silence, and never even knew what had become of the +picture. + +This precious picture, which Beethoven had held in his hands and wetted +with his tears, passed, with his death, into the possession of his +brother Carl's widow. No one knew who it was, or took any interest in +it. In 1863 a Viennese musician, Joseph Hellmesberger, succeeded in +having Beethoven's remains transferred to a metallic casket, and the +Beethoven family, in recognition of his efforts, made him a present of +the portrait. Later it was acquired by the Beethoven Museum, in Bonn, +where the master was born in 1772. There it hangs beside his own +portrait, and on the back still can be read the inscription, in a +feminine hand: + +"_To the rare genius, the great artist, and the good man, from T. B._" + +Who was "T. B."? If some one who had recently seen the Bonn portrait +should chance to visit the National Museum in Budapest, he would come +upon the bust of a woman whose features seemed familiar to him. They +would grow upon him as those of the woman with the yellow shawl over +her light-brown hair, a drapery of red on her shoulders and fastened at +her throat, who had looked out at him from the Bonn portrait. The +bust, made at a more advanced age, he would find had been placed in the +museum in honor of the woman who founded the first home for friendless +children in the Austrian Empire; and her name? Countess Therese +Brunswick. She was Beethoven's "Immortal Beloved." "T. B."--Therese +Brunswick. She was the woman who knew that the portrait found in the +old chest was hers; and that the letter had been received by her +shortly after her secret betrothal to Beethoven, and returned by her to +him when he broke the engagement because he loved her too deeply to +link her life to his. + +[Illustration: Countess Therese von Brunswick. From the portrait by +Ritter von Lampir in the Beethoven-Haus at Bonn. Redrawn by Reich.] + +The tragedy of their romance lay in its non-fulfilment. Beethoven was +a man of noble nature, yet what had he to offer her in return for her +love? His own love, it is true. But he was uncouth, stricken with +deafness, and had many of the "bad moments" of genius. He foresaw +unhappiness for both, and, to spare her, took upon himself the great +act of renunciation. We need only recall him weeping over the picture +of his Therese. And Therese? To her dying day she treasured his +memory. Very few shared her secret. Her brother Franz, Beethoven's +intimate friend, knew it. Baron Spaun also divined the cause of his +melancholy. Some years after the composer's death, Countess Therese +Brunswick conceived a great liking for a young girl, Miriam Tenger, +whom she had taken under her care for a short period, until a suitable +school was selected for her in Vienna. When the time for parting came, +Miriam burst into tears and clung to the Countess's hand. + +"Child! Child!" exclaimed the lady, "do you really love me so deeply?" + +"I love you, I love you so," sobbed the child, "that I could die for +you." + +The Countess placed her hand on the girl's head. "My child," she said, +"when you have grown older and wiser, you will understand what I mean +when I say that to _live_ for those we love shows a far greater love, +because it requires so much more courage. But while you are in Vienna, +there is one favor you can do me, which my heart will consider a great +one. On the twenty-seventh of every March go to the Wahringer Cemetery +and lay a wreath of immortelles on Beethoven's grave." + +When, true to her promise, the girl went with her school principal to +the cemetery, they found a man bending over the grave and placing +flowers upon it. He looked up as they approached. + +"The child comes at the request of the Countess Therese Brunswick," +explained the principal. + +"The Countess Therese Brunswick! Immortelles upon this grave are fit +from her alone." The speaker was Beethoven's faithful friend, Baron +Spaun. + +In 1860, when the leaves of thirty-three autumns had fallen upon the +composer's grave and the Countess had gone to her last resting-place, a +voice, like an echo from a dead past, linked the names of Beethoven and +the woman he had loved. There was at that time in Germany a virtuosa, +Frau Hebenstreit, who when a young girl had been a pupil of Beethoven's +friend, the violinist Schuppanzigh. At a musical, in the year +mentioned, she had just taken part in a performance of the third +"Leonore" overture, when, as if moved to speak by the beauty of the +music, she suddenly said: "Only think of it! Just as a person sits to +a painter for a portrait, Countess Therese Brunswick was the model for +Beethoven's Leonore. What a debt the world owes her for it!" After a +pause she went on: + +"Beethoven never would have dared marry without money, and a countess, +too--and so refined, and delicate enough to blow away. And he--an +angel and a demon in one! What would have become of them both, and of +his genius with him?" So far as I have been able to discover, this was +the first even semi-public linking of the two names. + +Yet all these years there was one person who knew the secret--the woman +who as a school-girl had placed the wreath of immortelles on +Beethoven's grave for her much-loved Countess Therese Brunswick. +Through this act of devotion Miriam Tenger seemed to become to the +Countess a tie that stretched back to her past, and though they saw +each other only at long intervals, Miriam's presence awakened anew the +old memories in the Countess's heart, and from her she heard piecemeal, +and with pauses of years between, the story of hers and Beethoven's +romance. + +Therese was the daughter of a noble house. Beethoven was welcome both +as teacher and guest in the most aristocratic circles of Vienna. The +noble men and women who figure in the dedications of his works were +friends, not merely patrons. Despite his uncouth manners and +appearance, his genius, up to the point at least when it took its +highest flights in the "Ninth Symphony" and the last quartets, was +appreciated; and he was a figure in Viennese society. The Brunswick +house was one of many that were open to him. The Brunswicks were art +lovers. Franz, the son of the house, was the composer's intimate +friend. The mother had all possible graciousness and charm, but with +it also a passionate pride in her family and her rank, a hauteur that +would have caused her to regard an alliance between Therese and +Beethoven as monstrous. Therese was an exceptional woman. She had an +oval, classic face, a lovely disposition, a pure heart and a finely +cultivated mind. The German painter, Peter Cornelius, said of her that +any one who spoke with her felt elevated and ennobled. The family was +of the right mettle. The Countess Blanka Teleki, who was condemned to +death for complicity in the Hungarian uprising of 1848, but whose +sentence was commuted to life imprisonment--she finally was released in +1858,--was Therese's niece, and is said to have borne a striking +likeness to her. It may be mentioned that Giulietta Guicciardi, of the +"Moonlight Sonata," was Therese's cousin. There seems no doubt that +the composer was attracted to Giulietta before he fell in love with his +"Immortal Beloved." That is why his biographers were so ready to +believe that the letter was addressed to the lady with the romantic +name and identified with one of his most romantic works. + +Therese herself told Miriam that one day Giulietta, who had become the +affianced of Count Gallenberg, rushed into her room, threw herself at +her feet like a "stage princess," and cried out: "Counsel me, cold, +wise one! I long to give Gallenberg his congé and marry the +wonderfully ugly, beautiful Beethoven, if--if only it did not involve +lowering myself socially." Therese, who worshipped the composer's +genius and already loved him secretly, turned the subject off, fearful +lest she should say, in her indignation at the young woman who thought +she would be lowering herself by marrying Beethoven, something that +might lead to an irreparable breach. "Moonlight Sonata," or no +"Moonlight Sonata," there are two greater works by the same genius that +bear the Brunswick name,--the "Appassionata," dedicated to Count Franz +Brunswick, and the sonata in F-sharp major, Opus 78, dedicated to +Therese, and far worthier of her chaste beauty and intellect than the +"Moonlight." + +It will be noticed that Giulietta called Therese the "cold, wise one." +Her purity led her own mother to speak other as an "anchoress." Yet it +was she who from the time she was fifteen years old to the day of her +death cherished the great composer in her heart; and of her love for +him were the mementos that he sacredly guarded. When Therese was +fifteen years old she became Beethoven's pupil. The lessons were +severe. Yet beneath the rough exterior she recognized the heart of a +nobleman. The "cold, wise one," the "anchoress," fell in love with him +soon after the lessons began, but carefully hid her feelings from every +one. There is a charming anecdote of the early acquaintance of the +composer and Therese. + +The children of the house of Brunswick were carefully brought up. +During the music lessons the mother was accustomed to sit in an +adjoining room with the door between open. One bitterly cold winter +day Beethoven arrived at the appointed hour. Therese had practised +diligently, but the work was difficult and, in addition, she was +nervous. As a result she began too fast, became disconcerted when +Beethoven gruffly called out "_Tempo!_" and made mistake after mistake, +until the master, irritated beyond endurance, rushed from the room and +the house in such a hurry that he forgot his overcoat and muffler. In +a moment Therese had picked up these, reached the door and was out in +the street with them, when the butler overtook her, relieved her of +them and hurried after the composer's retreating figure. + +When the girl entered the doorway again, she came face to face with her +mother, who, fortunately, had not seen her in the street, but who was +scandalized that a daughter of the house of Brunswick should so far +have forgotten herself and her dignity as to have run after a man even +if only to the front door, and with his overcoat and muffler. "He +might have caught cold and died," gasped Therese, in answer to her +mother's remonstrance. What would the mother have said had she known +that her daughter actually had run out into the street, and had been +prevented from following Beethoven until she overtook him only by the +butler's timely action! + +Therese's brother Franz was devoted to her. As a boy he had taken his +other sister (afterward Blanka Teleki's mother) out in a boat on the +"Mediterranean," one of the ponds at Montonvasar, the Brunswick country +estate. The boat upset. Therese, who was watching them from the bank, +rushed in and hauled them out. Franz was asked if he had been +frightened. "No," he answered, "I saw my good angel coming." + +When he became intimate with Beethoven, he told the composer about this +incident, and also how, after that stormy music lesson, Therese had +started to overtake him with his coat and muffler. Knowing what a +lonely, unhappy existence the composer led, he could not help adding +that life would be very different if he had a good angel to watch over +him, such as he had in his sister. + +Franz little knew that his words fell upon Beethoven like seed on eager +soil. From that time on he looked at Therese with different eyes. His +own love soon taught him to know that he was loved in return. No +pledge had yet passed between them when, in May, 1806, he went to +Montonvasar on a visit; but one evening there, when Therese was +standing at the piano listening to him play, he softly intoned Bach's-- + + "Would you your true heart show me, + Begin it secretly, + For all the love you trow me, + Let none the wiser be. + Our love, great beyond measure, + To none must we impart; + So, lock our rarest treasure + Securely in your heart." + +Next morning they met in the park. He told her that at last he had +discovered in her the model for his Leonore, the heroine of his opera +"Fidelio." "And so we found each other"--these were the simple words +with which, many years later, Therese concluded the narrative of her +betrothal with Beethoven to Miriam Tenger. + +The engagement had to be kept a secret. Had it become known, it would +have ended in his immediate dismissal by the Countess' mother. In only +one person was confidence reposed, Franz, the devoted brother and +treasured friend. Therese's income was small, and Franz, knowing the +opposition with which the proposed match would meet, pointed out to +Beethoven that it would be necessary for him to secure a settled +position and income before the engagement could be published and the +marriage take place. The composer himself saw the justice of this, and +assented. + +[Illustration: "Beethoven at Heiligenstadt." From the painting by Carl +Schmidt.] + +Early in July Beethoven left Montonvasar for Furen, a health resort on +the Plattensee, which he reached after a hard trip. Fatigued, grieving +over the first parting from Therese, and downcast over his uncertain +future, he there wrote the letter to his "Immortal Beloved," which is +now one of the treasures of the Berlin Library. It is a long letter, +much too long to be given here in full, written for the most part in +ejaculatory phrases, and curiously alternating between love, despair, +courage and hopefulness and commonplace, everyday affairs. Nor will +space permit me to tell how Alexander W. Thayer, an American, who spent +a great part of his life and means in gathering detailed and authentic +data for a Beethoven biography,--which, however, he did not live to +finish,--worked out the year in which this letter was written +(Beethoven gave only the day of the month); showed that it must be +1806; proved further that it could not have been intended for Giulietta +Guicciardi, yet did not venture to state that Countess Therese +Brunswick was the undoubted recipient. Afterward, I believe, he heard +of Miriam Tenger, entered into correspondence with her, and the letters +doubtless will be found among his papers; but he did not live to make +use of the information. + +One of the reasons why the identity of the recipient of Beethoven's +letter remained so long unknown was that he did not address her by +name. The letter begins: "My angel, my all, myself!" In order to +secure a fixed position, Beethoven had decided to try Prussia and even +England, and this intention he refers to when, after apostrophizing +Therese as his "immortal beloved," he writes these burning words: + +"Yes, I have decided to toss abroad so long, until I can fly to your +arms and call myself at home with you, and let my soul, enveloped in +your love, wander through the kingdom of spirits." The letter has this +exclamatory postscript: + + "Eternally yours! + Eternally mine! + Eternally one another's!" + +The engagement lasted until 1810, four years, when the letters, which +through Franz's aid had passed between Beethoven and Therese, were +returned. Therese, however, always treasured as one of her "jewels" a +sprig of immortelle fastened with a ribbon to a bit of paper, the +ribbon fading with passing years, the paper growing yellow, but still +showing the words: "_L'Immortelle à son Immortelle--Luigi_." + +It had been Beethoven's custom to enclose a sprig of immortelle in +nearly every letter he sent her, and all these sprigs she kept in her +desk many, many years. She made a white silken pillow of the flowers; +and, when death came at last, she was laid at rest, her head cushioned +on the mementos of the man she had loved. + + + + +Mendelssohn and his Cécile + +Mendelssohn was a popular idol. On his death the mournful news was +placarded all over Leipsic, where he had made his home, and there was +an immense funeral procession. When the church service was over, a +woman in deep mourning was led to the bier, and sinking down beside it, +remained long in prayer. It was Cécile taking her last farewell of +Felix. + +Mendelssohn was born under a lucky star. The pathways of most musical +geniuses are covered with thorns; his was strewn with roses. The +Mendelssohn family, originally Jewish, was well-to-do and highly +refined, and Felix's grandfather was a philosophical writer of some +note. This inspired the oft-quoted _mot_ of the musician's father: +"Once I was known as the son of the famous Mendelssohn; now I am known +as the father of the famous Mendelssohn." + +Felix was an amazingly clever, fascinating boy. Coincident with his +musical gifts he had a talent for art. Goethe was captivated by him, +and the many distinguished friends of the Mendelssohn house in Berlin +adored him. This house was a gathering place of artists, musicians, +literary men and scientists; his genius had the stimulus found in the +"atmosphere" of such a household. There was one member of that +household between whom and himself the most tender relations +existed,--his sister Fanny, who became the wife of Hensel, the artist. +The musical tastes of Felix and Fanny were alike: she was the +confidante of his ambitions, and thus was created between them an +artistic sympathy, which from childhood greatly strengthened the family +bond. Growing up amid love and devotion, to say nothing of the +admiration accorded his genius in the home circle, with tastes, +naturally refined, cultivated to the utmost both by education and +absorption, he was apt to be most fastidious in the choice of a wife. +Fastidiousness in everything was, in fact, one of his traits. One has +but to recall how, one after another, he rejected the subjects that +were offered him for operatic composition. "I am afraid," said his +father, who was quite anxious to see his famous son properly settled in +life, "that Felix's censoriousness will prevent his getting a wife as +well as a libretto." + +[Illustration: Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy.] + +It may have been a regretful feeling that he had disappointed his +father by not marrying which led him, after the latter's sudden death +in November, 1835, to consider the matter more seriously. He hastened +to Berlin to his mother, and then returned to Leipsic, where he had +charge of the famous Gewandhaus concerts. He settled down to work +again, and especially to finish his oratorio of "St. Paul." In March, +1836, the University of Leipsic made him a Ph.D. + +In May or June of this year a friend and colleague named Schelble, who +conducted the Caecilia Singing Society at Frankfort-on-the-Main, was +taken ill, and, desiring to rest and recuperate, asked Mendelssohn to +officiate in his place. The request came at an inconvenient time, for +he had planned to take some recreation himself, and had mapped out a +tour to Switzerland and Genoa. But Felix was an obliging fellow, and +promptly responded with an affirmative when his colleague called upon +him for aid. The unselfish relinquishment of his intended tour was to +meet with a further reward than that which comes from the satisfaction +of a good deed done at some self-sacrifice, and this reward was the +more grateful because unexpected by his friends, his family, or even +himself. Yet it was destined to delight them all. + +Felix was in Frankfort six weeks. So short a period rarely leads to a +decisive event in a man's life, but did so in Mendelssohn's case. He +occupied lodgings in a house on the Schöne Aussicht (Beautiful View), +with an outlook upon the river. But there was another beautiful view +in Frankfort which occupied his attention far more, for among those he +met during his sojourn in the city on the Main was Cécile,--Cécile +Charlotte Sophie Jeanrenaud. Her father, long dead, had been the +pastor of the French Walloon Reformed Church in Frankfort, where his +widow and children moved in the best social circles of the city. +Cécile, then seventeen (ten years younger than Felix), was a "beauty" +of a most delicate type. Mme. Jeanrenaud still was a fine-looking +woman, and possibly because of this fact, coupled with Felix's shy +manner in the presence of Cécile, now that for the first time his heart +was deeply touched, it was at first supposed that he was courting the +mother; and her children, Cécile included, twitted her on it. + +Now Felix acted in a manner characteristic of his bringing up and of +the bent of his genius. Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Schumann, Liszt, +Wagner--not one of these hesitated a moment where his heart was +concerned. If anything, they were too impetuous. They are the masters +of the passionate expression in music; Mendelssohn's music is of the +refined, delicate type--like his own bringing up. The perfectly +polished "Songs without Words," the smoothly flowing symphonies, the +lyric violin concerto--these are most typical of his genius. Only here +and there in his works are there fitful flashes of deeper significance, +as in certain dramatic passages of the "Elijah" oratorio. And so, when +Felix found himself possessed of a passion for Cécile Jeanrenaud, the +beautiful, he did not throw himself at her feet and pour out a +confession of love to her. Far from it. With a calmness that would +make one feel like pinching him, were it not that after all the story +has a "happy ending," he left Frankfort at the end of six weeks, when +his feelings were at their height, and in order to submit the state of +his affections to a cool and unprejudiced scrutiny, he went to +Scheveningen, Holland, where he spent a month. Anything more +characteristically Mendelssohnian can scarcely be imagined than this +leisurely passing of judgment on his own heart. + +Just what Cécile thought of his sudden departure we do not know. No +doubt by that time she had ceased twitting her mother on Felix's +supposed intentions to make Frau Mendelssohn of Mme. Jeanrenaud, for it +must have become apparent that the attentions of the famous composer +were not directed toward the beautiful mother, but toward the more +beautiful daughter. If, however, she felt at all uneasy at his going +away at the time when he should have been preparing to declare himself, +her doubts would have been dispelled could she have read some of the +letters which he dispatched from Scheveningen. That she herself was +captivated by him there seems no doubt. It was an amusing change from +her preconceived notion of him. She had imagined him a stiff, +disagreeable, jealous old man, who wore a green velvet skull-cap and +played tedious fugues. This prejudice, needless to say, was dispelled +at their first meeting, when she found the crabbed creation of her +fancy a man of the world, with gracious, winning manners, and a +brilliant conversationalist not only on music, but also on other topics. + +[Illustration: Fanny Hensel, sister of Mendelssohn.] + +It is a curious coincidence that when Felix left Frankfort for +Scheveningen, with the image of this fair being in his heart, the +Caecilia Society should have presented him with a handsome +dressing-case marked "F. M.-B. and Caecilia.'" [1] He had come to +Frankfort to conduct the Caecilia; he had met Caecilia; and now he was +at the last moment reminded that he was leaving Caecilia behind; yet he +was carrying Caecilia with him. If there is anything prophetic in +coincidences, everything pointed to the fact that Caecilia was to play +a more prominent part in his life than that of a mere name. + +Even before Felix left Frankfort there were some who were in his +secret. Evidently the Mendelssohn family had received reports of his +attentions to the fair Cécile Jeanrenaud and were all a-flutter with +happy anticipation. For there is a letter from Felix to his sister +Rebecca which must have been written in answer to one from her +containing something in the nature of an inquiry regarding the state of +his feelings. "The present period in my life," he writes to her, "is a +very strange one, for I am more desperately in love than I ever was +before, and I do not know what to do. I leave Frankfort the day after +to-morrow, but I feel as if it would cost me my life. At all events I +intend to return here and see this charming girl once more before I go +back to Leipsic. But I have not an idea whether she likes me or not, +and I do not know what to do to make her like me, as I already have +said. But one thing is certain--that to her I owe the first real +happiness I have had this year, and now I feel fresh and hopeful again +for the first time. When away from her, though, I always am sad--now, +you see, I have let you into a secret which nobody else knows anything +about; but in order that you may set the whole world an example in +discretion, I will tell you nothing more about it." He adds that he is +going to detest the seashore, and ends with the exclamation, "O +Rebecca! What shall I do?" Rebecca might have answered, "Tell Cécile, +instead of me;" and, indeed, I wonder if she did not take occasion to +drop a few hints to Cécile during her brother's absence in Holland. + +There was another who might have told Cécile how Felix felt toward +her,--his mother. For to her he wrote from Scheveningen that he gladly +would send Holland, its dykes, sea baths, bathing-machines, Kursaals +and visitors to the end of the world to be back in Frankfort. "When I +have seen this charming girl again, I hope the suspense soon will be +over and I shall know whether we are to be anything--or rather +everything--to each other, or not." Evidently his scrutiny of his own +feelings was leading him to a very definite conclusion. He was in +Scheveningen, but his heart was in the city on the Main, and he was +wishing himself back in the Schöne Aussicht--longing for that +"beautiful view" once more. + +Back to Frankfort he hied himself as soon as the month in Holland was +happily over. It was not only back to Frankfort, it was back to +Cécile, in every sense of the words; for if Rebecca and his mother had +not conveyed to the delicate beauty some suggestion of the feelings she +had inspired in Felix's heart, she herself must have become aware of +them, and of something very much like in her own, since matters were +not long in coming to a point after his return. He spent August at +Scheveningen; in September his suspense was over, for his engagement to +Cécile formally took place at Kronberg, near Frankfort. Three weeks +later he was obliged to go back to his duties at Leipsic. How much he +was beloved by the public appears from the fact that at the next +Gewandhaus concert the directors placed on the programme, "Wer ein +Holdes Weib Errungen" (He who a Lovely Wife has Won) from "Fidelio," +and that when the number was reached, and Felix raised his bâton, the +audience burst into applause which continued a long time. It was their +congratulations to their idol on his betrothal. + +[Illustration: Cécile, wife of Mendelssohn.] + +"Les Feliciens" was the title given to Felix and Cécile by his sister +Fanny later in life. At this time Mendelssohn himself was +indescribably happy. At least, he could not himself find words in +which to express all he felt. It is pleasant to find that a great +composer is no exception to the rule which makes lovers "too happy for +words." "But what words am I to use in describing my happiness?" he +writes to his sister. "I do not know and am dumb, but not for the same +reason as the monkeys on the Orinoco--far from it." + +We gain an idea of Cécile's social position from Felix's statement, +contained in this same letter, that he and his fiancée are obliged to +make one hundred and sixty-three calls in Frankfort. This was written +before he had returned to his duties in Leipsic. Christmas again found +him with his betrothed and again writing to Fanny--this time about a +portrait of Cécile, which her family had given him. "They gave me a +portrait of her on Christmas, but it only stirred up afresh my wrath +against all bad artists. She looks like an ordinary young woman +flattered." (Rather a good bit of criticism.) "It really is too bad +that with such a sitter the fellow could not have shown a spark of +poetry." It is quite evident that Felix was much in love with his fair +fiancée. + +He and Cécile were married in her father's former church in March, +1837. During their honeymoon Felix wrote to his friend, Eduard +Devrient, the famous actor, from the Bavarian highlands. A rare spirit +of peace and contentment breathes through the letter. "You know that I +am here with my wife, my dear Cécile, and that it is our wedding tour; +that we already are an old married couple of six weeks' standing. +There is so much to tell you that I know not how to make a beginning. +Picture it to yourself. I can only say that I am too happy, too glad; +and yet not at all beside myself, as I should have expected to be, but +calm and accustomed, as though it could not be otherwise. But you +should know my Cécile!" Evidently such a love as was here described +was not a mere sentimental flash in the pan. It was an affection +founded on reciprocal tastes and sympathies, the kind that usually +lasts. Cécile was refined and delicate, and beautiful. She was just +the woman to grace the home that a fastidious man like Mendelssohn +would want to establish. + +The most insistent note to be observed in his correspondence from this +time on is that of a desire to remain within his own four walls. Fanny +had been advised to go to the seashore for her health, but had delayed +doing so because loath to leave her husband. "Think of me," writes +Felix, urging her to go, "who must in a few weeks, though we have not +been married four months yet, leave Cécile here and go to England by +myself--all, too, for the sake of a music festival. Gracious me! All +this is no joke. But possibly the death of the King of England will +intervene and put a stop to the whole project." The life of a king +meant little to Felix in the distressing prospect of being obliged to +leave his Cécile. Felix, the husband, was not as eager to travel as +Felix, the bachelor, had been. + +There are various "appreciations" of Cécile. The least enthusiastic, +perhaps, is that of Hensel, Felix's brother-in-law. He says that she +was not a striking person in anyway, neither extraordinarily clever, +brilliantly witty, nor exceptionally accomplished. But to this +somewhat indefinite observation he adds that she exerted an influence +as soothing as that of the open sky, or running water. Indeed, +Hensel's first frigid reserve yielded to the opinion that Cécile's +gentleness and brightness made Felix's life one continued course of +happiness to the end. It was some time after the marriage before +Mendelssohn's sisters saw Cécile for the first time. The good they +heard of her made them the more impatient to meet her. "I tell you +candidly," the clever Fanny writes to her, "that by this time, when +anybody comes to talk to me about your beauty and your eyes, it makes +me quite cross. I have had enough of hearsay, and beautiful eyes were +not made to be heard." When at last Fanny did see Cécile, this fond +sister of Felix's, who naturally would be most critical, was +enthusiastic over her. "She is amiable, simple, fresh, happy and +even-tempered, and I consider Felix most fortunate. For though loving +him inexpressibly, she does not spoil him, but when he is moody, meets +him with a self-restraint which in due course of time will cure him of +his moodiness altogether. The effect of her presence is like that of a +fresh breeze, she is so light and bright and natural." + +To my mind, however, Devrient has drawn the best word portrait of her. +After their first meeting he wrote: "How often we had pictured the kind +of woman that would be a true second half to Felix; and now the lovely, +gentle being was before us, whose glance and smile alone promised all +that we could desire for the happiness of our spoilt favorite." Later, +Devrient finished the picture: "Cécile was one of those sweet, womanly +natures whose gentle simplicity, whose mere presence, soothed and +pleased. She was slender, with strikingly beautiful and delicate +features; her hair was between brown and gold; but the transcendent +lustre of her great blue eyes, and the brilliant roses on her cheeks, +were sad harbingers of early death. She spoke little and never with +animation, and in a low, soft voice. Shakespeare's words, 'my gracious +silence,' applied to her, no less than to Cordelia." + +[Illustration: The Mendelssohn Monument in Leipsig.] + +Thus, while Cécile does not seem to have been an extraordinarily gifted +woman from an artistic or intellectual point of view, it is quite +evident that she possessed a refinement that must have appealed +forcibly to a man brought up in such genteel surroundings and as +sensitive as Mendelssohn. Such a woman must have been, after all, +better suited to his delicate genius than a wife of unusual gifts would +have been. For it is a helpmeet, not another genius, that a man of +genius really needs most. The woman who, without being prosy or +commonplace and without allowing herself to retrograde in looks or in +personal care, can run a household in a systematic, orderly fashion is +the greatest blessing that Providence can bestow upon genius. +Evidently Cécile was just such a woman. Her tact seems to have been as +delicate as her beauty. Without, perhaps, having directly inspired any +composition of her husband's, her gentleness, her simple grace, +doubtless left their mark on many bars of his music. + +It seems doubly cruel that death should have cut Felix down when he had +enjoyed but ten happy years with his Cécile. Yet had his life been +long, the pang of separation would soon have come to him. Devrient had +not been mistaken when he spoke of "those sad harbingers of early +death;" and Cécile survived Felix scarcely five years. + +Felix's death occurred at Leipsic in 1847. In September, while +listening to his own recently composed "Nacht Lied" he swooned away. +His system, weakened by overwork, succumbed, nervous prostration +followed, and on November 4 he died. Sudden death had carried off his +grandfather, father, mother and favorite sister; and he had a +presentiment that his end would come about in the same way. During the +dull half-sleep preceding death he spoke but once, and then to Cécile +in answer to her inquiry how he felt--"Tired, very tired." + +Devrient tells how he went to the house of mutual friends in Dresden +for news of Mendelssohn's condition, when Clara Schumann came in, a +letter in her hand and weeping, and told them that Felix had died the +previous evening. Devrient hastened to Leipsic, and Cécile sent for +him. I cannot close this article more fittingly than with his +description of their meeting in the presence of the illustrious +dead--the cherished friend of one, the husband of the other. + +"She received me with the tenderness of a sister, wept in silence, and +was calm and composed as ever. She thanked me for all the love and +devotion I had shown to her Felix, grieved for me that I should have to +mourn so faithful a friend, and spoke of the love with which Felix +always had regarded me. Long we spoke of him; it comforted her, and +she was loath for me to depart. She was most unpretentious in her +sorrow, gentle, and resigned to live for the care and education of her +children. She said God would help her, and surely her boys would have +the inheritance of some of their father's genius. There could not be a +more worthy memory of him than the well-balanced, strong and tender +heart of this mourning widow." + + +[1] The "-B" on the dressing-case stands for "-Bartholdy." When the +Mendelssohn family changed from Judaism to Protestantism, it added the +mother's family name. + + + + +Chopin and the Countess Delphine Potocka + +"Her voice was destined to be the last which should vibrate upon the +musician's heart. Perhaps the sweetest sounds of earth accompanied the +parting soul until they blended in his ear with the first chords of the +angels' lyres." + +It is thus Liszt describes the voice of Countess Delphine Potocka as it +vibrated through the room in which Chopin lay dying. Witnesses +disagree regarding details. One of the small company that gathered +about his bed says she sang but once, others that she sang twice; and +even these vary when they name the compositions. Yet however they may +differ on these minor points, they agree as to the main incident. That +the beautiful Delphine sang for the dying Chopin is not a mere pleasing +tradition; it is a fact. Her voice ravished the ear of the great +composer, whose life was ebbing away, and soothed his last hours. + +"Therefore, then, has God so long delayed to call me to Him. He wanted +to vouchsafe me the joy of seeing you." These were the words Chopin +whispered when he opened his eyes and saw, beside his sister Louise, +the Countess Delphine Potocka, who had hurried from a distance as soon +as she was notified that his end was drawing near. She was one of +those rare and radiant souls who could bestow upon this delicate child +of genius her tenderest friendship, perhaps even her love, yet keep +herself unsullied and an object of adoration as much for her purity as +for her beauty. Because she was Chopin's friend, because she came to +him in his dying hours, because along paths unseen by those about them +her voice threaded its way to his very soul, no life of him is complete +without mention of her, and in the mind of the musical public her name +is irrevocably associated with his. Each succeeding biographer of the +great composer has sought to tell us a little more about her--yet +little is known of her even now beyond the fact that she was very +beautiful--and so eager have we been for a glimpse of her face that we +have accepted without reserve as an authentic presentment of her +features the famous portrait of a Countess Potocka who, I find, died +some seven or eight years before Delphine and Chopin met. + +[Illustration: Frédéric Chopin (missing from book)] + +But we have portraits of Delphine by Chopin himself, not drawn with +pencil or crayon, or painted with brush, but her face as his soul saw +it and transformed it into music. Listen to a great virtuoso play his +two concertos. Ask yourself which of the six movements is the most +beautiful. Surely your choice will fall on the slow movement of the +second--dedicated to the Countess Delphine Potocka, and one of the +composer's most tender and exquisite productions; or play over the +waltzes--the one over which for grace and poetic sentiment you will +linger longest will be the sixth, dedicated to the Countess Delphine +Potocka. + +Liszt, who knew Chopin, tells us that the composer evinced a decided +preference for the _Adagio_ of the second concerto and liked to repeat +it frequently. He speaks of the _Adagio_, this musical portrait of +Delphine, as almost ideally perfect; now radiant with light, now full +of tender pathos; a happy vale of _Tempe_, a magnificent landscape +flooded with summer glow and lustre, yet forming a background for the +rehearsal of some dire scene of mortal anguish, a contrast sustained by +a fusion of tones, a softening of gloomy hues, which, while saddening +joy, soothes the bitterness of sorrow. + +What a lifelike portrait Chopin drew in this "beautiful, deep-toned, +love-laden cantilena"! For was it not the incomparable Delphine who +was destined to "soothe the bitterness of sorrow" during his final +hours on earth? + +But while hers was a soul strung with chords that vibrated to the +slightest breath of sorrow, she could be vivacious as well. She was a +child of Poland, that land of sorrow, but where sorrow, for very excess +of itself, sometimes reverts to joy. And so she had her brilliant +joyous moments. Chopin saw her in such moments, too, and, that the +recollection might not pass away, for all time fixed her picture in her +vivacious moods in the last movement, the _Allegro vivace_ of the +concerto, with what Niecks, one of the leading modern biographers of +the composer, calls its feminine softness and rounded contours, its +graceful, gyrating, dance-like motions, its sprightliness and +frolicsomeness. In the same way in the waltz, there is an obvious +mingling of the gay and the sad, the tender and the debonair. Chopin +thought he was writing a waltz. He really was writing "Delphine +Potocka." He, too, was from Poland, and that circumstance of itself +drew them to each other from the time when they first met in France. + +One of Chopin's favorite musical amusements, when he was a guest at the +houses of his favorite friends, was to play on the piano musical +portraits of the company. At the salon of the Countess Komar, +Delphine's mother, he played one evening the portraits of the two +daughters of the house. When it came to Delphine's he gently drew her +light shawl from her shoulders, spread it over the keyboard, and then +played through it, his fingers, with every tone they produced, coming +in touch with the gossamer-like fabric, still warm and hallowed for him +from its contact with her. + +It seems to have been about 1830 that Delphine first came into the +composer's life. In that year the Count and Countess Komar and their +three beautiful daughters arrived in Nice. Count Komar was business +manager for one of the Potockas. The girls made brilliant matches. +Marie became the Princess de Beauvau-Craon; Delphine became the +Countess Potocka, and Nathalie, the Marchioness Medici Spada. The last +named died a victim to her zeal as nurse during a cholera plague in +Rome. + +Chopin was a man who attracted women. His delicate physique,--he died +of consumption,--his refined, poetic temperament, and his exquisite art +as a composer combined with his beautiful piano playing, so well suited +to the intimate circle of the drawing-room, to make his personality a +thoroughly fascinating one. Moreover, he was, besides an artist, a +gentleman, with the reserve yet charm of manner that characterizes the +man of breeding. In men women admire two extremes,--splendid physical +strength, or the delicacy that suggests a poetic soul. Chopin was a +creator of poetic music and a gentle virtuoso. His appearance +harmonized with his genius. He was one of his own nocturnes in which +you can feel a vague presentiment of untimely death. + +He is described as a model son, an affectionate brother and a faithful +friend. His eyes were brown; his hair was chestnut, luxuriant and as +soft as silk. His complexion was of transparent delicacy; his voice +subdued and musical. He moved with grace. Born near Warsaw, in 1809, +he was brought up in his father's school with the sons of aristocrats. +He had the manners of an aristocrat, and was careful in his dress. + +But despite his sensitive nature, he could resent undue familiarity or +rudeness, yet in a refined way all his own. Once when he was a guest +at dinner at a rich man's house in Paris, he was asked by the host to +play--a patent violation of etiquette toward a distinguished artist. +Chopin demurred. The host continued to press him, urging that Liszt +and Thalberg had played in his house after dinner. + +"But," protested Chopin, "I have eaten so little!" and thus put an end +to the matter. + +Some twenty or thirty of the best salons in Paris were open to him. +Among them were those of the Polish exiles, some of whom he had known +since their school-days at his father's. He was in the truest sense of +the word a friend of those who entertained him--in fact, one of them. +For a list of those among whom he moved socially read the dedications +on his music. They include wealthy women, like Mme. Nathaniel de +Rothschild, but also a long line of princesses and countesses. In the +salon of the Potocka he was intimately at home, and it was especially +there he drew his musical portraits at the piano. Delphine, his +brilliant countrywoman, vibrated with music herself. She possessed +"_une belle voix de soprano_," and sang "_d'après la méthode des +maîtres d'Italie_." + +[Illustration: Countess Potocka. From the famous pastel in the Royal +Berlin Gallery. Artist unknown.] + +In her salon were heard such singers as Rubini, Lablache, Tamburini, +Malibran, Grisi and Persiani. Yet it was her voice Chopin wished to +hear when he lay dying! Truly hers must have been a marvellous gift of +song! At her salon it was his delight to accompany her with his highly +poetical playing. From what is known of his delicate art as a pianist +it is possible to imagine how exquisitely his accompaniments must have +both sustained and mingled with that "_belle voix de soprano_." He had +a knack of improvising a melody to any poem that happened to take his +fancy, and thus he and Delphine would treat to an improvised song the +elite of the musical, artistic, literary and social world that gathered +in her salon. It is unfortunate that these improvisations were lightly +forgotten by the composer, for he has left us few songs. Delphine +"took as much trouble in giving choice musical entertainments as other +people did in giving choice dinners." Her salon must have been a +resort after the composer's own heart. + +Liszt, who knew Delphine well during Chopin's lifetime, and from whose +letters, as yet untranslated into English, I have been able to unearth +a few references to her (the last in May, 1861, nearly twelve years +after Chopin died, and the last definite reference to her which I have +been able to discover), says that her indescribable and spirited grace +made her one of the most admired sovereigns of the society of Paris. +He speaks of her "ethereal beauty" and her "enchanting voice" which +enchained Chopin. Delphine was, in fact, "famous for her rare beauty +and fascinating singing." + +No biography of Chopin contains so much as the scrap of a letter either +from him to her, or from her to him. That he should not have written +is hardly to be wondered at, considering that letter writing was most +repugnant to him. He would take a long walk in order to accept or +decline an invitation in person, rather than indite a brief note. +Moreover, in addition to this trait, he was so often in the salon of +the Countess Potocka that much correspondence with her was unnecessary. +I have, however, discovered two letters from her to the composer. One, +written in French, asks him to occupy a seat in her box at a Berlioz +concert. The other is in Polish and is quite long. It is undated, and +there is nothing to show from where it was written. Evidently, +however, she had heard that he was ailing, for she begs him to send her +a few words, _poste restante_, to Aix-la-Chapelle, letting her know how +he is. From this request it seems that she was away from Paris +(possibly in or near Poland), but expected to start for the French +capital soon and wished to be apprised of his condition at the earliest +moment. The anxious tone of the letter leads me to believe that it was +written during the last year of the composer's life, when the insidious +nature of the disease of which he was a victim had become apparent to +himself and his friends. . . . "I cannot," she writes, "wait so long +without news of your health and your plans for the future. Do not +attempt to write to me yourself, but ask Mme. Etienne, or that +excellent grandma, who dreams of chops, to let me know about your +strength, your chest, your breathing." + +Delphine also was well aware of the unsatisfactory state of his +finances, for she writes that she would like to know something about +"that Jew; if he called and was able to be of service to you." What +follows is in a vein of sadness, showing that her own life was not +without its sorrows. "Here everything is sad and lonely, but my life +goes on in much the usual way; if only it will continue without further +bitter sorrows and trials, I shall be able to support it. For me the +world has no more happiness, no more joy. All those to whom I have +wished well ever have rewarded me with ingratitude or caused me other +_tribulations_." (The _italics_ are hers.) "After all, this existence +is nothing but a great discord." Then, with a "_que Dieu vous garde_," +she bids him _au revoir_ till the beginning of October at the latest. + +Note that it was in October, 1849, that Chopin took to his deathbed; +that in another passage of the letter she advised him to think of Nice +for the winter; and that it was from Nice she was summoned to his +bedside. It would seem as if she had received alarming advices +regarding his health; had hastened to Paris and then to the Riviera to +make arrangements for him to pass the winter there; and then, learning +that the worst was feared, had hurried back to solace his last hours. + +Then came what is perhaps the most touching scene that has been handed +down to us from the lives of the great composers. When Delphine +entered what was soon to be the death chamber, Chopin's sister Louise +and a few of his most intimate friends were gathered there. She took +her place by Louise. When the dying man opened his eyes and saw her +standing at the foot of his bed, tall, slight, draped in white, +resembling a beautiful angel, and mingling her tears with those of his +sister, his lips moved, and those nearest him, bending over to catch +his words, heard him ask that she would sing. + +Mastering her emotion by a strong effort of the will, she sang in a +voice of bell-like purity the canticle to the Virgin attributed to +Stradella,--sang it so devoutly, so ethereally, that the dying man, +"artist and lover of the beautiful to the very last," whispered in +ecstasy, "How exquisite! Again, again!" + +Once more she sang--this time a psalm by Marcello. It was the haunted +hour of twilight. The dying day draped the scene in its mysterious +shadows. Those at the bedside had sunk noiselessly on their knees. +Over the mournful accompaniment of sobs floated the voice of Delphine +like a melody from heaven. + +Chopin died on October 17, 1849, just as the bells of Paris were +tolling the hour of three in the morning. He was known to love +flowers, and in death he literally was covered with them. The funeral +was held from the Madeleine, where Mozart's "Requiem" was sung, the +solos being taken by Pauline Viardot-Garcia, Castellan and Lablache. +Meyerbeer is said to have conducted, but this has been contradicted. +He was, however, one of the pallbearers on the long way from the church +to Père la Chaise. When the remains were lowered into the grave, some +Polish earth, which Chopin had brought with him from Wola nineteen +years before and piously guarded, was scattered over the coffin. There +is nothing to show what part, save that of a mourner, Delphine Potocka +took in his funeral. But though it was the famous Viardot-Garcia whose +voice rang out in the Madeleine, it was hers that had sung him to his +eternal rest. + +[Illustration: The death of Chopin. From the painting by Barrias.] + +How long did Delphine survive Chopin? In 1853 Liszt met her at Baden, +postponing his intended departure for Carlsruhe a day in order to dine +with her. In May, 1861, he met her at dinner at the Rothschilds'. +When Chopin's pupil, Mikuli, was preparing his edition of the +composer's works, Delphine furnished him copies of several compositions +bearing expression marks and other directions in the hand of Chopin +himself. Mikuli dated his edition 1879. It would seem as if the +Countess still were living at or about that time. + +Besides the aid she thus gave in the preparation of the Mikuli edition +of Chopin's works, there is other evidence that she treasured the +composer's memory. In 1857, when he had been dead eight years, there +was published a biographical dictionary of Polish and Slavonic +musicians, a book now very rare. Although the Potocka was only an +amateur, her name was included in the publication. Evidently the +biographies of living people were furnished by themselves. Chopin's +fame at that time did not approximate what it is now. Yet in the +second sentence of her biography Delphine records that she was "the +intimate friend of the illustrious Chopin." + +Forgetting that the line of the Potockis is a long one, the public for +years has associated with Chopin the famous pastel portrait of Countess +Potocka in the Royal Berlin Gallery. The Countess Potocka of that +portrait had a career that reads like a romance, but she was Sophie, +not Delphine Potocka. My discovery of a miniature of Countess Sophie +Potocka in Philadelphia, painted some fifteen or twenty years later +than the Berlin pastel, and of numerous references to her in the diary +of an American traveller who was entertained by her in Poland early in +the last century, were among the interesting results of my search for +information regarding Delphine, but they have no place here. Probably +the public, which clings to romance, still will cling to the pastel +portrait of Countess Potocka as that of the woman who sang to the dying +Chopin--and so the portrait is reproduced here. + +Barrias, the French historical painter, who was in Paris when Chopin +lived there, painted "The Death of Chopin." It shows Delphine singing +to the dying man. As Barrias had his reputation as a historical +painter to sustain and as the likenesses of others on the canvas are +correct, it is not improbable that he painted Delphine as he saw or +remembered her. If so, this is the only known portrait of Chopin's +faithful friend, the Countess Delphine Potocka. Of course no one who +undertakes to write about Chopin (or only to read about him for that +matter) can escape the episode with Mme. Dudevant,--George Sand,--who +used man after man as living "copy," and when she had finished with him +cast him aside for some new experience. But the story has been +admirably told by Huneker and others and its disagreeable details need +not be repeated here. It may have been love, even passion, while it +lasted, but it ended in harsh discord; whereas Delphine, sweet and pure +and tender, ever was like a strain of Chopin's own exquisite music +vibrating in a sympathetic heart. + + + + +The Schumanns: Robert and Clara + +Robert and Clara Schumann are names as closely linked in music as those +of Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning in literature. Robert +Schumann was a great composer, Clara Schumann a great pianist. In her +dual rôle of wife and virtuosa she was the first to secure proper +recognition for her husband's genius. Surviving him many years, she +continued the foremost interpreter of his works, winning new laurels +not only for herself but also for him. He was in his grave--yet she +had but to press the keyboard and he lived in her. Despite the fact +that tastes underwent a change and Wagner became the musical giant of +the nineteenth century, Clara, faithful to the ideal of her youth and +her young womanhood, saw to it that the fame of him whose name she bore +remained undimmed. Hers was, indeed, a consecrated widowhood. + +Robert was eighteen years old, Clara only nine, when they first met; +but while he had not yet definitely decided on a profession, she, in +the very year of their meeting, made her début as a pianist, and thus +began a career which lasted until 1896, a period of nearly seventy +years! When they first met, Schumann was studying law at the Leipsic +University. Born in Zwickau, Saxony, in 1810, he showed both as a boy +and as a youth not only strong musical proclivities, but also decided +literary predilections. In the latter his father, a bookseller and +publisher, who loved his trade, saw a reflection of his own tastes, and +they were encouraged rather more sedulously than the boy's musical +bent. It was in obedience to his father's wishes that he matriculated +at Leipsic, although he composed and played the piano, and his desire +to make music his profession was beginning to get the upper hand. His +meeting with the nine-year-old girl decided him--so early in her life +did she begin to influence his career! + +[Illustration: Robert Schumann.] + +Schumann had been invited by his friends, Dr. and Mrs. Carus, to an +evening of music, and especially to hear the piano playing of a +wonder-child--a "musical fairy," his hostess called her. In the course +of the evening he accompanied Frau Carus in some Schubert songs, when, +chancing to look up, he saw a child dressed in white, her pretty face +framed in dark hair, her expressive eyes raised toward the singer in +rapt admiration. The song over, and the applause having died away, he +stepped up to the child, laid his hand kindly on her head, and asked, +"Are you musical, too, little one?" + +A curious smile played around her lips. She was about to answer, when +a man came to her and led her to the piano, and the first thing +Schumann knew the shapely little hands struck into Beethoven's F-minor +Sonata and played it through with a firm, sure touch and fine musical +feeling. No wonder she had smiled at his question. + +"Was I right in calling her a Musical fairy'?" asked Frau Carus of +Schumann. + +"Her face is like that of a guardian angel in a picture that hangs in +my mother's room at home," was his reply. Little he knew then that +this child was destined to become his own good fairy and "guardian +angel." Had he foreseen what she was to be to him, he could not more +aptly have described her. The most important immediate result of the +meeting was that he became a pupil of her father, Friedrich Wieck, +whose remarkable skill as a teacher had carried his daughter so far at +such an early age. The lessons stopped when Schumann went to +Heidelberg to continue his studies, but he and Wieck, who was convinced +of the young man's musical genius, corresponded in a most friendly +manner. + +Clara, who was born in Leipsic in 1819, became her father's pupil in +her fifth year. It is she who chiefly reflected glory upon him as a +master, but, among his other pupils, Hans von Bülow became famous, and +Clara's half-sister Marie also was a noted pianist. Wieck's system was +not a hard-and-fast one, but varied according to the individuality of +each pupil. He was to his day what Leschetizky, the teacher of +Paderewski, is now. Very soon after her meeting with Schumann, Clara +made her public début, and with great success. Among those who heard +and praised her highly during this first year of her public career was +Paganini. + +In 1830, two years after the first meeting of Robert and Clara, +Schumann, his father having died, wrote to his mother and his guardian +and begged them to allow him to choose a musical career, referring them +to Wieck for an opinion as to his musical abilities. The mother wrote +to Wieck a letter which is highly creditable to her heart and judgment, +and Wieck's reply is equally creditable to him as a friend and teacher. +Evidently his powers of penetration led him to entertain the highest +hopes for Schumann. Among other things he writes that, with due +diligence, Robert should in a few years become one of the greatest +pianists of the day. Why Wieck's hopes in this particular were not +fulfilled, and why, for this reason, Clara's gifts as a pianist were +doubly useful to Schumann, we shall see shortly. + +[Illustration: Robert and Clara Schumann in 1847. From a lithograph in +possession of the Society of Friends of Music, Vienna.] + +Schumann entered with enthusiasm upon the career of his choice. He +left Heidelberg and took lodgings with the Wiecks in Leipsic. Clara, +then a mere girl, though already winning fame as a concert pianist, +certainly was too young for him to have fallen seriously in love with, +or for her to have responded to any such feeling. Even at that early +age, however, she exercised a strange power of attraction over him. +His former literary tastes had given him a great fund of stories and +anecdotes, and he delighted in the evenings to gather about him the +children of the family, Clara among them, and entertain them with tales +from the Arabian Nights and ghost and fairy stories. + +Among his compositions at this time are a set of impromptus on a theme +by Clara, and it is significant of his regard for her that later he +worked them over, as if he did not consider them in their original +shape good enough for her. Then we have from this period a letter +which he wrote to the twelve-year-old girl while she was concertizing +in Frankfort, and in which the expressions certainly transcend those of +a youth for a child, or of an elder brother for a sister, if one cared +to picture their relations as such. Indeed, he writes to her that he +often thinks other "not as a brother does of a sister, nor as one +friend of another, but as a pilgrim of a distant altar-picture." He +asks her if she has composed much, adding, "In my dreams I sometimes +hear music--so you must be composing." He confides in her about his +own work, tells her that his theoretical studies (with Heinrich Dorn) +have progressed as far as the three-part fugue; and that he has a +sonata in B minor and a set of "Papillons" ready; then jokingly asks +her how the Frankfort apples taste and inquires after the health of the +F above the staff in the "jumpy Chopin variation," and informs her that +his paper is giving out. "Everything gives out, save the friendship in +which I am Fraulein C. W.'s warmest admirer." + +For a letter from a man of twenty-one to a girl of twelve, the above is +remarkable. If Clara had not afterward become Robert's wife, it would +have interest merely as a curiosity. As matters eventuated, it is a +charming prelude to the love-symphony of two lives. Moreover, there +seems to have been ample ground for Schumann's admiration. Dorn has +left a description of Clara as she was at this time, which shows her to +have been unusually attractive. He speaks of her as a fascinating girl +of thirteen, "graceful in figure, of blooming complexion, with delicate +white hands, a profusion of black hair, and wise, glowing eyes. +Everything about her was appetizing, and I never have blamed my pupil, +young Robert Schumann, that only three years later he should have been +completely carried away by this lovely creature, his former +fellow-pupil and future wife." Her purity and her genius, added to her +beauty, may well have combined to make Robert, musical dreamer and +enthusiast on the threshold of his career, think of her, when absent, +"as a pilgrim of a distant altar-picture." + +She was clever, too, and through her concert tours was seeing much of +the world for those days. In Weimar she played for Goethe, the great +poet himself getting a cushion for her and placing it on the piano +stool in order that she might sit high enough; and not only praising +her playing, but also presenting her with his likeness in a medallion. +The poet Grillparzer, after hearing her play in Vienna Beethoven's +F-minor Sonata, wrote a delightful poem. "Clara Wieck and Beethoven's +F-minor Sonata." It tells how a magician, weary of life, locked all +his charms in a shrine, threw the key into the sea, and died. In vain +men tried to force open the shrine. At last a girl, wandering by the +strand and watching their vain efforts, simply dipped her white fingers +into the sea and drew forth the key, with which she opened the shrine +and released the charms. And now the freed spirits rise and fall at +the bidding of their lovely, innocent mistress, who guides them with +her white fingers as she plays. The imagery of this tribute to Clara's +playing is readily understood. In Paris she heard Chopin and +Mendelssohn. All these experiences tended to her early development, +and there is little wonder if Schumann saw her older than she really +was. + +In 1834 Schumann's early literary tastes asserted themselves, but now +in connection with music. He founded the "Neue Zeitschrift für Musik," +which under his editorship soon became one of the foremost musical +periodicals of the day. Among his own writings for it is the +enthusiastic essay on one of Chopin's early works, in which Schumann, +as he did later in the case of Brahms, discovered the unmistakable +marks of genius. The name of Chopin brings me back to Wieck's prophecy +regarding Schumann as a pianist. The latter in his enthusiasm devised +an apparatus for finger gymnastics which he practised so assiduously +that he strained one of his fingers and permanently impaired his +technique, making a pianistic career an impossibility. Through this +accident he was unable to introduce his own piano works to the public, +so that the importance of the service rendered him by Clara, in taking +his compositions into her repertoire, both before and after their +marriage, was doubled. + +One evening at Wieck's, Schumann was anxious to hear some new Chopin +works which he had just received. Realizing that his lame finger +rendered him incapable of playing, he called out despairingly: + +"Who will lend me fingers?" + +"I will," said Clara, and sat down and played the pieces for him. She +"lent him her fingers;" and that is precisely what she did for him +through life in making his piano and chamber music compositions known. +Familiarity with Schumann's music enables us of to-day to appreciate +its beauty. But for its day it was, like Brahms' music later, of a +kind that makes its way slowly. Left to the general musical public, it +probably would have been years in sinking into their hearts. Such +music requires to be publicly performed by a sympathetic interpreter +before receiving its meed of merit. Schumann had hoped to be his own +interpreter. He saw that hope vanish, but a lovely being came to his +aid. She saw his works come into life; their creation was part of her +own existence; she fathomed his genius to its utmost depths; her whole +being vibrated in sympathy with his, and when she sat down at the piano +and pressed the keys, it was as though he himself were the performer. +She was his fingers--fingers at once deft and delicate. She played +with a double love--love for him and love for his music. And why +should she not love it? She was as much the mother of his music as of +his children. I have already indicated that Clara probably developed +early. At all events, there are letters from Schumann to her, at +fourteen, which leave no doubt that he was in love with her then, or +that she could have failed to perceive this. In one of these letters +he proposes this highly poetic, not to say psychological, method of +communicating with her. "Promptly at eleven o'clock to-morrow +morning," he writes, "I will play the _Adagio_ from the Chopin +variations and will think strongly--in fact only--of you. Now I beg of +you that you will do the same, so that we may meet and see each other +in spirit. . . . Should you not do this, and there break to-morrow at +that hour a chord, you will know that it is I." + +[Illustration: Clara Schumann at the piano.] + +However far the affair may or may not have progressed at this time, +there was a curious interruption during the following year. Robert +appears to have temporarily lost his heart to a certain Ernestine von +Fricken, a young lady of sixteen, who was one of Wieck's pupils. Clara +consoled herself by permitting a musician named Banck to pay her +attention. For reasons which never have been clearly explained, +Schumann suddenly broke with Ernestine and turned with renewed ardor to +Clara, while Clara at once withdrew her affections from Banck and +retransferred them to Schumann. We find him writing to her again in +1835: + +"Through all the Autumn festivals there looks out an angel's head that +closely resembles a certain Clara who is very well known to me." By +the following year, Clara then being seventeen, things evidently had +gone so far that, between themselves, they were engaged. "Fate has +destined us for each other," he writes to her. "I myself knew that +long ago, but I had not the courage to tell you sooner, nor the hope to +be understood by you." + +Wieck evidently had remained in ignorance of the young people's +attachment, for, when on Clara's birthday the following year (1837) +Schumann made formal application in writing for her hand, her father +gave an evasive answer, and on the suit being pressed, he, who had been +almost like a second father to Robert, became his bitter enemy. Clara, +however, remained faithful to her lover through the three years of +unhappiness which her father's sudden hatred of Robert caused them. In +1839 she was in Paris, and from there she wrote to her father: + +"My love for Schumann is, it is true, a passionate love; I do not, +however, love him solely out of passion and sentimental enthusiasm, +but, furthermore, because I think him one of the best of men, because I +believe no other man could love me as purely and nobly as he or so +understandingly; and I believe, also, on my part that I can make him +wholly happy through allowing him to possess me, and that I understand +him as no other woman could." + +This love obviously was one not lightly bestowed, but Wieck remained +obdurate and refused his consent. Then Schumann took the only step +that under the circumstances was possible. Wieck's refusal of his +consent being a legal bar to the marriage, Robert invoked the law to +set his future father-in-law's objections aside. The case was tried, +decided in Schumann's favor, and on September 12, 1840, Robert Schumann +and Clara Wieck were married in the village of Schönefeld, near +Leipsic. That year Schumann composed no less than one hundred and +thirty-eight songs, among them some of his most beautiful. They were +his wedding gift to Clara. + +After their marriage his inspiration blossomed under her very eyes. +She was the companion of his innermost thoughts and purposes. +Meanwhile his musical genius and critical acumen ever were at her +command in her work as a pianist. Happily, too, a reconciliation was +effected with Wieck, and we find Clara writing to him about the first +performance of Schumann's piano quintet (now ranked as one of the +finest compositions of its class), on which occasion she, of course, +played the piano part. + +Four years after their marriage the Schumanns removed to Dresden, +remaining there until 1850, when they settled in Düsseldorf, where +Robert had been appointed musical director. There was but one shadow +over their lives. At times a deep melancholy came over him, and in +this Clara discerned with dread possible symptoms of coming mental +disorder. Her fears were only too well founded. Early in February, +1854, he arose during the night and demanded light, saying that +Schubert had appeared to him and given him a melody which he must write +out forthwith. On the 27th of the same month, he quietly left his +house, went to the bridge across the Rhine and threw himself into the +river. Boatmen prevented his intended suicide. When he was brought +home and had changed his wet clothes for dry ones, he sat down to work +on a variation as if nothing had happened. Within less than a week he +was removed at his own request to a sanatorium at Endenich, where he +died July 29, 1856. + +[Illustration: The Schumann Monument in the Bonn Cemetery.] + +Clara survived him forty years, wearing a crown of laurels and +thorns--the laurels of a famous pianist, the thorns of her widowhood. +It was a widowhood consecrated, as much as her wifehood had been, to +her husband's genius. She died at Frankfort, May 19, 1896, and is +buried beside her husband in Bonn. + + + + +Franz Liszt and his Carolyne + +In the famous Wagner-Liszt correspondence, Liszt writes from Weimar, +under date of April 8, 1853, "Daily the Princess greets me with the lines +'Nicht Gut, noch Geld, noch Göttliche Pracht.'" The lines are from +"Götterdämmerung," the whole passage being-- + + "Nor goods, nor gold, nor godlike splendor; + Nor house, nor home, nor lordly state; + Nor hollow contracts of a treach'rous race, + Its cruel cant, its custom and decree. + Blessed, in joy and sorrow, + Let love alone be." + +The lady who according to Liszt daily greeted him with these significant +lines was the Princess Carolyne Sayn-Wittgenstein. Since 1848 she and +her young daughter Marie had been living with Liszt at the Altenburg in +Weimar. She remained there until 1860, twelve years, when she went to +Rome, whither, in due time, Liszt followed her, to make the Eternal City +one of his homes for the rest of his life. His last letter to her is +dated July 6, 1886, the year and month of his death, so that for a period +of nearly forty years he enjoyed the personal and intellectual +companionship of this remarkable woman. Their relations form one of the +great love romances of the last century. + +[Illustration: Franz Liszt. Painting by Ary Scheffer.] + +Liszt's letters to the Princess, written in French and still +untranslated, are in four volumes. They were published by the Princess's +daughter, Princess Marie Hohenlohe, as a tribute to Liszt the musician +and the man. They teem with his musical activities--information +regarding the numerous celebrities with whom he was intimate, the +musicians he aided, his own great works. But their rarest charm to me +lies in the fact that from them the careful reader can glean the whole +story of the romance of Liszt and Carolyne, from its very beginnings to +his death. + +We know the fascinating male figure in this romance--the extraordinary +combination of unapproached virtuoso, great composer, and man of the +world; but who was the equally fascinating woman? + +Carolyne von Iwanowska was born near Kiew, Russian Poland, in February, +1819. When she still was young her parents separated, and she divided +her time between them. Her mother possessed marked social graces, +travelled much, was a favorite at many courts, and, as a pupil of +Rossini's in singing, was admired by Spontini and Meyerbeer, and was +sought after in the most select salons, including that of Metternich, the +Austrian chancellor. From her Carolyne inherited her charm of manner. + +Intellectually, however, she was wholly her father's child; and he was +her favorite parent. He was a wealthy landed proprietor, and in the +administration of his estates, he frequently consulted her. Moreover he +had an active, studious mind, and he found in her an interested companion +in his pursuits. Often they sat up until late into the night discussing +various questions, and both of them--smoking strong cigars! + +In 1836 her hand was asked in marriage by Prince Nicolaus von +Sayn-Wittgenstein. She thrice refused, but finally accepted him at her +father's instigation. The prince was a handsome but otherwise +commonplace man, and not at all the husband for this charming, mentally +alert and finely strung woman. The one happiness that came to her +through this marriage was her daughter Marie. + +Liszt came to Kiew on a concert tour in February, 1847. He announced a +charity concert, for which he received a contribution of one hundred +rubles from Princess Carolyne. He already had heard other, but she had +been described to him as a miserly and peculiar person. The gift +surprised him the more for this. He called on her to thank her, found +her a brilliant conversationalist, was charmed with her in every way, and +concluded that what the gossips considered peculiarities were merely the +evidences of an original and positive mentality. Upon the woman, who was +in revolt against the restraints of an unhappy married life, Liszt, from +whose eyes shone the divine spark, who was as much _au fait_ in the salon +as at the piano, and who already had been worshipped by a long succession +of women, made a deep impression. Thus they were drawn to each other at +this very first meeting. + +When, a little later, Liszt took her into his confidence regarding his +ambition to devote more time to composition, and communicated to her his +idea of composing a symphony on Dante's "Divine Comedy" with scenic +illustrations, she offered to pay the twenty thousand thalers which these +would cost. Liszt subsequently changed his mind regarding the need of +scenery to his "Dante," but the Princess's generous offer increased his +admiration for her. It was a tribute to himself as well as to his art, +and an expression of her confidence in his genius as a composer (shared +at that time by but few) which could not fail to touch him deeply. It at +once created a bond of artistic and personal sympathy between them. She +was carried away by his playing, and the programme of his first concert +which she attended was treasured by her, and after her death, forty years +later, was found among her possessions by her daughter. + +[Illustration: Liszt at the piano.] + +If it was not love at first sight between these two, it must have been +nearly that. Liszt came to Kiew in February, 1847. The same month +Carolyne invited him to visit her at one of her country seats, Woronince. +Brief correspondence already had passed between them. To his fifth note +he adds, as a postscript, "I am in the best of humor . . . and find, now +that the world contains Woronince, that the world is good, very good!" + +The great pianist continued his tour to Constantinople. When he writes +to the Princess from there, he already "is at her feet." Later in the +same year he is hers "heart and soul." Early the following year he +quotes for her these lines from "Paradise Lost:" + + "For contemplation he, and valour formed, + For softness she, and sweet attractive grace; + He for God only, she for God in him!" + +She presents him with a baton set with jewels; he writes to her about the +first concert at which he will use it. He transcribes Schubert's lovely +song, "My sweet Repose, My Peace art Thou," and tells her that he can +play it only for her. At the same time their letters to each other are +filled with references to public affairs and literary, artistic and +musical matters. They are the letters of two people of broad and +cultivated taste, who are drawn to each other by every bond of intellect +and sentiment. Is it a wonder that but little more than a year after +they met, the Princess decided to burn her bridges behind her and leave +her husband? Through his friend, Prince Felix Lichnowsky, Liszt arranged +that they should meet at Krzyzanowitz, one of the Lichnowsky country +seats in Austrian Silesia. "May the angel of the Lord lead you, my +radiant morning star!" he exclaims. At the same time he has an eye to +the practical side of the affair, and describes the place as just the one +for their meeting point, because Lichnowsky will be too busy to remain +there, and there will not be a soul about, save the servants. + +It was shortly before the revolution of 1848. To gain permission to +cross the border, the Princess pretended to be bound for Carlsbad, for +the waters. + +Liszt's valet met her and her daughter as soon as they were out of +Russia, took them to Ratibor, where they were received by Lichnowsky, who +conducted them to Liszt. After a few days at this place of meeting, they +went to Graz, where they spent a fortnight in another of the Lichnowsky +villas. Among the miscellaneous correspondence of Liszt is a letter from +Graz to his friend Franz von Schober, councillor of legation at Weimar, +where Liszt was settled as court conductor. In it he describes the +Princess as "without doubt an uncommonly and thoroughly brilliant example +of soul and mind and intelligence (with a prodigious amount of _esprit_ +as well). You readily will understand," he adds, "that henceforth I can +dream very little of personal ambition and of a future wrapped up in +myself. In political relations serfdom may have an end; but the dominion +of one soul over another in the spirit region--should that not remain +indestructible?"--Oh, Liszt's prophetic soul! Thereafter his life was +shaped by this extraordinary woman, for weal and, it must be confessed, +for reasons which will appear later, partly for woe. + +The Grandduchess of Weimar took the Princess under her protection, and +she settled at Weimar in the Altenburg, while Liszt lived in the Hotel +zum Erbprinzen. Many tender missives passed between them. "Bonjour, mon +bon ange!" writes Liszt. "On vous aime et vous adore du matin au soir et +du soir au matin."--"On vous attend et vous bénit, chère douce lumière de +mon âme!"--"Je suis triste comme toujours et toutes les fois que je +n'entends pas votre voix--que je ne regarde pas vos yeux." + +[Illustration: The Princess Carolyne in her later years at Rome.] + +One of the billets relates to an incident that has become historic. +Wagner had been obliged, because of his participation in the revolution, +to flee from Dresden. He sought refuge with Liszt in Weimar, but, +learning that the Saxon authorities were seeking to apprehend him, +decided to continue his flight to Switzerland. He was without means and, +at the moment, Liszt, too, was out of funds. In this extremity, Liszt +despatched a few lines to the Princess. "Can you send me by bearer sixty +thalers? Wagner is obliged to flee, and I am unable at present to come +to his aid. _Bonne et heureuse nuit_." The money was forthcoming, and +Wagner owed his safety to the Princess. This is but one instance in +which, at Liszt's instigation, she was the good fairy of poor musicians. +About a year after the Princess settled in the Altenburg, Liszt, too, +took up his residence there. From that time until they left it, it was +the Mecca of musical Europe. Thither came Von Bülow and Rubinstein, then +young men; Joachim and Wieniawski; Brahms, on his way to Schumann, who, +as the result of this visit from Brahms, wrote the famous article hailing +him as the coming Messiah of music; Berlioz, and many, many others. The +Altenburg was the headquarters of the Wagner propaganda. From there came +material and artistic comfort to Wagner during the darkest hours of his +exile and poverty. + +Wendelin Weissheimer, a German orchestral leader, a friend of Liszt and +Wagner, and of many other notable musicians of his day, has given in his +reminiscences (which should have been translated long ago) a delightful +glimpse of life at the Altenburg. He describes a dinner at which Von +Bronsart, the composer, and Count Laurencin, the musical writer, were the +other guests. At table the Princess did the honors "most graciously," +and her "divinity," Franz Liszt, was in "buoyant spirits." After the +champagne, the company rose and went upstairs to the smoking-room and +music salon, which formed one apartment, "for with Liszt, smoking and +music-making were, on such occasions, inseparable." One touch in +Weissheimer's description recalls the Princess's early acquired habit of +smoking. + +"He [Liszt] always had excellent Havanas, of unusual length, ready, and +they were passed around with the coffee. The Princess also had come +upstairs. When Liszt sat down at one of the two pianos, she drew an +armchair close up to it and seated herself expectantly, also with one of +the long Havanas in her mouth and pulling delectably at it. We others, +too, drew up near Liszt, who had the manuscript of his 'Faust' symphony +open before him. Of course he played the whole orchestra; of course the +way in which he did it was indescribable; and--of course we all were in +the highest state of exaltation. After the glorious 'Gretchen' division +of the symphony, the Princess sprang up from the armchair, caught hold of +Liszt and kissed him so fervently that we all were deeply moved. [In the +interim her long Havana had gone out.]" + +The years which Liszt passed with the Princess at the Altenburg, and when +he was most directly under her influence, were the most glorious in his +career. Besides the "Faust" symphony, he composed during this period the +twelve symphonic poems, thus originating a new and highly important +musical form, which may be said to bear, in their liberation from +pedantry, the same relation to the set symphony that the music drama does +to opera; the "Rhapsodies Hongroises;" his piano sonata and concertos; +the "Graner Messe;" and the beginnings of his "Christus" and "Legend of +the Holy Elizabeth." The Princess ordered the household arrangements in +such a way that the composer should not be disturbed in his work. No one +was admitted to him without her _visé_; she attended to the voluminous +correspondence which, with a man of so much natural courtesy as Liszt, +would have occupied an enormous amount of his time. He was the +acknowledged head of the Wagner movement, at that time regarded as +nothing short of revolutionary; he was looked upon as the friend of all +progressive propaganda in his art; to play for Liszt, to have his opinion +on performance or composition, was the ambition of every musical +celebrity, or would-be one; his cooperation in innumerable concerts and +music festivals was sought for. His was a name to conjure with. Between +him and these assaults on his almost proverbial kindness stood the +Princess, and the list of his great musical productions during this +period, to say nothing of his literary work, like the rhapsody on Chopin, +is the tale of what the world owes her for her devotion. The relations +between Liszt and the Princess were frankly acknowledged, and by the +world as frankly accepted, as if they were two exceptional beings in whom +one could pardon things which in the case of ordinary mortals would mean +social ostracism. The nearest approach to this situation was that of +George Eliot and Lewes. But with Liszt and his Princess the world, +possibly after the fashion of the Continent, was far more lenient, and +their lives in their outward aspects were far more brilliant. No exalted +mind in literature, music, art or science passed through Weimar, or came +near it, without being drawn to the Altenburg as by a magnet. There +seems to have been within its walls an almost uninterrupted intellectual +revel, or, to use a trite expression, which here is most apt, a steady +feast of reason and flow of soul. The sojourn of Liszt and the Princess +in the Altenburg was a "golden period" for Weimar, a revival of the time +when Goethe lived there and reflected his glory upon it. + +[Illustration: The Altenburg, Weimar, where Liszt and Carolyne lived.] + +And yet--convention is the result of the concentrated essence of the +experience of ages; and no one seems able to break through it without the +effort leaving a scar. It cast its shadow even over the life at the +Altenburg. There remained one great longing to the Princess, the +nonfulfilment of which was as a void in her soul. She yearned to bear +the name of the man she adored. During the twelve years of their Weimar +sojourn she battled for it, but in vain. Then she transferred the +battlefield to Rome. + +Her husband, a Protestant, had found no difficulty in securing a divorce +from her. She was an ardent Roman Catholic, and the church stood in her +way, her own relatives, who had been scandalized at her flight, being +active in invoking its opposition. She went to Rome in the spring of +1860, to press her suit at the very centre of churchly authority. Liszt +remained in Weimar awaiting word from her. It took her more than a year +to secure the Papal sanction. Then, when everything seemed auspiciously +settled and her marriage with Liszt a certainty, her enthusiasm led her +to take a step which, at the very last moment, proved fatal to her +long-cherished hope. + +Had she returned at once to Weimar, her union with Liszt undoubtedly +would have taken place. But no. In her joy she must go too far. In +Rome, there where the marriage had been interdicted, there where she had +successfully overcome opposition to it, there it should take place. Her +triumph should be complete. + +Liszt was sent for. His last two letters to her before their meeting in +Rome are dated from Marseilles in October, 1861. The marriage was to +take place October 22, his fiftieth birthday. He writes her from the +Hotel des Empereurs, himself "_plus heureux que tous les empereurs du +monde_!" and again, "_Mon long exil va finir_." Yet it was only just +beginning! + +He arrived in Rome on October 20. All arrangements for the ceremony in +the San Carlo al Corso had been made. Then, by a strange fatality, it +chanced that several of the Princess's relations, who were most bitter +against her, entered upon the scene. Of all times, they happened to be +in Rome at this critical moment, and, getting wind of the impending +marriage, they entered a violent protest. When, on the evening of the +21st, Liszt was visiting the Princess, a Papal messenger called and +announced that His Holiness had decided to forbid the ceremony until he +could look into the matter more fully, and requested from her a +resubmission of the documents bearing on the case. + +To the Princess, then on the threshold of realizing her most cherished +hopes, this was the last stroke. Her over-wrought nature saw in it a +Judgment of Heaven. She refused to resubmit the papers; and even, when a +few years later, Prince Wittgenstein died and she was free, she regarded +marriage with Liszt as opposed by the Divine will. A strain of +mysticism, nurtured by busy ecclesiastics, developed itself in her; she +became possessed of the idea that she was a chosen instrument in the +Church's hands to further its interests; and with feverish, desperate +energy she devoted herself to literary work as its champion. She had her +own press, which set up each day's work and showed it to her in proof the +next. She did not leave Rome except on one occasion, and then for less +than a day, during the remaining twenty-six years of her life. + +It has been hinted more than once that the Princess's course was not as +completely governed by religious mysticism as might be supposed--that her +sensitive nature had divined in Liszt an unexpressed opposition to the +marriage, as if, possibly, he did not wish to be tied down to her, yet +felt bound in honor, because of the sacrifices she had made for him, to +appear to share her hope. La Mara (Marie Lipsius), the editor of the +Liszt letters and whose interesting notes form the connecting links in +the correspondence, does not take this view. It is noticeable, however, +although Liszt and the Princess saw each other frequently whenever he was +in Rome, and he became an abbé probably through her influence, that while +in some of his letters to her in later years there are notes of regret, +those written after the crisis in Rome breathe an intellectual rather +than a personal affinity. + +Be this as it may, it was a tragedy in his life as well as in her own. +Practically the rest of his life was divided, each year, between +Budapest, at the Conservatory there; Weimar, but no longer at the +Altenburg; and Rome, but not at the Princess's residence, Piazza di +Spagna. Thus he had three homes--none of which was home. The "golden +period" of his life, as well as the Altenburg itself, where others now +were installed, were dim shadows of the past. Liszt was the "grand old +man" of the piano, and is a great figure among composers; but whoever +knows the story of the last years of his life, sees him a wandering and +pathetic figure. He died at Bayreuth in July, 1886; Carolyne survived +him less than a year. The literary work of her twenty-six years in Rome +probably will be forgotten; it will be the linking of her name with +Liszt, and its association with the "golden period" of Weimar, that will +cause her to be remembered. + + + + +Wagner and Cosima + +No woman not a professional musician has ever played so important a part +in musical history as "Frau Cosima," the widow of Richard Wagner. In +fact, has any woman, professional musician or not? Bear in mind who +"Frau Cosima" is. She is the daughter of Franz Liszt, the greatest +pianist and one of the great composers of the last century, and was the +wife and, in the most exalted meaning of the term, the helpmeet of the +greatest of all composers! The two men with whom Cosima has thus stood +in such intimate relation are exceptional even among great musicians. +Composers are usually strongly emotional, inspired in all that pertains +to their art, but with a specialist's lack of interest in everything +else. Not so, however, Liszt or Wagner, for not since the time of +Beethoven had there been two musicians who, in the exercise of their art, +approached it from so clear an intellectual standpoint. Beethoven +through the greatness of his mind was able to enlarge the symphonic form, +which had been left by Haydn and Mozart. It became more responsive, more +plastic, in his hands. Form in art is the creation of the intellect; +what goes into it is the outflow of the heart. Thus Liszt created the +Symphonic Poem, and Wagner completely revolutionized the musical stage by +creating the Music-Drama. Into the Symphonic Poem, into the Music-Drama, +they put their hearts; but the creation of these forms was in each an +intellectual _tour de force_. The musician who thinks as well as feels +is the one who advances his art. In the historic struggle between Wagner +and the classicists Liszt played a large part. He was the first to +produce "Lohengrin"--was, as orchestral conductor, its subtle +interpreter, and, thus, a pioneer of the new school; he was Wagner's +steadfast champion through life, and a beautiful friendship existed +between "Richard" and "Franz." + +[Illustration: Richard Wagner. From the original lithograph of the +Egusquiza portrait.] + +Even now the reader can begin to realize the rôle Cosima has played in +music. That she is the daughter of Liszt is not in itself wonderful, but +that she should have fulfilled the mission to which she was born is one +of the most exquisite touches of fate. Liszt was one of Wagner's first +champions and friends. He came to the composer's aid in the darkest +years of his career--during that long exile after Wagner had been obliged +to flee from Germany because of his participation in the revolution of +1848. It was, in fact, through Liszt that Wagner received the means to +continue his flight from the Saxon authorities and cross the border to +safety in Switzerland. + +Nor did Liszt's beneficence stop there. From afar he continued to be +Wagner's good fairy. To fully appreciate Liszt's action at this time, +one must keep in mind the position of the Saxon composer. To-day his +fame is world-wide; we can scarcely realize that there was a time when +his genius was not recognized, but at that time he was not famous at all. +Those who had the slightest premonition of what the future would accord +him were a mere handful of enthusiasts. Such a thing as a Wagner cult +was undreamed of. He had produced three works for the stage. "Rienzi" +had been a brilliant success, "The Flying Dutchman" a mere _succès +d'estime_, "Tannhäuser" a comparative failure. From a popular point of +view he had not sustained the promise of his first work. We know now +that compared with his second and third works "Rienzi" is trash, and that +rarely has a composer made such wonderful forward strides in his art as +did Wagner with "The Flying Dutchman" and "Tannhäuser." But that was not +the opinion when they were produced. The former, although it is now +acknowledged to be an exquisitely poetic treatment of the weird legend, +was voted sombre and dull, and "Tannhäuser" was simply a puzzle. After +listening to "Tannhäuser," Schumann declared that Wagner was unmusical! +Unless a person is familiar with Wagner's life, it is impossible to +believe how bitter was the opposition to his theories and to his music. +Does it seem possible now that he had to struggle for twenty-five years +before he could secure the production of his "Ring of the Nibelung"? Yet +such was the case. Then, too, he was poor, and sometimes driven to such +straits that he contemplated suicide. + +When the public remained indifferent to one of his works and critics +reviled it, Wagner's usual method of reply was to produce something still +more advanced. Thus, when "Tannhäuser" proved caviar to the public, and +seemed to affect the critics like a red rag waved before a bull, he +promptly sat down and wrote and composed "Lohengrin." But how should he, +an exile, secure its production? There it lay a mute score. As he +turned its pages, the notes looked out at him appealingly for a hearing. +It was like a homesick child asking for its own. What did Wagner do? He +wrote a few lines to Liszt. The answer was not long in coming. Liszt +was already making the necessary arrangements to accede to Wagner's +request and produce "Lohengrin" in Weimar, where he was musical director. +Liszt's name gave great _éclat_ to the undertaking; and through the +acclaim which, with the aid of his pupils and admirers, he understood so +well how to create, it attracted widespread attention, musicians from far +and near in Germany coming to hear it. Of course, opinions on the work +were divided, but the band of Wagner enthusiasts received accessions, and +the interest in the production had been too intense not to leave an +impression. The performance was, in fact, epoch-making. It raised a +"Wagner question" which would not down; which kept at least his earlier +works before the public; and which made him, even while still a fugitive +from Germany, and an exile, a prominent figure in the musical circles of +the country that refused him the right to cross its borders. + +All this was done by Liszt. Next to Wagner's own genius, which would +eventually have fought its way into the open, the influence that first +brought Wagner some degree of recognition was Franz Liszt. His +assistance to Wagner at this stage in that composer's career cannot be +overestimated. He was his tonic in despair, his solace in his darkest +hours. Few men appear in a nobler rôle than Liszt in his correspondence +with Wagner during this period. Is it not marvellous that some twenty +years later, at another crisis in Wagner's life, another being came to +his aid and became to him as a haven of rest; and that that being should +have been none other than the daughter of his earlier benefactor, Franz +Liszt? Fate often is cruel and often unaccountable, but in this instance +it seems to have acted the rôle of Cupid with an exquisite sense of what +was appropriate, and to have set the crowning glory of a great woman's +love upon Wagner's career. + +When Liszt was producing "Lohengrin," aiding Wagner pecuniarily, and +cheering him in his exile, Cosima Liszt was a young girl in Paris, where +she, her elder sister Blandine (afterward the wife of Emile Ollivier, who +became the war minister of Napoleon the Third) and her brother Daniel +lived with Liszt's mother. It was in Mme. Liszt's house that Wagner +first met her. He had gone to Paris in hopes of furthering his cause +there. During his sojourn he held a reading of his libretto to "The Ring +of the Nibelung" at Mme. Liszt's before a choice audience, which included +Liszt, Berlioz and Von Bülow. This occurred in the early fifties. +Cosima, who was among the listeners, was at the time fifteen or sixteen +years old. The mere fact of her presence at the reading is recorded. +Whether she was impressed with the libretto or its author we do not know. +It is probable that their meeting consisted of nothing more than the mere +formal introduction of the composer to the girl who was the daughter of +his friend Liszt, and who was to be one of the small and privileged +gathering at the reading. Wagner soon left Paris, and if she made any +impression on him at that time, he does not mention the fact in his +letters. + +[Illustration: Cosima, wife of Wagner. From a portrait bust made before +her marriage.] + +Whoever takes the trouble to read Liszt's correspondence, which is in +seven volumes and nearly all in French, will have little difficulty in +discerning that Cosima was his favorite child. He speaks of her +affectionately as "Cosette" and "Cosimette." Like his own, her +temperament was artistic and responsive, and she also inherited his charm +of manner and his exquisite tact, which, if anything, her early bringing +up in Paris enhanced. In 1857, when she was twenty, Wagner saw her again +and describes her as "Liszt's wonderful image, but of superior intellect." + +Well might Wagner speak of her resemblance to her father as wonderful. I +have seen Liszt and Cosima together, on an occasion to be referred to +later, and was struck with the remarkable likeness between father and +daughter. Both were idealists; if he had his eyes upon the stars, so had +she. Here is a passage from one of Liszt's letters: + +"_Une pensée favorite de Cosima:' De quelque coté qu'un tourne la torche, +la flamme se redresse et monte vers le ciel._'" ("A favorite thought of +Cosima's: Whichever way you may turn the torch, the flame turns on itself +and still points toward the heavens.'") + +A woman whose life holds that motto is in herself an inspiration. +Whatever turn fortune takes, her aspirations still blaze the way. She +herself is the torch of her motto. + +Although not a musician, although keeping herself consistently in the +background during Wagner's life (much as a mere private secretary would), +her influence at Bayreuth was continually felt; and since his death she +has been the head and front of the Wagner movement, and yet without +seeking publicity. Her intellectual force quietly assured her the +succession. There have been protests against her absolute rule, but she +has serenely ignored them. She still moulds to her will all the forces +concerned in the Bayreuth productions. + +When Mme. Nordica was preparing to sing "Elsa" at Bayreuth, it was Frau +Cosima who went over the rôle with her, sometimes repeating a single +phrase a hundred times in order to assure the correct pronunciation of +one word. It taxed the singer to the utmost; but she found Wagner's +widow willing to work as long and as hard as she herself would. The +performance established Mme. Nordica as a Wagner singer. Despite the +criticisms that have been heaped upon Frau Wagner for assuming to set +herself up as the great conservator of Wagnerian traditions, it is +significant that when, some years later, Mme. Nordica decided to add +"Sieglinde" to her repertoire, but with no special purpose of singing it +at Bayreuth, she arranged with Frau Cosima to go over the rôle with her, +and in order to do so made a trip to Switzerland, where the former was +staying. So far as adding to her reputation was concerned, there was not +the slightest reason for Mme. Nordica to do this. That the American +prima donna elected to study with Frau Cosima shows that she must have +found Wagner's widow a woman of rare temperament. + +Cosima was not Wagner's first love, nor even his first wife. For in +November, 1836, he had married Wilhelmina Planer, the leading actress of +the theatre in Magdeburg where he was musical director of opera. Her +father was a spindle-maker. It is said that her desire to earn money for +the household, rather than the impetus of a well-defined histrionic gift, +led her to go on the stage; but, once on the stage, she discovered that +she had unquestionable talent, and played leading characters in tragedy +and comedy with success. + +Minna is described as handsome, but not strikingly so; of medium height +and slim figure, with "soft, gazelle-like eyes which were a faithful +index of a tender heart." Later, however, the Princess Sayn-Wittgenstein +wrote to Liszt that she was too stout, but praised her management of the +household and her excellent cuisine. Her nature was the very opposite of +Wagner's. Where he was passionate, strong-willed and ambitious, she was +gentle, affectionate and retiring. Where he yearned for conquest, she +wanted only a well-regulated home. But she could not follow him in his +art theories, and as they assumed more definite shape she became less and +less able to comprehend them and, finally, they became almost a sealed +book to her. + +[Illustration: Richard and Cosima Wagner.] + +Doubtless, the ill success of "The Flying Dutchman" and "Tannhäuser," +works which, after "Rienzi," puzzled people, engendered her first +misunderstanding of Wagner's genius. Some may be surprised that this +lack of appreciation did not bring about a separation sooner, instead of +after nearly a quarter of a century of married life. But when a man is +struggling with poverty, the woman who unobtrusively aids him in bearing +it is regarded by him as an angel of light, and the question as to +whether she appreciates his genius or not becomes a secondary one in the +struggle for existence. + +But when at last there is some promise of success, some relief from +drudgery, and with it a little leisure for companionship--then, too, +there is opportunity for an estimate of intellectual quality. Then it is +that the man of genius discovers that the woman who has stood by him +through his poverty lacks the graces of mind necessary to his complete +happiness, and the self-sacrificing wife who has been his drudge, in +order that he might the better meet want, and who has perhaps lost her +youth and her looks in his service, is forgotten for some one else. The +worst of it is that the world forgets her and all she has done for the +great man in her quiet, uncomplaining way. The drudge never finds a page +in the "Loves of the Poets." The woman who comes in and reaps where the +other has sown, does. + +Wagner's friend, Ferdinand Praeger, has much to say of Minna's fine +qualities. But he also tells several anecdotes which completely +illustrate how absolutely she failed to comprehend Wagner's genius and +ambition. Praeger visited them in their "trimly kept Swiss chalet" in +Zurich in the summer of 1856. One day when Praeger and Minna were seated +at the luncheon table waiting for Wagner, who was scoring the "Nibelung," +to come down from his study, she asked: "Now, honestly, is Richard really +such a great genius?" Remember that this question was asked about the +composer of "The Flying Dutchman," "Tannhäuser" and "Lohengrin." If she +was unable to discover his genius in these, how could she be expected to +follow its loftier flights in his later works? + +On another occasion when Wagner was complaining that the public did not +understand him, she said: "Well, Richard, why don't you write something +for the gallery?" So little did she understand the man whose genius was +founded upon unswerving devotion to artistic truth. + +During Praeger's visit, a former singer at the Magdeburg opera and her +two daughters called on Wagner. They sang the music of the +Rhine-daughters from "Rheingold." When they finished singing, Minna +asked Praeger: "Is it really as beautiful as you say? It does not seem +so to me, and I'm afraid it would not sound so to others." + +While, as can be shown from passages in his correspondence, Wagner +appreciated the homely virtues of his first wife, and never, even after +they had separated, allowed a word to be spoken against her, the last +years of their married life were stormy. She had been tried beyond her +strength, and, not sharing her husband's enormous confidence in his +artistic powers, she had not the stimulus of his faith in his ultimate +success to sustain her. Moreover a heart trouble with which she was +afflicted resulted, through the strain to which their uncertain material +condition subjected her, in a growing irritability which was accentuated +by jealousy of women who entered the growing circle of Wagner's admirers +as his genius began to be appreciated. + +The crisis came in 1858, when they separated, Minna retiring to Dresden. +Two years later, when Wagner was ill in Paris, she went there and nursed +him, but they separated again. An interesting fact, not generally known, +is that, in 1862, when Wagner was in Biebrich on the Rhine composing his +"Meistersinger," Minna came from Dresden as a surprise to pay him a +visit--evidently an effort to effect a reconciliation. Wendelin +Weissheimer, a conductor at the opera in Mayeuse on the opposite bank of +the river and a close friend of Wagner's at that time, has left an +enlightening record of the episode. + +Wagner, he says, "the heaven-storming genius, who knew no bounds, tried +to play the rôle of Hausvater--of loving husband and comforter. He had +some cold edibles brought in from the hotel, made tea, and himself boiled +half a dozen eggs. [What a picture! The composer of 'Tristan' boiling +eggs!] Afterwards he put on one of his familiar velvet dressing-gowns and +a fitting barretta, and proceeded to read aloud the book of 'Die +Meistersinger.' + +"The first act passed off without mishap save for some unnecessary +questions from Minna. But at the beginning of the second act, when he +had described the stage-setting--'to the right the cobbler shop of Hans +Sachs; to the left,' etc.,--Minna exclaimed: + +"'And here sits the audience!' at the same time letting a bread-ball roll +over Wagner's manuscript. That ended the reading." + +The visit of course was futile. Minna returned to Dresden, where she +died in 1866. Poor Minna! A good cook, but she did not appreciate his +genius, would seem to sum up her story. Yet it is but just that we +should pay at least a passing salute to this woman who was the love of +Wagner's youth and the drudge of his middle life, and who, from the +distance of her lonely separation, saw him basking in the favor of the +king, who, too late for her, had become his munificent patron.--What a +contrast between her fate and Cosima's! + +[Illustration: Richard and Cosima Wagner entertaining in their home +Wahnfried, Liszt, and Hans von Wolzogen. Painting by W. Beckmann.] + +Were it not for Liszt's letters, meagre would be the information +regarding Cosima before her marriage to Wagner. But by going over his +voluminous correspondence and picking out references to her here and +there, I am able to give at least some idea of her earlier life. + +This extraordinary woman, who brought Wagner so much happiness and of +whom it may be said that no other woman ever played so important a part +in the history of music, came to her many graces and accomplishments by +right of birth. She was the daughter of Liszt and the Countess d'Agoult, +a French author, better known under her pen name of "Daniel Stern." Thus +she had genius on one side of her parentage and distinguished talent on +the other; and, on both sides, rare personal charm and tact. + +The Countess d'Agoult's father, Viscount Flavigny, was an old Royalist +nobleman. While an émigré during the revolution, he had married the +beautiful daughter of the Frankfort banker, Bethman. After the Flavignys +returned to France, their daughter, an extremely beautiful blonde, was +brought up, partly at the Flavigny château, partly at the Sacré Coeur de +Marie, in Paris. Talented beyond her years, her wit and beauty won her +much admiration. At an early age she married Count Charles d'Agoult, a +French officer, a member of the old aristocracy and twenty years her +senior. + +When she first met Liszt she was twenty-nine years old, had been married +six years and was the mother of three children. She still was beautiful, +and in her salon she gathered around her men and women of rank, _esprit_ +and fame. In 1835 Liszt left Paris after the concert season there. The +Countess followed him, and the next heard of them they were in +Switzerland. They remained together six years, Cosima, born in 1837, +being one of the three children resulting from the union. In the +Countess's relations with Liszt there appears to have been a curious +mingling of _la grande passion_ and hauteur. For when, soon after she +had joined him in Switzerland, he urged her to secure a divorce in order +that they might marry, she drew herself up and replied: "_Madame la +Comtesse d'Agoult ne sera jamais Madame Liszt_!" Certainly none but a +Frenchwoman would have been capable of such a reply under the same +circumstances. Equally French was her husband's remark when, the +Countess's support having been assumed by Liszt, he expressed the opinion +that throughout the whole affair the pianist had behaved like a man of +honor. + +After the separation of Liszt and Countess d'Agoult, he entrusted the +care of the three children to his mother. During a brief sojourn in +Paris, Wagner met Cosima, then a girl of sixteen, for the first time. +She formed with Liszt, Von Bülow, Berlioz and a few others the very +small, but extremely select, audience which, at the house of Liszt's +mother, heard Wagner read selections from his "Nibelung" dramas. In +1855, the burden of the care of the children falling too heavily upon +Liszt's mother, the duty of looking after the daughters was cheerfully +undertaken by the mother of Hans von Bülow, who resided in Berlin. + +In a letter written by Von Bülow in June, 1856, he speaks of them in +these interesting terms: "These wonderful girls bear their name with +right--full of talent, cleverness and life, they are interesting +personalities, such as I have rarely met. Another than I would be happy +in their companionship. But their evident superiority annoys me, and the +impossibility to appear sufficiently interesting to them prevents my +appreciating the pleasure of their society as much as I would like +to--there you have a confession, the candor of which you will not deny. +It is not very flattering for a young man, but it is absolutely true." +Yet, a year later, he married Cosima, one of the girls whose +"superiority" so annoyed him. + +How strange, in view of what happened later, that Von Bülow so planned +his wedding trip that its main objective was a visit to Zurich in order +that he might present Cosima to Wagner, who had not seen her since she +had formed one of his audience at the "Rheingold" reading in Paris. It +is in a letter to his friend, Richard Pohl, written the day before his +wedding, that Von Bülow mentions the "Wagnerstadt," Zurich, as the aim of +his wedding journey. Was it Fate--or fatality--that led him thither with +Cosima? The daughter of Liszt, the bride of Von Bülow, being conducted +on her honeymoon to the very lair of the great composer for whom she was, +within a few years, to leave her husband! What wonderful musical links +destiny wove in the life of this woman who herself was not a musician! + +Hans and Cosima arrived at Zurich early in September. "For the last +fortnight," writes Von Bülow, under date of September 19, 1857, "I and my +wife have been living in Wagner's house, and I do not know anything else +that could have afforded me such benefit, such refreshment as being +together with this wonderful, unique man, whom one should worship as a +god." + +On his side Wagner was charmed with the Von Bülows. In one of his +letters he speaks of their visit as his most delightful experience of the +summer. "They spent three weeks in our little house; I have rarely been +so pleasantly and delightfully affected as by their informal visit. In +the mornings they had to keep quiet, for I was writing my 'Tristan,' of +which I read them an act aloud every week. If you knew Cosima, you would +agree with me when I conclude that this young pair is wonderfully well +mated. With all their great intelligence and real artistic sympathy, +there is something so light and buoyant in the two young people that one +was obliged to feel perfectly at home with them." + +Wagner allowed them to depart only under promise that they would return +next year, which they did, to find a household on the verge of disruption +and to be unwilling witnesses to some of the closing scenes of Wagner's +first marriage. + +During her childhood in Paris Cosima was frail and delicate. Liszt, in +one of his letters, confesses that this caused him to regard her with a +deeper affection than he bestowed on her elder sister. Later he speaks +of her as a rare and beautiful nature of great and spontaneous charm. A +friend of Liszt's who saw her at the Altenburg in 1860 writes that she +was pale, slender, wan and thin to a degree, and that she crept through +the room like a shadow. Liszt was greatly concerned about her, for the +year previous her brother Daniel had died of consumption, and he feared +she might be stricken with the same malady. + +Daniel's death was a sad experience through which they passed together, +and which strengthened the ties of tenderness that drew Liszt to his +younger daughter. The son died in his father's arms and in her presence. +She had nursed him devotedly in his last illness. "Cosima tells me," +Liszt wrote, before he had seen Daniel on his sick-bed, "that the color +of his beard and of his hair has taken on a touch of brownish red, and +that he looks like a Christ by Correggio." Together, after Daniel's +death, they knelt beside his bed "praying to God that His will be +done--and that He reconcile us to that Divine will, in according us the +grace on our part to accept it without a murmur." + +Such a scene was a memory for a lifetime. Cosima herself, in one of her +letters, gives a beautiful description of her brother's passage from +life. "He fell back into the arms of death as into those of a guardian +angel, for whom he had been waiting a long time. There was no struggle; +without a distaste for life, he seemed, nevertheless, to have aspired +ardently toward eternity." + +With a pretty touch Liszt gives an idea of Cosima's interest in others. +It seems that a certain Frau Stilke was anxious to possess a gray dress +of moiré antique, and Liszt had persuaded the Princess Sayn-Wittgenstein +to place the necessary sum for buying it at his daughter's disposal. "In +order to estimate the cost," he writes, "Cosette has devised this +excellent formula: It should be a dress such as one would give to persons +who want a dress--only it is necessary that it should be gray and of +moiré antique to satisfy the ideal of taste of the person in question." + +Wagner does not seem to have seen Cosima after the Von Bülows' second +visit to him at Zurich until they came to him for a visit at Biebrich +during the summer of 1862. What a contrast Cosima must have seemed to +poor Minna who, in the same house and but a short time before, had +desecrated the manuscript of "Die Meistersinger" by allowing a bread-ball +to roll over it! Wagner's favorable opinion of Hans and Cosima underwent +a great change during their sojourn with him. In a letter, after +speaking of Von Bülow's depression owing to poor health, he writes: "Add +to this a tragic marriage; a young woman of extraordinary, quite +unprecedented, endowment, Liszt's wonderful image, but of superior +intellect." + +That this woman who so impressed Wagner was in her turn filled with +admiration for his gifts appears from two letters which, during the +summer of 1862, she wrote from Biebrich to her father. In one of these +she speaks enthusiastically of some of the "Tristan" music. The other +letter concerns "Die Meistersinger:" + +"The 'Meistersinger' is to Wagner's other conceptions what the 'Winter's +Tale' is to Shakespeare's other works. Its fantasy is founded on gayety +and drollery, and it has called up the Nuremberg of the Middle Ages, with +its guilds, its poet-artisans, its pedants, its cavaliers, to draw forth +the freshest laughter in the midst of the highest, the most ideal poetry." + +It is evident that two souls so sympathetic could not long remain in +proximity without craving a closer union. "Coming events cast their +shadows before," remarks one who often was present during the Biebrich +visit of the Von Bülows to Wagner. + +How deeply Cosima sympathized with Wagner's aims even then is shown by +another episode of this visit. One evening the composer outlined to his +friends his plans for "Parsifal," adding that it probably would be his +last work. The little circle was deeply affected, and Cosima wept. +Strange prescience! "Parsifal" was not produced until twenty years +later, yet it proved to be the finale of Wagner's life's labors. + +The incident has interest from another point of view. It shows that +Wagner had his plans for "Parsifal" fairly matured in 1862, and that it +was not, as some critics, who see in it a decadence of his powers, claim, +a late afterthought, designed to give to Bayreuth a curiosity somewhat +after the _façon_ of the Oberammergau "Passion Play." Decadence? Henry +T. Finck, the most consistent and eloquent champion Wagner has had in +America, sees in it no falling off in the composer's genius; nor do I. +Wagner's scores always fully voice his dramas,--"Parsifal" as completely +as any. The subject simply required different musical treatment from the +heroic "Ring of the Nibelung" and the impassioned "Tristan." + +In a letter written by Wagner in June, 1864, occurs this significant +sentence: "There is one good being who brightens my household." The +"good being" was Cosima, who from now on was destined to fill his life +with the sunshine of love and of devotion to his art. + +"Since I last saw you in Munich," Wagner writes to a friend, "I have not +again left my asylum, which in the meanwhile also has become the refuge +of her who was destined to prove that I could well be helped, and that +the axiom of my many friends, that 'I could not be helped,' was false! +She knew that I could be helped, and has helped me: she has defied every +disapprobation and taken upon herself every condemnation." + +This was written in June, 1870, a year after Cosima had borne him +Siegfried, and two months before their marriage. For in August, 1870, +the following announcement was sent out: + + +"We have the honor to announce our marriage, which took place on the 25th +of August of this year in the Protestant Church in Lucerne. + Richard Wagner. + Cosima Wagner, née Liszt. + +"August 25, 1870." + + +When, in 1882, I attended the first performance of "Parsifal" in +Bayreuth, I had frequent opportunity of seeing Wagner and Frau Cosima. +Probably the best view I had of them together, and of Franz Liszt at the +same time, was at a dinner given by Wagner to the artists who took part +in the performances. It was in one of the restaurants near the theatre +on the hill overlooking Bayreuth. Wagner's entrance upon the scene was +highly theatrical. All the singers and a few other guests had been +seated, and Liszt, Frau Cosima and Siegfried Wagner were in their places +when the door opened and in shot Wagner. It was as well calculated as +the entrance of the star in a play. On his way to his seat he stopped +and chatted a few moments with this one and that one. Instead of Wagner +sitting at the head of the table and his wife at the foot, they sat +together in the middle. It seemed impossible for him, though, to remain +seated more than a few minutes at a time, and he was jumping up and down +and running about the table all through the banquet. On the other side +of Wagner sat Liszt; on the other side of Frau Cosima, Siegfried Wagner, +then still a boy. Among the four there were two pairs of likenesses. +Liszt was gray; but, although Frau Cosima's hair was blonde, and her face +smooth and fair as compared with her father's, which was furrowed with +age and boldly aquiline, she was his child in every lineament. Moreover, +the quick, responsive lighting up of the features, her graceful bearing, +her tact--that these were inherited from him a brief surveillance of the +two sufficed to disclose. Combined with these fascinating, but after all +more or less superficial characteristics was the stamp of a rare +intellectual force on both faces. No one seeing them together needed to +be told that Cosima was a Liszt. + +Nor did any one need to be told that Siegfried was a Wagner. The boy was +as much like his father as his mother was like hers. Feature for +feature, Wagner was reproduced in his son. That there should be no trace +of the mother, and such a mother, in the boy's face struck me as +remarkable; but there was none. Siegfried Wagner was a veritable pocket +edition of his famous father. His later photographs as a young man show +that much of this likeness has disappeared. After dinner, there were +speeches. Wagner, his hand resting affectionately on Liszt's shoulder, +paid a feeling tribute to the man who had befriended him early in his +career and who had given him the precious wife at his side. I remember +as if it had been but last night the tenderness with which he spoke the +words _die theure Gattin_. + +It was a wonderful two or three hours, that banquet, with the numerous +notabilities present, and at least two great men, Liszt and Wagner, and +one great woman, the daughter of Liszt and the wife of Wagner; and the +experience is to be treasured all the more, because few of those present +saw Wagner again. Early in the following year he died at Venice. He is +buried in the garden back of Wahnfried, his Bayreuth villa. He was a +great lover of animals, and at his burial his two favorite dogs, Wotan +and Mark, burst through the bushes that surround the grave and joined the +mourners. One of these pets is buried near him, and on the slab is the +inscription: "Here lies in peace Wahnfried's faithful watcher and +friend--the good and handsome Mark." + +What Cosima was to Wagner is best told in Liszt's words, written to a +friend after a visit to Bayreuth, in 1872, when his favorite child had +been married to Wagner two years. "Cosima still is my terrible daughter, +as I used to call her,--an extraordinary woman and of the highest merit, +far above vulgar judgment, and worthy of the admiring sentiments which +she has inspired in all who have known her. She is devoted to Wagner +with an all-absorbing enthusiasm, like Senta to the Flying Dutchman--and +she will prove his salvation, because he listens to her and follows her +with keen perception." + +That Bayreuth with Wagner's death did not become a mere tradition, that +the Wagner performances still continue there, is due to Frau Cosima. She +is Bayreuth. No woman has made such an impression on the music of her +time as she. Yet she is not a musician! + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LOVES OF GREAT COMPOSERS*** + + +******* This file should be named 18138-8.txt or 18138-8.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/1/3/18138 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +https://www.gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/pglaf. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at https://www.gutenberg.org/about/contact + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: +https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + diff --git a/18138-8.zip b/18138-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..2ee92a6 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-8.zip diff --git a/18138-h.zip b/18138-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f8d4677 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h.zip diff --git a/18138-h/18138-h.htm b/18138-h/18138-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5142632 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/18138-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,3774 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Loves of Great Composers, by Gustav Kobbé</title> +<style type="text/css"> +BODY { color: Black; + background: White; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-size: medium; + font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; + text-align: justify } + +P {text-indent: 4% } + +P.noindent {text-indent: 0% } + +P.poem {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-size: small } + +P.letter {font-size: small } + + hr.full { width: 100%; + height: 5px; } + a:link {color:#0000ff; + text-decoration:none; } + link {color:#0000ff; + text-decoration:none; } + a:visited {color:#0000ff; + text-decoration:none; } + a:hover {color:#ff0000; + text-decoration: underline; } + pre {font-size: 75%; } + +</style> +</head> +<body> +<h1 align="center">The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Loves of Great Composers, by Gustav Kobbé</h1> +<pre> +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre> +<p>Title: The Loves of Great Composers</p> +<p>Author: Gustav Kobbé</p> +<p>Release Date: April 10, 2006 [eBook #18138]</p> +<p>Language: English</p> +<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p> +<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LOVES OF GREAT COMPOSERS***</p> +<br><br><center><h3>E-text prepared by Al Haines</h3></center><br><br> +<hr class="full" noshade> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<A NAME="img-front"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-front.jpg" ALT="Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (photogravure)" BORDER="2" WIDTH="240" HEIGHT="372"> +<H4> +[Frontispiece: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (photogravure)] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +The Loves of Great Composers +</H1> + +<BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +by Gustav Kobbé +</H2> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +Thomas Y. Crowell & Co. +<BR> +New York +</H4> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +Copyright, 1904 and 1905 +<BR> +By The Butterick Publishing Co. (Limited) +<BR> +Copyright, 1905, by Thomas Y. Crowell & Co. +<BR><BR> +Published September, 1905 +<BR><BR><BR> +Composition and electrotype plates by +<BR> +D. B. Updike, The Merrymount Press, Boston +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +To Charles Dwyer +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +Table of Contents +</H2> + +<BR> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap01"> +Mozart and his Constance +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap02"> +Beethoven and his "Immortal Beloved" +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap03"> +Mendelssohn and his Cécile +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap04"> +Chopin and the Countess Delphine Potocka +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap05"> +The Schumanns: Robert and Clara +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap06"> +Franz Liszt and his Carolyne +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap07"> +Wagner and Cosima +</A> +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +List of Illustrations +</H2> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-front"> +Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (photogravure) . . . . Frontispiece +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-006"> +Mozart at the Age of Eleven +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-016"> +Constance, Wife of Mozart +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-022"> +Ludwig van Beethoven +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-028"> +Countess Therese von Brunswick +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-040"> +"Beethoven at Heiligenstadt" +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-048"> +Félix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-054"> +Fanny Hensel, Sister of Mendelssohn +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-058"> +Cécile, Wife of Mendelssohn +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-064"> +The Mendelssohn Monument in Leipsic +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-072"> +Frédéric Chopin [missing from book] +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-080"> +Countess Potocka +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-086"> +The Death of Chopin +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-094"> +Robert Schumann +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-098"> +Robert and Clara Schumann, in 1847 +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-106"> +Clara Schumann at the Piano +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-110"> +The Schumann Monument in the Bonn Cemetery +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-116"> +Franz Liszt +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-120"> +Liszt at the Piano +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-124"> +The Princess Carolyne, in her Latter Years at Rome +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-130"> +The Altenburg, Weimar, where Liszt and Carolyne lived +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-140"> +Richard Wagner +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-146"> +Cosima, Wife of Wagner +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-152"> +Richard and Cosima Wagner +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-156"> +Richard and Cosima Wagner entertaining in their Home<BR> +Wahnfried, Liszt and Hans von Wolzogen +</A> +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap01"></A> +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +Mozart and His Constance +</H2> + +<BR> + +<P> +Nearly eight years after Mozart's death his widow, in response to a +request from a famous publishing house for relics of the composer, +sent, among other Mozartiana, a packet of letters written to her by her +husband. In transmitting these she wrote: +</P> + +<P> +"Especially characteristic is his great love for me, which breathes +through all the letters. Is it not true—those from the last year of +his life are just as tender as those written during the first year of +our marriage?" She added that she would like to have this fact +especially mentioned "to his honor" in any biography in which the data +she sent were to be used. This request was not prompted by vanity, but +by a just pride in the love her husband had borne her and which she +still cherished. The love of his Constance was the solace of Mozart's +life. +</P> + +<P> +The wonder-child, born in Salzburg in 1756, and taken by his father +from court to court, where he and his sister played to admiring +audiences, did not, like so many wonder-children, fade from public +view, but with manhood fulfilled the promise of his early years and +became one of the world's great masters of music. But his genius was +not appreciated until too late. The world of to-day sees in Mozart the +type of the brilliant, careless Bohemian, whom it loves to associate +with art, and long since has taken him to its heart. But the world of +his own day, when he asked for bread, offered him a stone. +</P> + +<P> +Mozart died young; he was only thirty-five. His sufferings were +crowded into a few years, but throughout these years there stood by his +side one whose love soothed his trials and brightened his life,—the +Constance whom he adored. What she wrote to the publishers was +strictly true. His last letters to her breathed a love as fervent as +the first. +</P> + +<P> +Some six months before he died, she was obliged to go to Baden for her +health. "You hardly will believe," he writes to her, "how heavily time +hangs on my hands without you. I cannot exactly explain my feelings. +There is a void that pains me; a certain longing that cannot be +satisfied, hence never ceases, continues ever, aye, grows from day to +day. When I think how happy and childlike we would be together in +Baden and what sad, tedious hours I pass here! I take no pleasure in +my work, because I cannot break it off now and then for a few words +with you, as I am accustomed to. When I go to the piano and sing +something from the opera ["The Magic Flute"], I have to stop right +away, it affects me so. <I>Basta</I>!—if this very hour I could see my way +clear to you, the next hour wouldn't find me here." In another letter +written at this time he kisses her "in thought two thousand times." +</P> + +<P> +When Mozart first met Constance, she was too young to attract his +notice. He had stopped at Mannheim on his way to Paris, whither he was +going with his mother on a concert tour. Requiring the services of a +music copyist, he was recommended to Fridolin Weber, who eked out a +livelihood by copying music and by acting as prompter at the theatre. +His brother was the father of Weber, the famous composer, and his own +family, which consisted of four daughters, was musical. Mozart's visit +to Mannheim occurred in 1777, when Constance Weber was only fourteen. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-006"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-006.jpg" ALT="Mozart at the age of eleven. From a painting by Van der Smissen in the Mozarteum, Salzburg." BORDER="2" WIDTH="357" HEIGHT="470"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Mozart at the age of eleven. <BR> +From a painting by Van der Smissen in the Mozarteum, Salzburg.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +Of her two older sisters the second, Aloysia, had a beautiful voice and +no mean looks, and the young genius was greatly taken with her from the +first. He induced his mother to linger in Mannheim much longer than +was necessary. Aloysia became his pupil; and under his tuition her +voice improved wonderfully. She achieved brilliant success in public, +and her father, delighted, watched with pleasure the sentimental +attachment that was springing up between her and Mozart. Meanwhile +Leopold Mozart was in Salzburg wondering why his wife and son were so +long delaying their further journey to Paris. +</P> + +<P> +When he received from Wolfgang letters full of enthusiasm over his +pupil, coupled with a proposal that instead of going to Paris, he and +his mother should change their destination to Italy and take the Weber +family along, in order that Aloysia might further develop her talents +there, he got an inkling of the true state of affairs and was furious. +He had large plans for his son, knew Weber to be shiftless and the +family poor, and concluded that, for their own advantage, they were +endeavoring to trap Wolfgang into a matrimonial alliance. Peremptory +letters sent wife and son on their way to Paris, and the elder Mozart +was greatly relieved when he knew them safely beyond the confines of +Mannheim. +</P> + +<P> +Mozart's stay in Paris was tragically brought to an end by his mother's +death. He set out for his return to Salzburg, intending, however, to +stop at Mannheim, for he still remembered Aloysia affectionately. +Finding that the Weber family had moved to Munich, he went there. But +as soon as he came into the presence of the beautiful young singer her +manner showed that her feelings toward him had cooled. Thereupon, his +ardor was likewise chilled, and he continued on his way to Salzburg, +where he arrived, much to his father's relief, still "unattached." +</P> + +<P> +When Mozart departed from Munich, he probably thought that he was +leaving behind him forever, not only the fickle Aloysia, but the rest +of the Weber family as well. How slight our premonition of fate! For, +if ever the inscrutable ways of Providence brought two people together, +those two were Mozart and Constance Weber. Nor was Aloysia without +further influence on his career. She married an actor named Lange, +with whom she went to Vienna, where she became a singer at the opera. +There Mozart composed for her the rôle of Constance in his opera, "The +Elopement from the Seraglio." For the eldest Weber girl, Josepha, who +had a high, flexible soprano, he wrote one of his most brilliant rôles, +that of the Queen of the Night in "The Magic Flute." I am anticipating +somewhat in the order of events that I may correct an erroneous +impression regarding Mozart's marriage, which I find frequently +obtains. He composed the rôle of Constance for Aloysia shortly before +he married the real Constance; and this has led many people to believe +that he took the younger sister out of pique, because he had been +rejected by Aloysia. Whoever believes this has a very superficial +acquaintance with Mozart's biography. Five years had passed since he +had parted from Aloysia at Munich. The youthful affair had blown over; +and when they met again in Vienna she was Frau Lange. Mozart's +marriage with Constance was a genuine love-match. It was bitterly +opposed by his father, who never became wholly reconciled to the woman +of his son's choice, and met with no favor from her mother. Fridolin +Weber had died. Altogether the omens were unfavorable, and there were +obstacles enough to have discouraged any but the most ardent couple. +So much for the pique story. +</P> + +<P> +Mozart went to Vienna in 1781 with the Archbishop of Salzburg, by whom, +however, he was treated with such indignity that he left his service. +Whom should he find in Vienna but his old friends the Webers! Frau +Weber was glad enough of the opportunity to let lodgings to Mozart, +for, as in Mannheim and Munich, the family was in straitened +circumstances. As soon as the composer's father heard of this +arrangement, he began to expostulate. Finally Mozart changed his +lodgings; but this step had the very opposite effect hoped for by +Leopold Mozart, for separation only increased the love that had sprung +up between the young people since they had met again in Vienna, and +Mozart had found the little fourteen-year-old girl of his Mannheim +visit grown to young womanhood. +</P> + +<P> +There seems little doubt that the Webers, with the exception of +Constance, were a shiftless lot. They had drifted from place to place +and had finally come to Vienna, because Aloysia had moved there with +her husband. When Mozart finally decided to marry Constance, come what +might, he wrote his father a letter which shows that his eyes were wide +open to the faults of the family, and by the calm, almost judicial, +manner in which he refers to the virtues of his future wife, that his +was no hastily formed attachment, based merely on superficial +attractions. +</P> + +<P> +He does not spare the family in his analysis of their traits. If he +seems ungallant in his references to his future Queen of the Night and +to the prima donna of his "Elopement from the Seraglio," to say nothing +of his former attachment for her, one must remember that this is a +letter from a son to a father, in which frankness is permissible. He +admits the intemperance and shrewishness of the mother; characterizes +Josepha as lazy and vulgar; calls Aloysia a malicious person and +coquette; dismisses the youngest, Sophie, as too young to be anything +but simply a good though thoughtless creature. Surely not an +attractive picture and not a family one would enter lightly. +</P> + +<P> +What drew him to Constance? Let him answer that question himself. +"But the middle one, my good, dear Constance," he writes to his father, +"is a martyr among them, and for that reason, perhaps, the best +hearted, cleverest, and, in a word, the best among them.… She is +neither homely nor beautiful. Her whole beauty lies in two small, dark +eyes and in a fine figure. She is not brilliant, but has common sense +enough to perform her duties as wife and mother. She is not +extravagant; on the contrary, she is accustomed to go poorly dressed, +because what little her mother can do for her children she does for the +others, but never for her. It is true that she would like to be +tastefully and becomingly dressed, but never expensively; and most of +the things a woman needs she can make for herself. She does her own +coiffure every day [head-dress must have been something appalling in +those days]; understands housekeeping; has the best disposition in the +world. We love each other with all our hearts. Tell me if I could ask +a better wife for myself?" +</P> + +<P> +The letter is so touchingly frank and simple that whoever reads it must +feel that the portrait Mozart draws of his Constance is absolutely true +to life. He makes no attempt to paint her as a paragon of beauty and +intellect. It is a picture of the neglected member of a +household—neglected because of her homely virtues, the one fair flower +blooming in the dark crevice of this shiftless menage. And at the end +of the letter is the one cry which, since the world was young, has +defied and brought to naught the doubting counsels of wiser heads: "We +love each other with all our hearts." +</P> + +<P> +The elder Mozart, fearful for his son's future, had kept himself +informed of what was going on in Vienna. He knew that when his son's +attentions to Constance became marked, her guardian had compelled him +to sign a promise of marriage. In this the father again saw a trap +laid for his son, who in worldly matters was as unversed as a child. +But Leopold Mozart did not know how the episode ended, and little +suspected that future generations would see in it one of the most +charming incidents in the love affairs of great men. For, when her +guardian had left the house, Constance asked her mother for the paper, +and as soon as she had it in her hands, tore it up, exclaiming: "Dear +Mozart, I do not need a written promise from you. I trust your words." +</P> + +<P> +Frau Weber saw in Mozart, the suitor, a possible contributor to the +household expenses, and as soon as she learned that he and Constance +intended to set up for themselves, she became bitterly opposed to the +match. Finally a titled lady, Baroness von Waldstadter, took the young +people under her protection, and Constance went to live with her to +escape her mother's nagging. Frau Weber then planned to force her +daughter to return to her by legal process. Immediate marriage was the +only method of escape from the scandal this would entail; and so, +August 4, 1782, Mozart and his Constance were married in the Church of +St. Stephen, Vienna. When at last they had all obstacles behind them +and stood at the altar as one, they were so overcome by their feelings +that they began to cry; and the few bystanders, including the priest, +were so deeply affected by their happiness that they too were moved to +tears. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-016"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-016.jpg" ALT="Constance, wife of Mozart. From an engraving by Nissen." BORDER="2" WIDTH="356" HEIGHT="567"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Constance, wife of Mozart. <BR> +From an engraving by Nissen.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +Although poor, Mozart, through his music, had become acquainted with +titled personages and was known at court. He and Constance, shortly +after their wedding, were walking in the Prater with their pet dog. To +make the dog bark, Mozart playfully pretended to strike Constance with +his cane. At that moment the Emperor, chancing to come out of a summer +house and seeing Mozart's action, which he misinterpreted, began +chiding him for abusing his wife so shortly after they had been +married. When his mistake was explained to him, he was highly amused. +Later he could not fail to hear of the couple's devotion. "Vienna was +witness to these relations," wrote a contemporary of Mozart's and +Constance's love for each other; and when Aloysia and her husband +quarrelled and separated, the Emperor, meeting Constance and referring +to her sister's troubles, said, "What a difference it makes to have a +good husband." +</P> + +<P> +In spite of poverty and its attendant struggles, Mozart's marriage was +a happy one, because it was a marriage of love. Like every child of +genius, he had his moods, but Constance adapted herself to them and +thereby won his confidence and gained an influence over him which, +however, she brought into play only when the occasion demanded. When +he was thinking out a work, he was absent-minded, and at such times she +always was ready to humor him, and even cut his meat for him at table, +as he was apt during such periods of abstraction to injure himself. +But when he had a composition well in mind, to put it on paper seemed +little more to him than copying; and then he loved to have her sit by +him and tell him stories—yes, regular fairy tales and children's +stories, as if he himself still were a child. He would write and +listen, drop his pen and laugh, and then go on with work again. The +day before the first performance of "Don Giovanni," when the final +rehearsal already had been held, the overture still remained unwritten. +It had to be written overnight, and it was she who sat by him and +relieved the rush and strain of work with her cheerful prattle. It is +said that, among other things, she read to him the story of "Aladdin +and the Wonderful Lamp." Be that as it may;—she rubbed the lamp, and +the overture to "Don Giovanni" appeared. +</P> + +<P> +Would that their life could be portrayed in a series of such charming +pictures! but grinding poverty was there also, and the bitterness of +disappointed hopes. His sensitive nature could not withstand the +repeated material shocks to which it was subjected. And the pity is, +that it gave way just when there seemed a prospect of a change. "The +Magic Flute" had been produced with great success, and that in the face +of relentless opposition from envious rivals; and orders from new +sources and on better terms were coming to him. But the turn of the +tide was too late. When he received an order for a Requiem from a +person who wished his identity to remain unknown—he was subsequently +discovered to be a nobleman, who wanted to produce the work as his +own—Mozart already felt the hand of death upon him and declared that +he was composing the Requiem for his own obsequies. Even after he was +obliged to take to his bed, he worked at it, saying it was to be <I>his</I> +Requiem and must be ready in time. The afternoon before he died, he +went over the completed portions with three friends, and at the +Lachrymosa burst into tears. In the evening he lost consciousness, and +early the following morning, December 5, 1791, he passed away. The +immediate cause of death was rheumatic fever with typhoid +complications, and his distracted widow, hoping to catch the same +disease and be carried away by it, threw herself upon his bed. She was +too prostrated to attend his funeral, which, be it said to the shame of +his friends, was a shabby affair. The day was stormy, and after the +service indoors they left before the actual burial, which was in one of +the "common graves," holding ten or twelve bodies and intended to be +worked over every few years for new interments. When, as soon as +Constance was strong enough, she visited the cemetery there was a new +grave-digger, who upon being questioned could not locate her husband's +grave, and to this day Mozart's last resting-place is unknown. +</P> + +<P> +It must not be reckoned against Constance that, eighteen years after +Mozart's death, she married again. For she did not forget the man on +whom her heart first was set. Her second husband, Nissen, formerly +Danish chargé d'affaires in Vienna, is best known by the biography of +Mozart which he wrote under her guidance. They removed to Mozart's +birthplace, Salzburg, where Nissen died in 1826. Constance's death was +strangely associated with Mozart's memory. It was as if in her last +moments she must go back to him who was her first love. For she died +in Salzburg, on March 6, 1842, a few hours after the model for the +Mozart monument, which adorns one of the spacious squares of the city +where the composer was born, was received there. She had been the +life-love of a child of genius and, without being singularly gifted +herself, had understood how to humor his whims and adapt herself to his +moods in which sunshine often was succeeded by shadow. It was +singularly appropriate that, surviving him many years, she yet died +under circumstances which formed a new link between her and his memory. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap02"></A> +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +Beethoven and his "Immortal Beloved" +</H2> + +<BR> + +<P> +One day when Baron Spaun, an old Viennese character and a friend of +Beethoven's, entered the composer's lodgings, he found the man, every +line of whose face denoted, above all else, strength of character, +bending over a portrait of a woman and weeping, as he muttered, "You +were too good, too angelic!" A moment later, he had thrust the +portrait into an old chest and, with a toss of his well-set head, was +his usual self again. +</P> + +<P> +As Spaun was leaving, he said to the composer, "There is nothing evil +in your face to-day, old fellow." +</P> + +<P> +"My good angel appeared to me this morning," was Beethoven's reply. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-022"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-022.jpg" ALT="Ludwig van Beethoven" BORDER="2" WIDTH="363" HEIGHT="499"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Ludwig van Beethoven] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +After the composer's death, in 1827, the portrait was found in the old +chest, and also a letter, in his handwriting and evidently written to a +woman, whose name, however, was not given, but who was addressed by +Beethoven as his "Immortal Beloved." The letter was regarded as a +great find, and biographer after biographer has stated that it must +have been written to the Countess Giulietta Guicciardi, to whom he +dedicated the famous "Moonlight Sonata." There was, however, one +woman, who survived Beethoven more than thirty years, and who, during +that weary stretch of time, knew whose was the portrait that had been +found in the old chest and the identity of the woman who had returned +to him the letter addressed to his "Immortal Beloved," after the +strange severance of relations which both had continued to hold sacred. +But she suffered in silence, and never even knew what had become of the +picture. +</P> + +<P> +This precious picture, which Beethoven had held in his hands and wetted +with his tears, passed, with his death, into the possession of his +brother Carl's widow. No one knew who it was, or took any interest in +it. In 1863 a Viennese musician, Joseph Hellmesberger, succeeded in +having Beethoven's remains transferred to a metallic casket, and the +Beethoven family, in recognition of his efforts, made him a present of +the portrait. Later it was acquired by the Beethoven Museum, in Bonn, +where the master was born in 1772. There it hangs beside his own +portrait, and on the back still can be read the inscription, in a +feminine hand: +</P> + +<P> +"<I>To the rare genius, the great artist, and the good man, from T. B.</I>" +</P> + +<P> +Who was "T. B."? If some one who had recently seen the Bonn portrait +should chance to visit the National Museum in Budapest, he would come +upon the bust of a woman whose features seemed familiar to him. They +would grow upon him as those of the woman with the yellow shawl over +her light-brown hair, a drapery of red on her shoulders and fastened at +her throat, who had looked out at him from the Bonn portrait. The +bust, made at a more advanced age, he would find had been placed in the +museum in honor of the woman who founded the first home for friendless +children in the Austrian Empire; and her name? Countess Therese +Brunswick. She was Beethoven's "Immortal Beloved." "T. B."—Therese +Brunswick. She was the woman who knew that the portrait found in the +old chest was hers; and that the letter had been received by her +shortly after her secret betrothal to Beethoven, and returned by her to +him when he broke the engagement because he loved her too deeply to +link her life to his. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-028"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-028.jpg" ALT="Countess Therese von Brunswick. From the portrait by Ritter von Lampir in the Beethoven-Haus at Bonn. Redrawn by Reich." BORDER="2" WIDTH="353" HEIGHT="436"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Countess Therese von Brunswick. <BR> +From the portrait by Ritter von Lampir in the Beethoven-Haus at Bonn. <BR> +Redrawn by Reich.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +The tragedy of their romance lay in its non-fulfilment. Beethoven was +a man of noble nature, yet what had he to offer her in return for her +love? His own love, it is true. But he was uncouth, stricken with +deafness, and had many of the "bad moments" of genius. He foresaw +unhappiness for both, and, to spare her, took upon himself the great +act of renunciation. We need only recall him weeping over the picture +of his Therese. And Therese? To her dying day she treasured his +memory. Very few shared her secret. Her brother Franz, Beethoven's +intimate friend, knew it. Baron Spaun also divined the cause of his +melancholy. Some years after the composer's death, Countess Therese +Brunswick conceived a great liking for a young girl, Miriam Tenger, +whom she had taken under her care for a short period, until a suitable +school was selected for her in Vienna. When the time for parting came, +Miriam burst into tears and clung to the Countess's hand. +</P> + +<P> +"Child! Child!" exclaimed the lady, "do you really love me so deeply?" +</P> + +<P> +"I love you, I love you so," sobbed the child, "that I could die for +you." +</P> + +<P> +The Countess placed her hand on the girl's head. "My child," she said, +"when you have grown older and wiser, you will understand what I mean +when I say that to <I>live</I> for those we love shows a far greater love, +because it requires so much more courage. But while you are in Vienna, +there is one favor you can do me, which my heart will consider a great +one. On the twenty-seventh of every March go to the Wahringer Cemetery +and lay a wreath of immortelles on Beethoven's grave." +</P> + +<P> +When, true to her promise, the girl went with her school principal to +the cemetery, they found a man bending over the grave and placing +flowers upon it. He looked up as they approached. +</P> + +<P> +"The child comes at the request of the Countess Therese Brunswick," +explained the principal. +</P> + +<P> +"The Countess Therese Brunswick! Immortelles upon this grave are fit +from her alone." The speaker was Beethoven's faithful friend, Baron +Spaun. +</P> + +<P> +In 1860, when the leaves of thirty-three autumns had fallen upon the +composer's grave and the Countess had gone to her last resting-place, a +voice, like an echo from a dead past, linked the names of Beethoven and +the woman he had loved. There was at that time in Germany a virtuosa, +Frau Hebenstreit, who when a young girl had been a pupil of Beethoven's +friend, the violinist Schuppanzigh. At a musical, in the year +mentioned, she had just taken part in a performance of the third +"Leonore" overture, when, as if moved to speak by the beauty of the +music, she suddenly said: "Only think of it! Just as a person sits to +a painter for a portrait, Countess Therese Brunswick was the model for +Beethoven's Leonore. What a debt the world owes her for it!" After a +pause she went on: +</P> + +<P> +"Beethoven never would have dared marry without money, and a countess, +too—and so refined, and delicate enough to blow away. And he—an +angel and a demon in one! What would have become of them both, and of +his genius with him?" So far as I have been able to discover, this was +the first even semi-public linking of the two names. +</P> + +<P> +Yet all these years there was one person who knew the secret—the woman +who as a school-girl had placed the wreath of immortelles on +Beethoven's grave for her much-loved Countess Therese Brunswick. +Through this act of devotion Miriam Tenger seemed to become to the +Countess a tie that stretched back to her past, and though they saw +each other only at long intervals, Miriam's presence awakened anew the +old memories in the Countess's heart, and from her she heard piecemeal, +and with pauses of years between, the story of hers and Beethoven's +romance. +</P> + +<P> +Therese was the daughter of a noble house. Beethoven was welcome both +as teacher and guest in the most aristocratic circles of Vienna. The +noble men and women who figure in the dedications of his works were +friends, not merely patrons. Despite his uncouth manners and +appearance, his genius, up to the point at least when it took its +highest flights in the "Ninth Symphony" and the last quartets, was +appreciated; and he was a figure in Viennese society. The Brunswick +house was one of many that were open to him. The Brunswicks were art +lovers. Franz, the son of the house, was the composer's intimate +friend. The mother had all possible graciousness and charm, but with +it also a passionate pride in her family and her rank, a hauteur that +would have caused her to regard an alliance between Therese and +Beethoven as monstrous. Therese was an exceptional woman. She had an +oval, classic face, a lovely disposition, a pure heart and a finely +cultivated mind. The German painter, Peter Cornelius, said of her that +any one who spoke with her felt elevated and ennobled. The family was +of the right mettle. The Countess Blanka Teleki, who was condemned to +death for complicity in the Hungarian uprising of 1848, but whose +sentence was commuted to life imprisonment—she finally was released in +1858,—was Therese's niece, and is said to have borne a striking +likeness to her. It may be mentioned that Giulietta Guicciardi, of the +"Moonlight Sonata," was Therese's cousin. There seems no doubt that +the composer was attracted to Giulietta before he fell in love with his +"Immortal Beloved." That is why his biographers were so ready to +believe that the letter was addressed to the lady with the romantic +name and identified with one of his most romantic works. +</P> + +<P> +Therese herself told Miriam that one day Giulietta, who had become the +affianced of Count Gallenberg, rushed into her room, threw herself at +her feet like a "stage princess," and cried out: "Counsel me, cold, +wise one! I long to give Gallenberg his congé and marry the +wonderfully ugly, beautiful Beethoven, if—if only it did not involve +lowering myself socially." Therese, who worshipped the composer's +genius and already loved him secretly, turned the subject off, fearful +lest she should say, in her indignation at the young woman who thought +she would be lowering herself by marrying Beethoven, something that +might lead to an irreparable breach. "Moonlight Sonata," or no +"Moonlight Sonata," there are two greater works by the same genius that +bear the Brunswick name,—the "Appassionata," dedicated to Count Franz +Brunswick, and the sonata in F-sharp major, Opus 78, dedicated to +Therese, and far worthier of her chaste beauty and intellect than the +"Moonlight." +</P> + +<P> +It will be noticed that Giulietta called Therese the "cold, wise one." +Her purity led her own mother to speak other as an "anchoress." Yet it +was she who from the time she was fifteen years old to the day of her +death cherished the great composer in her heart; and of her love for +him were the mementos that he sacredly guarded. When Therese was +fifteen years old she became Beethoven's pupil. The lessons were +severe. Yet beneath the rough exterior she recognized the heart of a +nobleman. The "cold, wise one," the "anchoress," fell in love with him +soon after the lessons began, but carefully hid her feelings from every +one. There is a charming anecdote of the early acquaintance of the +composer and Therese. +</P> + +<P> +The children of the house of Brunswick were carefully brought up. +During the music lessons the mother was accustomed to sit in an +adjoining room with the door between open. One bitterly cold winter +day Beethoven arrived at the appointed hour. Therese had practised +diligently, but the work was difficult and, in addition, she was +nervous. As a result she began too fast, became disconcerted when +Beethoven gruffly called out "<I>Tempo!</I>" and made mistake after mistake, +until the master, irritated beyond endurance, rushed from the room and +the house in such a hurry that he forgot his overcoat and muffler. In +a moment Therese had picked up these, reached the door and was out in +the street with them, when the butler overtook her, relieved her of +them and hurried after the composer's retreating figure. +</P> + +<P> +When the girl entered the doorway again, she came face to face with her +mother, who, fortunately, had not seen her in the street, but who was +scandalized that a daughter of the house of Brunswick should so far +have forgotten herself and her dignity as to have run after a man even +if only to the front door, and with his overcoat and muffler. "He +might have caught cold and died," gasped Therese, in answer to her +mother's remonstrance. What would the mother have said had she known +that her daughter actually had run out into the street, and had been +prevented from following Beethoven until she overtook him only by the +butler's timely action! +</P> + +<P> +Therese's brother Franz was devoted to her. As a boy he had taken his +other sister (afterward Blanka Teleki's mother) out in a boat on the +"Mediterranean," one of the ponds at Montonvasar, the Brunswick country +estate. The boat upset. Therese, who was watching them from the bank, +rushed in and hauled them out. Franz was asked if he had been +frightened. "No," he answered, "I saw my good angel coming." +</P> + +<P> +When he became intimate with Beethoven, he told the composer about this +incident, and also how, after that stormy music lesson, Therese had +started to overtake him with his coat and muffler. Knowing what a +lonely, unhappy existence the composer led, he could not help adding +that life would be very different if he had a good angel to watch over +him, such as he had in his sister. +</P> + +<P> +Franz little knew that his words fell upon Beethoven like seed on eager +soil. From that time on he looked at Therese with different eyes. His +own love soon taught him to know that he was loved in return. No +pledge had yet passed between them when, in May, 1806, he went to +Montonvasar on a visit; but one evening there, when Therese was +standing at the piano listening to him play, he softly intoned Bach's— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Would you your true heart show me,<BR> + Begin it secretly,<BR> +For all the love you trow me,<BR> + Let none the wiser be.<BR> +Our love, great beyond measure,<BR> + To none must we impart;<BR> +So, lock our rarest treasure<BR> + Securely in your heart." +</P> + +<P> +Next morning they met in the park. He told her that at last he had +discovered in her the model for his Leonore, the heroine of his opera +"Fidelio." "And so we found each other"—these were the simple words +with which, many years later, Therese concluded the narrative of her +betrothal with Beethoven to Miriam Tenger. +</P> + +<P> +The engagement had to be kept a secret. Had it become known, it would +have ended in his immediate dismissal by the Countess' mother. In only +one person was confidence reposed, Franz, the devoted brother and +treasured friend. Therese's income was small, and Franz, knowing the +opposition with which the proposed match would meet, pointed out to +Beethoven that it would be necessary for him to secure a settled +position and income before the engagement could be published and the +marriage take place. The composer himself saw the justice of this, and +assented. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-040"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-040.jpg" ALT=""Beethoven at Heiligenstadt." From the painting by Carl Schmidt." BORDER="2" WIDTH="522" HEIGHT="388"> +<H4> +[Illustration: "Beethoven at Heiligenstadt." <BR> +From the painting by Carl Schmidt.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +Early in July Beethoven left Montonvasar for Furen, a health resort on +the Plattensee, which he reached after a hard trip. Fatigued, grieving +over the first parting from Therese, and downcast over his uncertain +future, he there wrote the letter to his "Immortal Beloved," which is +now one of the treasures of the Berlin Library. It is a long letter, +much too long to be given here in full, written for the most part in +ejaculatory phrases, and curiously alternating between love, despair, +courage and hopefulness and commonplace, everyday affairs. Nor will +space permit me to tell how Alexander W. Thayer, an American, who spent +a great part of his life and means in gathering detailed and authentic +data for a Beethoven biography,—which, however, he did not live to +finish,—worked out the year in which this letter was written +(Beethoven gave only the day of the month); showed that it must be +1806; proved further that it could not have been intended for Giulietta +Guicciardi, yet did not venture to state that Countess Therese +Brunswick was the undoubted recipient. Afterward, I believe, he heard +of Miriam Tenger, entered into correspondence with her, and the letters +doubtless will be found among his papers; but he did not live to make +use of the information. +</P> + +<P> +One of the reasons why the identity of the recipient of Beethoven's +letter remained so long unknown was that he did not address her by +name. The letter begins: "My angel, my all, myself!" In order to +secure a fixed position, Beethoven had decided to try Prussia and even +England, and this intention he refers to when, after apostrophizing +Therese as his "immortal beloved," he writes these burning words: +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I have decided to toss abroad so long, until I can fly to your +arms and call myself at home with you, and let my soul, enveloped in +your love, wander through the kingdom of spirits." The letter has this +exclamatory postscript: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Eternally yours!<BR> +Eternally mine!<BR> +Eternally one another's!" +</P> + +<P> +The engagement lasted until 1810, four years, when the letters, which +through Franz's aid had passed between Beethoven and Therese, were +returned. Therese, however, always treasured as one of her "jewels" a +sprig of immortelle fastened with a ribbon to a bit of paper, the +ribbon fading with passing years, the paper growing yellow, but still +showing the words: "<I>L'Immortelle à son Immortelle—Luigi</I>." +</P> + +<P> +It had been Beethoven's custom to enclose a sprig of immortelle in +nearly every letter he sent her, and all these sprigs she kept in her +desk many, many years. She made a white silken pillow of the flowers; +and, when death came at last, she was laid at rest, her head cushioned +on the mementos of the man she had loved. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap03"></A> +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +Mendelssohn and his Cécile +</H2> + +<BR> + +<P> +Mendelssohn was a popular idol. On his death the mournful news was +placarded all over Leipsic, where he had made his home, and there was +an immense funeral procession. When the church service was over, a +woman in deep mourning was led to the bier, and sinking down beside it, +remained long in prayer. It was Cécile taking her last farewell of +Felix. +</P> + +<P> +Mendelssohn was born under a lucky star. The pathways of most musical +geniuses are covered with thorns; his was strewn with roses. The +Mendelssohn family, originally Jewish, was well-to-do and highly +refined, and Felix's grandfather was a philosophical writer of some +note. This inspired the oft-quoted <I>mot</I> of the musician's father: +"Once I was known as the son of the famous Mendelssohn; now I am known +as the father of the famous Mendelssohn." +</P> + +<P> +Felix was an amazingly clever, fascinating boy. Coincident with his +musical gifts he had a talent for art. Goethe was captivated by him, +and the many distinguished friends of the Mendelssohn house in Berlin +adored him. This house was a gathering place of artists, musicians, +literary men and scientists; his genius had the stimulus found in the +"atmosphere" of such a household. There was one member of that +household between whom and himself the most tender relations +existed,—his sister Fanny, who became the wife of Hensel, the artist. +The musical tastes of Felix and Fanny were alike: she was the +confidante of his ambitions, and thus was created between them an +artistic sympathy, which from childhood greatly strengthened the family +bond. Growing up amid love and devotion, to say nothing of the +admiration accorded his genius in the home circle, with tastes, +naturally refined, cultivated to the utmost both by education and +absorption, he was apt to be most fastidious in the choice of a wife. +Fastidiousness in everything was, in fact, one of his traits. One has +but to recall how, one after another, he rejected the subjects that +were offered him for operatic composition. "I am afraid," said his +father, who was quite anxious to see his famous son properly settled in +life, "that Felix's censoriousness will prevent his getting a wife as +well as a libretto." +</P> + +<A NAME="img-048"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-048.jpg" ALT="Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy." BORDER="2" WIDTH="354" HEIGHT="457"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +It may have been a regretful feeling that he had disappointed his +father by not marrying which led him, after the latter's sudden death +in November, 1835, to consider the matter more seriously. He hastened +to Berlin to his mother, and then returned to Leipsic, where he had +charge of the famous Gewandhaus concerts. He settled down to work +again, and especially to finish his oratorio of "St. Paul." In March, +1836, the University of Leipsic made him a Ph.D. +</P> + +<P> +In May or June of this year a friend and colleague named Schelble, who +conducted the Caecilia Singing Society at Frankfort-on-the-Main, was +taken ill, and, desiring to rest and recuperate, asked Mendelssohn to +officiate in his place. The request came at an inconvenient time, for +he had planned to take some recreation himself, and had mapped out a +tour to Switzerland and Genoa. But Felix was an obliging fellow, and +promptly responded with an affirmative when his colleague called upon +him for aid. The unselfish relinquishment of his intended tour was to +meet with a further reward than that which comes from the satisfaction +of a good deed done at some self-sacrifice, and this reward was the +more grateful because unexpected by his friends, his family, or even +himself. Yet it was destined to delight them all. +</P> + +<P> +Felix was in Frankfort six weeks. So short a period rarely leads to a +decisive event in a man's life, but did so in Mendelssohn's case. He +occupied lodgings in a house on the Schöne Aussicht (Beautiful View), +with an outlook upon the river. But there was another beautiful view +in Frankfort which occupied his attention far more, for among those he +met during his sojourn in the city on the Main was Cécile,—Cécile +Charlotte Sophie Jeanrenaud. Her father, long dead, had been the +pastor of the French Walloon Reformed Church in Frankfort, where his +widow and children moved in the best social circles of the city. +Cécile, then seventeen (ten years younger than Felix), was a "beauty" +of a most delicate type. Mme. Jeanrenaud still was a fine-looking +woman, and possibly because of this fact, coupled with Felix's shy +manner in the presence of Cécile, now that for the first time his heart +was deeply touched, it was at first supposed that he was courting the +mother; and her children, Cécile included, twitted her on it. +</P> + +<P> +Now Felix acted in a manner characteristic of his bringing up and of +the bent of his genius. Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Schumann, Liszt, +Wagner—not one of these hesitated a moment where his heart was +concerned. If anything, they were too impetuous. They are the masters +of the passionate expression in music; Mendelssohn's music is of the +refined, delicate type—like his own bringing up. The perfectly +polished "Songs without Words," the smoothly flowing symphonies, the +lyric violin concerto—these are most typical of his genius. Only here +and there in his works are there fitful flashes of deeper significance, +as in certain dramatic passages of the "Elijah" oratorio. And so, when +Felix found himself possessed of a passion for Cécile Jeanrenaud, the +beautiful, he did not throw himself at her feet and pour out a +confession of love to her. Far from it. With a calmness that would +make one feel like pinching him, were it not that after all the story +has a "happy ending," he left Frankfort at the end of six weeks, when +his feelings were at their height, and in order to submit the state of +his affections to a cool and unprejudiced scrutiny, he went to +Scheveningen, Holland, where he spent a month. Anything more +characteristically Mendelssohnian can scarcely be imagined than this +leisurely passing of judgment on his own heart. +</P> + +<P> +Just what Cécile thought of his sudden departure we do not know. No +doubt by that time she had ceased twitting her mother on Felix's +supposed intentions to make Frau Mendelssohn of Mme. Jeanrenaud, for it +must have become apparent that the attentions of the famous composer +were not directed toward the beautiful mother, but toward the more +beautiful daughter. If, however, she felt at all uneasy at his going +away at the time when he should have been preparing to declare himself, +her doubts would have been dispelled could she have read some of the +letters which he dispatched from Scheveningen. That she herself was +captivated by him there seems no doubt. It was an amusing change from +her preconceived notion of him. She had imagined him a stiff, +disagreeable, jealous old man, who wore a green velvet skull-cap and +played tedious fugues. This prejudice, needless to say, was dispelled +at their first meeting, when she found the crabbed creation of her +fancy a man of the world, with gracious, winning manners, and a +brilliant conversationalist not only on music, but also on other topics. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-054"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-054.jpg" ALT="Fanny Hensel, sister of Mendelssohn." BORDER="2" WIDTH="360" HEIGHT="549"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Fanny Hensel, sister of Mendelssohn.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +It is a curious coincidence that when Felix left Frankfort for +Scheveningen, with the image of this fair being in his heart, the +Caecilia Society should have presented him with a handsome +dressing-case marked "F. M.-B. and Caecilia.'" [1] He had come to +Frankfort to conduct the Caecilia; he had met Caecilia; and now he was +at the last moment reminded that he was leaving Caecilia behind; yet he +was carrying Caecilia with him. If there is anything prophetic in +coincidences, everything pointed to the fact that Caecilia was to play +a more prominent part in his life than that of a mere name. +</P> + +<P> +Even before Felix left Frankfort there were some who were in his +secret. Evidently the Mendelssohn family had received reports of his +attentions to the fair Cécile Jeanrenaud and were all a-flutter with +happy anticipation. For there is a letter from Felix to his sister +Rebecca which must have been written in answer to one from her +containing something in the nature of an inquiry regarding the state of +his feelings. "The present period in my life," he writes to her, "is a +very strange one, for I am more desperately in love than I ever was +before, and I do not know what to do. I leave Frankfort the day after +to-morrow, but I feel as if it would cost me my life. At all events I +intend to return here and see this charming girl once more before I go +back to Leipsic. But I have not an idea whether she likes me or not, +and I do not know what to do to make her like me, as I already have +said. But one thing is certain—that to her I owe the first real +happiness I have had this year, and now I feel fresh and hopeful again +for the first time. When away from her, though, I always am sad—now, +you see, I have let you into a secret which nobody else knows anything +about; but in order that you may set the whole world an example in +discretion, I will tell you nothing more about it." He adds that he is +going to detest the seashore, and ends with the exclamation, "O +Rebecca! What shall I do?" Rebecca might have answered, "Tell Cécile, +instead of me;" and, indeed, I wonder if she did not take occasion to +drop a few hints to Cécile during her brother's absence in Holland. +</P> + +<P> +There was another who might have told Cécile how Felix felt toward +her,—his mother. For to her he wrote from Scheveningen that he gladly +would send Holland, its dykes, sea baths, bathing-machines, Kursaals +and visitors to the end of the world to be back in Frankfort. "When I +have seen this charming girl again, I hope the suspense soon will be +over and I shall know whether we are to be anything—or rather +everything—to each other, or not." Evidently his scrutiny of his own +feelings was leading him to a very definite conclusion. He was in +Scheveningen, but his heart was in the city on the Main, and he was +wishing himself back in the Schöne Aussicht—longing for that +"beautiful view" once more. +</P> + +<P> +Back to Frankfort he hied himself as soon as the month in Holland was +happily over. It was not only back to Frankfort, it was back to +Cécile, in every sense of the words; for if Rebecca and his mother had +not conveyed to the delicate beauty some suggestion of the feelings she +had inspired in Felix's heart, she herself must have become aware of +them, and of something very much like in her own, since matters were +not long in coming to a point after his return. He spent August at +Scheveningen; in September his suspense was over, for his engagement to +Cécile formally took place at Kronberg, near Frankfort. Three weeks +later he was obliged to go back to his duties at Leipsic. How much he +was beloved by the public appears from the fact that at the next +Gewandhaus concert the directors placed on the programme, "Wer ein +Holdes Weib Errungen" (He who a Lovely Wife has Won) from "Fidelio," +and that when the number was reached, and Felix raised his bâton, the +audience burst into applause which continued a long time. It was their +congratulations to their idol on his betrothal. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-058"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-058.jpg" ALT="Cécile, wife of Mendelssohn." BORDER="2" WIDTH="360" HEIGHT="543"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Cécile, wife of Mendelssohn.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +"Les Feliciens" was the title given to Felix and Cécile by his sister +Fanny later in life. At this time Mendelssohn himself was +indescribably happy. At least, he could not himself find words in +which to express all he felt. It is pleasant to find that a great +composer is no exception to the rule which makes lovers "too happy for +words." "But what words am I to use in describing my happiness?" he +writes to his sister. "I do not know and am dumb, but not for the same +reason as the monkeys on the Orinoco—far from it." +</P> + +<P> +We gain an idea of Cécile's social position from Felix's statement, +contained in this same letter, that he and his fiancée are obliged to +make one hundred and sixty-three calls in Frankfort. This was written +before he had returned to his duties in Leipsic. Christmas again found +him with his betrothed and again writing to Fanny—this time about a +portrait of Cécile, which her family had given him. "They gave me a +portrait of her on Christmas, but it only stirred up afresh my wrath +against all bad artists. She looks like an ordinary young woman +flattered." (Rather a good bit of criticism.) "It really is too bad +that with such a sitter the fellow could not have shown a spark of +poetry." It is quite evident that Felix was much in love with his fair +fiancée. +</P> + +<P> +He and Cécile were married in her father's former church in March, +1837. During their honeymoon Felix wrote to his friend, Eduard +Devrient, the famous actor, from the Bavarian highlands. A rare spirit +of peace and contentment breathes through the letter. "You know that I +am here with my wife, my dear Cécile, and that it is our wedding tour; +that we already are an old married couple of six weeks' standing. +There is so much to tell you that I know not how to make a beginning. +Picture it to yourself. I can only say that I am too happy, too glad; +and yet not at all beside myself, as I should have expected to be, but +calm and accustomed, as though it could not be otherwise. But you +should know my Cécile!" Evidently such a love as was here described +was not a mere sentimental flash in the pan. It was an affection +founded on reciprocal tastes and sympathies, the kind that usually +lasts. Cécile was refined and delicate, and beautiful. She was just +the woman to grace the home that a fastidious man like Mendelssohn +would want to establish. +</P> + +<P> +The most insistent note to be observed in his correspondence from this +time on is that of a desire to remain within his own four walls. Fanny +had been advised to go to the seashore for her health, but had delayed +doing so because loath to leave her husband. "Think of me," writes +Felix, urging her to go, "who must in a few weeks, though we have not +been married four months yet, leave Cécile here and go to England by +myself—all, too, for the sake of a music festival. Gracious me! All +this is no joke. But possibly the death of the King of England will +intervene and put a stop to the whole project." The life of a king +meant little to Felix in the distressing prospect of being obliged to +leave his Cécile. Felix, the husband, was not as eager to travel as +Felix, the bachelor, had been. +</P> + +<P> +There are various "appreciations" of Cécile. The least enthusiastic, +perhaps, is that of Hensel, Felix's brother-in-law. He says that she +was not a striking person in anyway, neither extraordinarily clever, +brilliantly witty, nor exceptionally accomplished. But to this +somewhat indefinite observation he adds that she exerted an influence +as soothing as that of the open sky, or running water. Indeed, +Hensel's first frigid reserve yielded to the opinion that Cécile's +gentleness and brightness made Felix's life one continued course of +happiness to the end. It was some time after the marriage before +Mendelssohn's sisters saw Cécile for the first time. The good they +heard of her made them the more impatient to meet her. "I tell you +candidly," the clever Fanny writes to her, "that by this time, when +anybody comes to talk to me about your beauty and your eyes, it makes +me quite cross. I have had enough of hearsay, and beautiful eyes were +not made to be heard." When at last Fanny did see Cécile, this fond +sister of Felix's, who naturally would be most critical, was +enthusiastic over her. "She is amiable, simple, fresh, happy and +even-tempered, and I consider Felix most fortunate. For though loving +him inexpressibly, she does not spoil him, but when he is moody, meets +him with a self-restraint which in due course of time will cure him of +his moodiness altogether. The effect of her presence is like that of a +fresh breeze, she is so light and bright and natural." +</P> + +<P> +To my mind, however, Devrient has drawn the best word portrait of her. +After their first meeting he wrote: "How often we had pictured the kind +of woman that would be a true second half to Felix; and now the lovely, +gentle being was before us, whose glance and smile alone promised all +that we could desire for the happiness of our spoilt favorite." Later, +Devrient finished the picture: "Cécile was one of those sweet, womanly +natures whose gentle simplicity, whose mere presence, soothed and +pleased. She was slender, with strikingly beautiful and delicate +features; her hair was between brown and gold; but the transcendent +lustre of her great blue eyes, and the brilliant roses on her cheeks, +were sad harbingers of early death. She spoke little and never with +animation, and in a low, soft voice. Shakespeare's words, 'my gracious +silence,' applied to her, no less than to Cordelia." +</P> + +<A NAME="img-064"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-064.jpg" ALT="The Mendelssohn Monument in Leipsig." BORDER="2" WIDTH="360" HEIGHT="557"> +<H4> +[Illustration: The Mendelssohn Monument in Leipsig.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +Thus, while Cécile does not seem to have been an extraordinarily gifted +woman from an artistic or intellectual point of view, it is quite +evident that she possessed a refinement that must have appealed +forcibly to a man brought up in such genteel surroundings and as +sensitive as Mendelssohn. Such a woman must have been, after all, +better suited to his delicate genius than a wife of unusual gifts would +have been. For it is a helpmeet, not another genius, that a man of +genius really needs most. The woman who, without being prosy or +commonplace and without allowing herself to retrograde in looks or in +personal care, can run a household in a systematic, orderly fashion is +the greatest blessing that Providence can bestow upon genius. +Evidently Cécile was just such a woman. Her tact seems to have been as +delicate as her beauty. Without, perhaps, having directly inspired any +composition of her husband's, her gentleness, her simple grace, +doubtless left their mark on many bars of his music. +</P> + +<P> +It seems doubly cruel that death should have cut Felix down when he had +enjoyed but ten happy years with his Cécile. Yet had his life been +long, the pang of separation would soon have come to him. Devrient had +not been mistaken when he spoke of "those sad harbingers of early +death;" and Cécile survived Felix scarcely five years. +</P> + +<P> +Felix's death occurred at Leipsic in 1847. In September, while +listening to his own recently composed "Nacht Lied" he swooned away. +His system, weakened by overwork, succumbed, nervous prostration +followed, and on November 4 he died. Sudden death had carried off his +grandfather, father, mother and favorite sister; and he had a +presentiment that his end would come about in the same way. During the +dull half-sleep preceding death he spoke but once, and then to Cécile +in answer to her inquiry how he felt—"Tired, very tired." +</P> + +<P> +Devrient tells how he went to the house of mutual friends in Dresden +for news of Mendelssohn's condition, when Clara Schumann came in, a +letter in her hand and weeping, and told them that Felix had died the +previous evening. Devrient hastened to Leipsic, and Cécile sent for +him. I cannot close this article more fittingly than with his +description of their meeting in the presence of the illustrious +dead—the cherished friend of one, the husband of the other. +</P> + +<P> +"She received me with the tenderness of a sister, wept in silence, and +was calm and composed as ever. She thanked me for all the love and +devotion I had shown to her Felix, grieved for me that I should have to +mourn so faithful a friend, and spoke of the love with which Felix +always had regarded me. Long we spoke of him; it comforted her, and +she was loath for me to depart. She was most unpretentious in her +sorrow, gentle, and resigned to live for the care and education of her +children. She said God would help her, and surely her boys would have +the inheritance of some of their father's genius. There could not be a +more worthy memory of him than the well-balanced, strong and tender +heart of this mourning widow." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[1] The "-B" on the dressing-case stands for "-Bartholdy." When the +Mendelssohn family changed from Judaism to Protestantism, it added the +mother's family name. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap04"></A> +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +Chopin and the Countess Delphine Potocka +</H2> + +<BR> + +<P> +"Her voice was destined to be the last which should vibrate upon the +musician's heart. Perhaps the sweetest sounds of earth accompanied the +parting soul until they blended in his ear with the first chords of the +angels' lyres." +</P> + +<P> +It is thus Liszt describes the voice of Countess Delphine Potocka as it +vibrated through the room in which Chopin lay dying. Witnesses +disagree regarding details. One of the small company that gathered +about his bed says she sang but once, others that she sang twice; and +even these vary when they name the compositions. Yet however they may +differ on these minor points, they agree as to the main incident. That +the beautiful Delphine sang for the dying Chopin is not a mere pleasing +tradition; it is a fact. Her voice ravished the ear of the great +composer, whose life was ebbing away, and soothed his last hours. +</P> + +<P> +"Therefore, then, has God so long delayed to call me to Him. He wanted +to vouchsafe me the joy of seeing you." These were the words Chopin +whispered when he opened his eyes and saw, beside his sister Louise, +the Countess Delphine Potocka, who had hurried from a distance as soon +as she was notified that his end was drawing near. She was one of +those rare and radiant souls who could bestow upon this delicate child +of genius her tenderest friendship, perhaps even her love, yet keep +herself unsullied and an object of adoration as much for her purity as +for her beauty. Because she was Chopin's friend, because she came to +him in his dying hours, because along paths unseen by those about them +her voice threaded its way to his very soul, no life of him is complete +without mention of her, and in the mind of the musical public her name +is irrevocably associated with his. Each succeeding biographer of the +great composer has sought to tell us a little more about her—yet +little is known of her even now beyond the fact that she was very +beautiful—and so eager have we been for a glimpse of her face that we +have accepted without reserve as an authentic presentment of her +features the famous portrait of a Countess Potocka who, I find, died +some seven or eight years before Delphine and Chopin met. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-072"></A> +<CENTER> +<H4> +[Illustration: Frédéric Chopin (missing from book)] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +But we have portraits of Delphine by Chopin himself, not drawn with +pencil or crayon, or painted with brush, but her face as his soul saw +it and transformed it into music. Listen to a great virtuoso play his +two concertos. Ask yourself which of the six movements is the most +beautiful. Surely your choice will fall on the slow movement of the +second—dedicated to the Countess Delphine Potocka, and one of the +composer's most tender and exquisite productions; or play over the +waltzes—the one over which for grace and poetic sentiment you will +linger longest will be the sixth, dedicated to the Countess Delphine +Potocka. +</P> + +<P> +Liszt, who knew Chopin, tells us that the composer evinced a decided +preference for the <I>Adagio</I> of the second concerto and liked to repeat +it frequently. He speaks of the <I>Adagio</I>, this musical portrait of +Delphine, as almost ideally perfect; now radiant with light, now full +of tender pathos; a happy vale of <I>Tempe</I>, a magnificent landscape +flooded with summer glow and lustre, yet forming a background for the +rehearsal of some dire scene of mortal anguish, a contrast sustained by +a fusion of tones, a softening of gloomy hues, which, while saddening +joy, soothes the bitterness of sorrow. +</P> + +<P> +What a lifelike portrait Chopin drew in this "beautiful, deep-toned, +love-laden cantilena"! For was it not the incomparable Delphine who +was destined to "soothe the bitterness of sorrow" during his final +hours on earth? +</P> + +<P> +But while hers was a soul strung with chords that vibrated to the +slightest breath of sorrow, she could be vivacious as well. She was a +child of Poland, that land of sorrow, but where sorrow, for very excess +of itself, sometimes reverts to joy. And so she had her brilliant +joyous moments. Chopin saw her in such moments, too, and, that the +recollection might not pass away, for all time fixed her picture in her +vivacious moods in the last movement, the <I>Allegro vivace</I> of the +concerto, with what Niecks, one of the leading modern biographers of +the composer, calls its feminine softness and rounded contours, its +graceful, gyrating, dance-like motions, its sprightliness and +frolicsomeness. In the same way in the waltz, there is an obvious +mingling of the gay and the sad, the tender and the debonair. Chopin +thought he was writing a waltz. He really was writing "Delphine +Potocka." He, too, was from Poland, and that circumstance of itself +drew them to each other from the time when they first met in France. +</P> + +<P> +One of Chopin's favorite musical amusements, when he was a guest at the +houses of his favorite friends, was to play on the piano musical +portraits of the company. At the salon of the Countess Komar, +Delphine's mother, he played one evening the portraits of the two +daughters of the house. When it came to Delphine's he gently drew her +light shawl from her shoulders, spread it over the keyboard, and then +played through it, his fingers, with every tone they produced, coming +in touch with the gossamer-like fabric, still warm and hallowed for him +from its contact with her. +</P> + +<P> +It seems to have been about 1830 that Delphine first came into the +composer's life. In that year the Count and Countess Komar and their +three beautiful daughters arrived in Nice. Count Komar was business +manager for one of the Potockas. The girls made brilliant matches. +Marie became the Princess de Beauvau-Craon; Delphine became the +Countess Potocka, and Nathalie, the Marchioness Medici Spada. The last +named died a victim to her zeal as nurse during a cholera plague in +Rome. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin was a man who attracted women. His delicate physique,—he died +of consumption,—his refined, poetic temperament, and his exquisite art +as a composer combined with his beautiful piano playing, so well suited +to the intimate circle of the drawing-room, to make his personality a +thoroughly fascinating one. Moreover, he was, besides an artist, a +gentleman, with the reserve yet charm of manner that characterizes the +man of breeding. In men women admire two extremes,—splendid physical +strength, or the delicacy that suggests a poetic soul. Chopin was a +creator of poetic music and a gentle virtuoso. His appearance +harmonized with his genius. He was one of his own nocturnes in which +you can feel a vague presentiment of untimely death. +</P> + +<P> +He is described as a model son, an affectionate brother and a faithful +friend. His eyes were brown; his hair was chestnut, luxuriant and as +soft as silk. His complexion was of transparent delicacy; his voice +subdued and musical. He moved with grace. Born near Warsaw, in 1809, +he was brought up in his father's school with the sons of aristocrats. +He had the manners of an aristocrat, and was careful in his dress. +</P> + +<P> +But despite his sensitive nature, he could resent undue familiarity or +rudeness, yet in a refined way all his own. Once when he was a guest +at dinner at a rich man's house in Paris, he was asked by the host to +play—a patent violation of etiquette toward a distinguished artist. +Chopin demurred. The host continued to press him, urging that Liszt +and Thalberg had played in his house after dinner. +</P> + +<P> +"But," protested Chopin, "I have eaten so little!" and thus put an end +to the matter. +</P> + +<P> +Some twenty or thirty of the best salons in Paris were open to him. +Among them were those of the Polish exiles, some of whom he had known +since their school-days at his father's. He was in the truest sense of +the word a friend of those who entertained him—in fact, one of them. +For a list of those among whom he moved socially read the dedications +on his music. They include wealthy women, like Mme. Nathaniel de +Rothschild, but also a long line of princesses and countesses. In the +salon of the Potocka he was intimately at home, and it was especially +there he drew his musical portraits at the piano. Delphine, his +brilliant countrywoman, vibrated with music herself. She possessed +"<I>une belle voix de soprano</I>," and sang "<I>d'après la méthode des +maîtres d'Italie</I>." +</P> + +<A NAME="img-080"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-080.jpg" ALT="Countess Potocka. From the famous pastel in the Royal Berlin Gallery. Artist unknown." BORDER="2" WIDTH="357" HEIGHT="477"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Countess Potocka. <BR> +From the famous pastel in the Royal Berlin Gallery. Artist unknown.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +In her salon were heard such singers as Rubini, Lablache, Tamburini, +Malibran, Grisi and Persiani. Yet it was her voice Chopin wished to +hear when he lay dying! Truly hers must have been a marvellous gift of +song! At her salon it was his delight to accompany her with his highly +poetical playing. From what is known of his delicate art as a pianist +it is possible to imagine how exquisitely his accompaniments must have +both sustained and mingled with that "<I>belle voix de soprano</I>." He had +a knack of improvising a melody to any poem that happened to take his +fancy, and thus he and Delphine would treat to an improvised song the +elite of the musical, artistic, literary and social world that gathered +in her salon. It is unfortunate that these improvisations were lightly +forgotten by the composer, for he has left us few songs. Delphine +"took as much trouble in giving choice musical entertainments as other +people did in giving choice dinners." Her salon must have been a +resort after the composer's own heart. +</P> + +<P> +Liszt, who knew Delphine well during Chopin's lifetime, and from whose +letters, as yet untranslated into English, I have been able to unearth +a few references to her (the last in May, 1861, nearly twelve years +after Chopin died, and the last definite reference to her which I have +been able to discover), says that her indescribable and spirited grace +made her one of the most admired sovereigns of the society of Paris. +He speaks of her "ethereal beauty" and her "enchanting voice" which +enchained Chopin. Delphine was, in fact, "famous for her rare beauty +and fascinating singing." +</P> + +<P> +No biography of Chopin contains so much as the scrap of a letter either +from him to her, or from her to him. That he should not have written +is hardly to be wondered at, considering that letter writing was most +repugnant to him. He would take a long walk in order to accept or +decline an invitation in person, rather than indite a brief note. +Moreover, in addition to this trait, he was so often in the salon of +the Countess Potocka that much correspondence with her was unnecessary. +I have, however, discovered two letters from her to the composer. One, +written in French, asks him to occupy a seat in her box at a Berlioz +concert. The other is in Polish and is quite long. It is undated, and +there is nothing to show from where it was written. Evidently, +however, she had heard that he was ailing, for she begs him to send her +a few words, <I>poste restante</I>, to Aix-la-Chapelle, letting her know how +he is. From this request it seems that she was away from Paris +(possibly in or near Poland), but expected to start for the French +capital soon and wished to be apprised of his condition at the earliest +moment. The anxious tone of the letter leads me to believe that it was +written during the last year of the composer's life, when the insidious +nature of the disease of which he was a victim had become apparent to +himself and his friends.… "I cannot," she writes, "wait so long +without news of your health and your plans for the future. Do not +attempt to write to me yourself, but ask Mme. Etienne, or that +excellent grandma, who dreams of chops, to let me know about your +strength, your chest, your breathing." +</P> + +<P> +Delphine also was well aware of the unsatisfactory state of his +finances, for she writes that she would like to know something about +"that Jew; if he called and was able to be of service to you." What +follows is in a vein of sadness, showing that her own life was not +without its sorrows. "Here everything is sad and lonely, but my life +goes on in much the usual way; if only it will continue without further +bitter sorrows and trials, I shall be able to support it. For me the +world has no more happiness, no more joy. All those to whom I have +wished well ever have rewarded me with ingratitude or caused me other +<I>tribulations</I>." (The <I>italics</I> are hers.) "After all, this existence +is nothing but a great discord." Then, with a "<I>que Dieu vous garde</I>," +she bids him <I>au revoir</I> till the beginning of October at the latest. +</P> + +<P> +Note that it was in October, 1849, that Chopin took to his deathbed; +that in another passage of the letter she advised him to think of Nice +for the winter; and that it was from Nice she was summoned to his +bedside. It would seem as if she had received alarming advices +regarding his health; had hastened to Paris and then to the Riviera to +make arrangements for him to pass the winter there; and then, learning +that the worst was feared, had hurried back to solace his last hours. +</P> + +<P> +Then came what is perhaps the most touching scene that has been handed +down to us from the lives of the great composers. When Delphine +entered what was soon to be the death chamber, Chopin's sister Louise +and a few of his most intimate friends were gathered there. She took +her place by Louise. When the dying man opened his eyes and saw her +standing at the foot of his bed, tall, slight, draped in white, +resembling a beautiful angel, and mingling her tears with those of his +sister, his lips moved, and those nearest him, bending over to catch +his words, heard him ask that she would sing. +</P> + +<P> +Mastering her emotion by a strong effort of the will, she sang in a +voice of bell-like purity the canticle to the Virgin attributed to +Stradella,—sang it so devoutly, so ethereally, that the dying man, +"artist and lover of the beautiful to the very last," whispered in +ecstasy, "How exquisite! Again, again!" +</P> + +<P> +Once more she sang—this time a psalm by Marcello. It was the haunted +hour of twilight. The dying day draped the scene in its mysterious +shadows. Those at the bedside had sunk noiselessly on their knees. +Over the mournful accompaniment of sobs floated the voice of Delphine +like a melody from heaven. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin died on October 17, 1849, just as the bells of Paris were +tolling the hour of three in the morning. He was known to love +flowers, and in death he literally was covered with them. The funeral +was held from the Madeleine, where Mozart's "Requiem" was sung, the +solos being taken by Pauline Viardot-Garcia, Castellan and Lablache. +Meyerbeer is said to have conducted, but this has been contradicted. +He was, however, one of the pallbearers on the long way from the church +to Père la Chaise. When the remains were lowered into the grave, some +Polish earth, which Chopin had brought with him from Wola nineteen +years before and piously guarded, was scattered over the coffin. There +is nothing to show what part, save that of a mourner, Delphine Potocka +took in his funeral. But though it was the famous Viardot-Garcia whose +voice rang out in the Madeleine, it was hers that had sung him to his +eternal rest. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-086"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-086.jpg" ALT="The death of Chopin. From the painting by Barrias." BORDER="2" WIDTH="518" HEIGHT="388"> +<H4> +[Illustration: The death of Chopin. <BR> +From the painting by Barrias.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +How long did Delphine survive Chopin? In 1853 Liszt met her at Baden, +postponing his intended departure for Carlsruhe a day in order to dine +with her. In May, 1861, he met her at dinner at the Rothschilds'. +When Chopin's pupil, Mikuli, was preparing his edition of the +composer's works, Delphine furnished him copies of several compositions +bearing expression marks and other directions in the hand of Chopin +himself. Mikuli dated his edition 1879. It would seem as if the +Countess still were living at or about that time. +</P> + +<P> +Besides the aid she thus gave in the preparation of the Mikuli edition +of Chopin's works, there is other evidence that she treasured the +composer's memory. In 1857, when he had been dead eight years, there +was published a biographical dictionary of Polish and Slavonic +musicians, a book now very rare. Although the Potocka was only an +amateur, her name was included in the publication. Evidently the +biographies of living people were furnished by themselves. Chopin's +fame at that time did not approximate what it is now. Yet in the +second sentence of her biography Delphine records that she was "the +intimate friend of the illustrious Chopin." +</P> + +<P> +Forgetting that the line of the Potockis is a long one, the public for +years has associated with Chopin the famous pastel portrait of Countess +Potocka in the Royal Berlin Gallery. The Countess Potocka of that +portrait had a career that reads like a romance, but she was Sophie, +not Delphine Potocka. My discovery of a miniature of Countess Sophie +Potocka in Philadelphia, painted some fifteen or twenty years later +than the Berlin pastel, and of numerous references to her in the diary +of an American traveller who was entertained by her in Poland early in +the last century, were among the interesting results of my search for +information regarding Delphine, but they have no place here. Probably +the public, which clings to romance, still will cling to the pastel +portrait of Countess Potocka as that of the woman who sang to the dying +Chopin—and so the portrait is reproduced here. +</P> + +<P> +Barrias, the French historical painter, who was in Paris when Chopin +lived there, painted "The Death of Chopin." It shows Delphine singing +to the dying man. As Barrias had his reputation as a historical +painter to sustain and as the likenesses of others on the canvas are +correct, it is not improbable that he painted Delphine as he saw or +remembered her. If so, this is the only known portrait of Chopin's +faithful friend, the Countess Delphine Potocka. Of course no one who +undertakes to write about Chopin (or only to read about him for that +matter) can escape the episode with Mme. Dudevant,—George Sand,—who +used man after man as living "copy," and when she had finished with him +cast him aside for some new experience. But the story has been +admirably told by Huneker and others and its disagreeable details need +not be repeated here. It may have been love, even passion, while it +lasted, but it ended in harsh discord; whereas Delphine, sweet and pure +and tender, ever was like a strain of Chopin's own exquisite music +vibrating in a sympathetic heart. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap05"></A> +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +The Schumanns: Robert and Clara +</H2> + +<BR> + +<P> +Robert and Clara Schumann are names as closely linked in music as those +of Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning in literature. Robert +Schumann was a great composer, Clara Schumann a great pianist. In her +dual rôle of wife and virtuosa she was the first to secure proper +recognition for her husband's genius. Surviving him many years, she +continued the foremost interpreter of his works, winning new laurels +not only for herself but also for him. He was in his grave—yet she +had but to press the keyboard and he lived in her. Despite the fact +that tastes underwent a change and Wagner became the musical giant of +the nineteenth century, Clara, faithful to the ideal of her youth and +her young womanhood, saw to it that the fame of him whose name she bore +remained undimmed. Hers was, indeed, a consecrated widowhood. +</P> + +<P> +Robert was eighteen years old, Clara only nine, when they first met; +but while he had not yet definitely decided on a profession, she, in +the very year of their meeting, made her début as a pianist, and thus +began a career which lasted until 1896, a period of nearly seventy +years! When they first met, Schumann was studying law at the Leipsic +University. Born in Zwickau, Saxony, in 1810, he showed both as a boy +and as a youth not only strong musical proclivities, but also decided +literary predilections. In the latter his father, a bookseller and +publisher, who loved his trade, saw a reflection of his own tastes, and +they were encouraged rather more sedulously than the boy's musical +bent. It was in obedience to his father's wishes that he matriculated +at Leipsic, although he composed and played the piano, and his desire +to make music his profession was beginning to get the upper hand. His +meeting with the nine-year-old girl decided him—so early in her life +did she begin to influence his career! +</P> + +<A NAME="img-094"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-094.jpg" ALT="Robert Schumann." BORDER="2" WIDTH="319" HEIGHT="467"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Robert Schumann.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +Schumann had been invited by his friends, Dr. and Mrs. Carus, to an +evening of music, and especially to hear the piano playing of a +wonder-child—a "musical fairy," his hostess called her. In the course +of the evening he accompanied Frau Carus in some Schubert songs, when, +chancing to look up, he saw a child dressed in white, her pretty face +framed in dark hair, her expressive eyes raised toward the singer in +rapt admiration. The song over, and the applause having died away, he +stepped up to the child, laid his hand kindly on her head, and asked, +"Are you musical, too, little one?" +</P> + +<P> +A curious smile played around her lips. She was about to answer, when +a man came to her and led her to the piano, and the first thing +Schumann knew the shapely little hands struck into Beethoven's F-minor +Sonata and played it through with a firm, sure touch and fine musical +feeling. No wonder she had smiled at his question. +</P> + +<P> +"Was I right in calling her a Musical fairy'?" asked Frau Carus of +Schumann. +</P> + +<P> +"Her face is like that of a guardian angel in a picture that hangs in +my mother's room at home," was his reply. Little he knew then that +this child was destined to become his own good fairy and "guardian +angel." Had he foreseen what she was to be to him, he could not more +aptly have described her. The most important immediate result of the +meeting was that he became a pupil of her father, Friedrich Wieck, +whose remarkable skill as a teacher had carried his daughter so far at +such an early age. The lessons stopped when Schumann went to +Heidelberg to continue his studies, but he and Wieck, who was convinced +of the young man's musical genius, corresponded in a most friendly +manner. +</P> + +<P> +Clara, who was born in Leipsic in 1819, became her father's pupil in +her fifth year. It is she who chiefly reflected glory upon him as a +master, but, among his other pupils, Hans von Bülow became famous, and +Clara's half-sister Marie also was a noted pianist. Wieck's system was +not a hard-and-fast one, but varied according to the individuality of +each pupil. He was to his day what Leschetizky, the teacher of +Paderewski, is now. Very soon after her meeting with Schumann, Clara +made her public début, and with great success. Among those who heard +and praised her highly during this first year of her public career was +Paganini. +</P> + +<P> +In 1830, two years after the first meeting of Robert and Clara, +Schumann, his father having died, wrote to his mother and his guardian +and begged them to allow him to choose a musical career, referring them +to Wieck for an opinion as to his musical abilities. The mother wrote +to Wieck a letter which is highly creditable to her heart and judgment, +and Wieck's reply is equally creditable to him as a friend and teacher. +Evidently his powers of penetration led him to entertain the highest +hopes for Schumann. Among other things he writes that, with due +diligence, Robert should in a few years become one of the greatest +pianists of the day. Why Wieck's hopes in this particular were not +fulfilled, and why, for this reason, Clara's gifts as a pianist were +doubly useful to Schumann, we shall see shortly. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-098"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-098.jpg" ALT="Robert and Clara Schumann in 1847. From a lithograph in possession of the Society of Friends of Music, Vienna." BORDER="2" WIDTH="360" HEIGHT="574"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Robert and Clara Schumann in 1847. <BR> +From a lithograph in possession of the Society of Friends of Music, Vienna.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +Schumann entered with enthusiasm upon the career of his choice. He +left Heidelberg and took lodgings with the Wiecks in Leipsic. Clara, +then a mere girl, though already winning fame as a concert pianist, +certainly was too young for him to have fallen seriously in love with, +or for her to have responded to any such feeling. Even at that early +age, however, she exercised a strange power of attraction over him. +His former literary tastes had given him a great fund of stories and +anecdotes, and he delighted in the evenings to gather about him the +children of the family, Clara among them, and entertain them with tales +from the Arabian Nights and ghost and fairy stories. +</P> + +<P> +Among his compositions at this time are a set of impromptus on a theme +by Clara, and it is significant of his regard for her that later he +worked them over, as if he did not consider them in their original +shape good enough for her. Then we have from this period a letter +which he wrote to the twelve-year-old girl while she was concertizing +in Frankfort, and in which the expressions certainly transcend those of +a youth for a child, or of an elder brother for a sister, if one cared +to picture their relations as such. Indeed, he writes to her that he +often thinks other "not as a brother does of a sister, nor as one +friend of another, but as a pilgrim of a distant altar-picture." He +asks her if she has composed much, adding, "In my dreams I sometimes +hear music—so you must be composing." He confides in her about his +own work, tells her that his theoretical studies (with Heinrich Dorn) +have progressed as far as the three-part fugue; and that he has a +sonata in B minor and a set of "Papillons" ready; then jokingly asks +her how the Frankfort apples taste and inquires after the health of the +F above the staff in the "jumpy Chopin variation," and informs her that +his paper is giving out. "Everything gives out, save the friendship in +which I am Fraulein C. W.'s warmest admirer." +</P> + +<P> +For a letter from a man of twenty-one to a girl of twelve, the above is +remarkable. If Clara had not afterward become Robert's wife, it would +have interest merely as a curiosity. As matters eventuated, it is a +charming prelude to the love-symphony of two lives. Moreover, there +seems to have been ample ground for Schumann's admiration. Dorn has +left a description of Clara as she was at this time, which shows her to +have been unusually attractive. He speaks of her as a fascinating girl +of thirteen, "graceful in figure, of blooming complexion, with delicate +white hands, a profusion of black hair, and wise, glowing eyes. +Everything about her was appetizing, and I never have blamed my pupil, +young Robert Schumann, that only three years later he should have been +completely carried away by this lovely creature, his former +fellow-pupil and future wife." Her purity and her genius, added to her +beauty, may well have combined to make Robert, musical dreamer and +enthusiast on the threshold of his career, think of her, when absent, +"as a pilgrim of a distant altar-picture." +</P> + +<P> +She was clever, too, and through her concert tours was seeing much of +the world for those days. In Weimar she played for Goethe, the great +poet himself getting a cushion for her and placing it on the piano +stool in order that she might sit high enough; and not only praising +her playing, but also presenting her with his likeness in a medallion. +The poet Grillparzer, after hearing her play in Vienna Beethoven's +F-minor Sonata, wrote a delightful poem. "Clara Wieck and Beethoven's +F-minor Sonata." It tells how a magician, weary of life, locked all +his charms in a shrine, threw the key into the sea, and died. In vain +men tried to force open the shrine. At last a girl, wandering by the +strand and watching their vain efforts, simply dipped her white fingers +into the sea and drew forth the key, with which she opened the shrine +and released the charms. And now the freed spirits rise and fall at +the bidding of their lovely, innocent mistress, who guides them with +her white fingers as she plays. The imagery of this tribute to Clara's +playing is readily understood. In Paris she heard Chopin and +Mendelssohn. All these experiences tended to her early development, +and there is little wonder if Schumann saw her older than she really +was. +</P> + +<P> +In 1834 Schumann's early literary tastes asserted themselves, but now +in connection with music. He founded the "Neue Zeitschrift für Musik," +which under his editorship soon became one of the foremost musical +periodicals of the day. Among his own writings for it is the +enthusiastic essay on one of Chopin's early works, in which Schumann, +as he did later in the case of Brahms, discovered the unmistakable +marks of genius. The name of Chopin brings me back to Wieck's prophecy +regarding Schumann as a pianist. The latter in his enthusiasm devised +an apparatus for finger gymnastics which he practised so assiduously +that he strained one of his fingers and permanently impaired his +technique, making a pianistic career an impossibility. Through this +accident he was unable to introduce his own piano works to the public, +so that the importance of the service rendered him by Clara, in taking +his compositions into her repertoire, both before and after their +marriage, was doubled. +</P> + +<P> +One evening at Wieck's, Schumann was anxious to hear some new Chopin +works which he had just received. Realizing that his lame finger +rendered him incapable of playing, he called out despairingly: +</P> + +<P> +"Who will lend me fingers?" +</P> + +<P> +"I will," said Clara, and sat down and played the pieces for him. She +"lent him her fingers;" and that is precisely what she did for him +through life in making his piano and chamber music compositions known. +Familiarity with Schumann's music enables us of to-day to appreciate +its beauty. But for its day it was, like Brahms' music later, of a +kind that makes its way slowly. Left to the general musical public, it +probably would have been years in sinking into their hearts. Such +music requires to be publicly performed by a sympathetic interpreter +before receiving its meed of merit. Schumann had hoped to be his own +interpreter. He saw that hope vanish, but a lovely being came to his +aid. She saw his works come into life; their creation was part of her +own existence; she fathomed his genius to its utmost depths; her whole +being vibrated in sympathy with his, and when she sat down at the piano +and pressed the keys, it was as though he himself were the performer. +She was his fingers—fingers at once deft and delicate. She played +with a double love—love for him and love for his music. And why +should she not love it? She was as much the mother of his music as of +his children. I have already indicated that Clara probably developed +early. At all events, there are letters from Schumann to her, at +fourteen, which leave no doubt that he was in love with her then, or +that she could have failed to perceive this. In one of these letters +he proposes this highly poetic, not to say psychological, method of +communicating with her. "Promptly at eleven o'clock to-morrow +morning," he writes, "I will play the <I>Adagio</I> from the Chopin +variations and will think strongly—in fact only—of you. Now I beg of +you that you will do the same, so that we may meet and see each other +in spirit.… Should you not do this, and there break to-morrow at +that hour a chord, you will know that it is I." +</P> + +<A NAME="img-106"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-106.jpg" ALT="Clara Schumann at the piano." BORDER="2" WIDTH="357" HEIGHT="549"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Clara Schumann at the piano.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +However far the affair may or may not have progressed at this time, +there was a curious interruption during the following year. Robert +appears to have temporarily lost his heart to a certain Ernestine von +Fricken, a young lady of sixteen, who was one of Wieck's pupils. Clara +consoled herself by permitting a musician named Banck to pay her +attention. For reasons which never have been clearly explained, +Schumann suddenly broke with Ernestine and turned with renewed ardor to +Clara, while Clara at once withdrew her affections from Banck and +retransferred them to Schumann. We find him writing to her again in +1835: +</P> + +<P> +"Through all the Autumn festivals there looks out an angel's head that +closely resembles a certain Clara who is very well known to me." By +the following year, Clara then being seventeen, things evidently had +gone so far that, between themselves, they were engaged. "Fate has +destined us for each other," he writes to her. "I myself knew that +long ago, but I had not the courage to tell you sooner, nor the hope to +be understood by you." +</P> + +<P> +Wieck evidently had remained in ignorance of the young people's +attachment, for, when on Clara's birthday the following year (1837) +Schumann made formal application in writing for her hand, her father +gave an evasive answer, and on the suit being pressed, he, who had been +almost like a second father to Robert, became his bitter enemy. Clara, +however, remained faithful to her lover through the three years of +unhappiness which her father's sudden hatred of Robert caused them. In +1839 she was in Paris, and from there she wrote to her father: +</P> + +<P> +"My love for Schumann is, it is true, a passionate love; I do not, +however, love him solely out of passion and sentimental enthusiasm, +but, furthermore, because I think him one of the best of men, because I +believe no other man could love me as purely and nobly as he or so +understandingly; and I believe, also, on my part that I can make him +wholly happy through allowing him to possess me, and that I understand +him as no other woman could." +</P> + +<P> +This love obviously was one not lightly bestowed, but Wieck remained +obdurate and refused his consent. Then Schumann took the only step +that under the circumstances was possible. Wieck's refusal of his +consent being a legal bar to the marriage, Robert invoked the law to +set his future father-in-law's objections aside. The case was tried, +decided in Schumann's favor, and on September 12, 1840, Robert Schumann +and Clara Wieck were married in the village of Schönefeld, near +Leipsic. That year Schumann composed no less than one hundred and +thirty-eight songs, among them some of his most beautiful. They were +his wedding gift to Clara. +</P> + +<P> +After their marriage his inspiration blossomed under her very eyes. +She was the companion of his innermost thoughts and purposes. +Meanwhile his musical genius and critical acumen ever were at her +command in her work as a pianist. Happily, too, a reconciliation was +effected with Wieck, and we find Clara writing to him about the first +performance of Schumann's piano quintet (now ranked as one of the +finest compositions of its class), on which occasion she, of course, +played the piano part. +</P> + +<P> +Four years after their marriage the Schumanns removed to Dresden, +remaining there until 1850, when they settled in Düsseldorf, where +Robert had been appointed musical director. There was but one shadow +over their lives. At times a deep melancholy came over him, and in +this Clara discerned with dread possible symptoms of coming mental +disorder. Her fears were only too well founded. Early in February, +1854, he arose during the night and demanded light, saying that +Schubert had appeared to him and given him a melody which he must write +out forthwith. On the 27th of the same month, he quietly left his +house, went to the bridge across the Rhine and threw himself into the +river. Boatmen prevented his intended suicide. When he was brought +home and had changed his wet clothes for dry ones, he sat down to work +on a variation as if nothing had happened. Within less than a week he +was removed at his own request to a sanatorium at Endenich, where he +died July 29, 1856. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-110"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-110.jpg" ALT="The Schumann Monument in the Bonn Cemetery." BORDER="2" WIDTH="353" HEIGHT="549"> +<H4> +[Illustration: The Schumann Monument in the Bonn Cemetery.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +Clara survived him forty years, wearing a crown of laurels and +thorns—the laurels of a famous pianist, the thorns of her widowhood. +It was a widowhood consecrated, as much as her wifehood had been, to +her husband's genius. She died at Frankfort, May 19, 1896, and is +buried beside her husband in Bonn. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap06"></A> +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +Franz Liszt and his Carolyne +</H2> + +<BR> + +<P> +In the famous Wagner-Liszt correspondence, Liszt writes from Weimar, +under date of April 8, 1853, "Daily the Princess greets me with the +lines 'Nicht Gut, noch Geld, noch Göttliche Pracht.'" The lines are +from "Götterdämmerung," the whole passage being— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Nor goods, nor gold, nor godlike splendor;<BR> +Nor house, nor home, nor lordly state;<BR> +Nor hollow contracts of a treach'rous race,<BR> +Its cruel cant, its custom and decree.<BR> +Blessed, in joy and sorrow,<BR> +Let love alone be." +</P> + +<P> +The lady who according to Liszt daily greeted him with these +significant lines was the Princess Carolyne Sayn-Wittgenstein. Since +1848 she and her young daughter Marie had been living with Liszt at the +Altenburg in Weimar. She remained there until 1860, twelve years, when +she went to Rome, whither, in due time, Liszt followed her, to make the +Eternal City one of his homes for the rest of his life. His last +letter to her is dated July 6, 1886, the year and month of his death, +so that for a period of nearly forty years he enjoyed the personal and +intellectual companionship of this remarkable woman. Their relations +form one of the great love romances of the last century. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-116"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-116.jpg" ALT="Franz Liszt. Painting by Ary Scheffer." BORDER="2" WIDTH="374" HEIGHT="543"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Franz Liszt. <BR> +Painting by Ary Scheffer.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +Liszt's letters to the Princess, written in French and still +untranslated, are in four volumes. They were published by the +Princess's daughter, Princess Marie Hohenlohe, as a tribute to Liszt +the musician and the man. They teem with his musical +activities—information regarding the numerous celebrities with whom he +was intimate, the musicians he aided, his own great works. But their +rarest charm to me lies in the fact that from them the careful reader +can glean the whole story of the romance of Liszt and Carolyne, from +its very beginnings to his death. +</P> + +<P> +We know the fascinating male figure in this romance—the extraordinary +combination of unapproached virtuoso, great composer, and man of the +world; but who was the equally fascinating woman? +</P> + +<P> +Carolyne von Iwanowska was born near Kiew, Russian Poland, in February, +1819. When she still was young her parents separated, and she divided +her time between them. Her mother possessed marked social graces, +travelled much, was a favorite at many courts, and, as a pupil of +Rossini's in singing, was admired by Spontini and Meyerbeer, and was +sought after in the most select salons, including that of Metternich, +the Austrian chancellor. From her Carolyne inherited her charm of +manner. +</P> + +<P> +Intellectually, however, she was wholly her father's child; and he was +her favorite parent. He was a wealthy landed proprietor, and in the +administration of his estates, he frequently consulted her. Moreover +he had an active, studious mind, and he found in her an interested +companion in his pursuits. Often they sat up until late into the night +discussing various questions, and both of them—smoking strong cigars! +</P> + +<P> +In 1836 her hand was asked in marriage by Prince Nicolaus von +Sayn-Wittgenstein. She thrice refused, but finally accepted him at her +father's instigation. The prince was a handsome but otherwise +commonplace man, and not at all the husband for this charming, mentally +alert and finely strung woman. The one happiness that came to her +through this marriage was her daughter Marie. +</P> + +<P> +Liszt came to Kiew on a concert tour in February, 1847. He announced a +charity concert, for which he received a contribution of one hundred +rubles from Princess Carolyne. He already had heard other, but she had +been described to him as a miserly and peculiar person. The gift +surprised him the more for this. He called on her to thank her, found +her a brilliant conversationalist, was charmed with her in every way, +and concluded that what the gossips considered peculiarities were +merely the evidences of an original and positive mentality. Upon the +woman, who was in revolt against the restraints of an unhappy married +life, Liszt, from whose eyes shone the divine spark, who was as much +<I>au fait</I> in the salon as at the piano, and who already had been +worshipped by a long succession of women, made a deep impression. Thus +they were drawn to each other at this very first meeting. +</P> + +<P> +When, a little later, Liszt took her into his confidence regarding his +ambition to devote more time to composition, and communicated to her +his idea of composing a symphony on Dante's "Divine Comedy" with scenic +illustrations, she offered to pay the twenty thousand thalers which +these would cost. Liszt subsequently changed his mind regarding the +need of scenery to his "Dante," but the Princess's generous offer +increased his admiration for her. It was a tribute to himself as well +as to his art, and an expression of her confidence in his genius as a +composer (shared at that time by but few) which could not fail to touch +him deeply. It at once created a bond of artistic and personal +sympathy between them. She was carried away by his playing, and the +programme of his first concert which she attended was treasured by her, +and after her death, forty years later, was found among her possessions +by her daughter. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-120"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-120.jpg" ALT="Liszt at the piano." BORDER="2" WIDTH="388" HEIGHT="533"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Liszt at the piano.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +If it was not love at first sight between these two, it must have been +nearly that. Liszt came to Kiew in February, 1847. The same month +Carolyne invited him to visit her at one of her country seats, +Woronince. Brief correspondence already had passed between them. To +his fifth note he adds, as a postscript, "I am in the best of +humor~.~.~. and find, now that the world contains Woronince, that the +world is good, very good!" +</P> + +<P> +The great pianist continued his tour to Constantinople. When he writes +to the Princess from there, he already "is at her feet." Later in the +same year he is hers "heart and soul." Early the following year he +quotes for her these lines from "Paradise Lost:" +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"For contemplation he, and valour formed,<BR> +For softness she, and sweet attractive grace;<BR> +He for God only, she for God in him!" +</P> + +<P> +She presents him with a baton set with jewels; he writes to her about +the first concert at which he will use it. He transcribes Schubert's +lovely song, "My sweet Repose, My Peace art Thou," and tells her that +he can play it only for her. At the same time their letters to each +other are filled with references to public affairs and literary, +artistic and musical matters. They are the letters of two people of +broad and cultivated taste, who are drawn to each other by every bond +of intellect and sentiment. Is it a wonder that but little more than a +year after they met, the Princess decided to burn her bridges behind +her and leave her husband? Through his friend, Prince Felix +Lichnowsky, Liszt arranged that they should meet at Krzyzanowitz, one +of the Lichnowsky country seats in Austrian Silesia. "May the angel of +the Lord lead you, my radiant morning star!" he exclaims. At the same +time he has an eye to the practical side of the affair, and describes +the place as just the one for their meeting point, because Lichnowsky +will be too busy to remain there, and there will not be a soul about, +save the servants. +</P> + +<P> +It was shortly before the revolution of 1848. To gain permission to +cross the border, the Princess pretended to be bound for Carlsbad, for +the waters. +</P> + +<P> +Liszt's valet met her and her daughter as soon as they were out of +Russia, took them to Ratibor, where they were received by Lichnowsky, +who conducted them to Liszt. After a few days at this place of +meeting, they went to Graz, where they spent a fortnight in another of +the Lichnowsky villas. Among the miscellaneous correspondence of Liszt +is a letter from Graz to his friend Franz von Schober, councillor of +legation at Weimar, where Liszt was settled as court conductor. In it +he describes the Princess as "without doubt an uncommonly and +thoroughly brilliant example of soul and mind and intelligence (with a +prodigious amount of <I>esprit</I> as well). You readily will understand," +he adds, "that henceforth I can dream very little of personal ambition +and of a future wrapped up in myself. In political relations serfdom +may have an end; but the dominion of one soul over another in the +spirit region—should that not remain indestructible?"—Oh, Liszt's +prophetic soul! Thereafter his life was shaped by this extraordinary +woman, for weal and, it must be confessed, for reasons which will +appear later, partly for woe. +</P> + +<P> +The Grandduchess of Weimar took the Princess under her protection, and +she settled at Weimar in the Altenburg, while Liszt lived in the Hotel +zum Erbprinzen. Many tender missives passed between them. "Bonjour, +mon bon ange!" writes Liszt. "On vous aime et vous adore du matin au +soir et du soir au matin."—"On vous attend et vous bénit, chère douce +lumière de mon âme!"—"Je suis triste comme toujours et toutes les fois +que je n'entends pas votre voix—que je ne regarde pas vos yeux." +</P> + +<A NAME="img-124"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-124.jpg" ALT="The Princess Carolyne in her later years at Rome." BORDER="2" WIDTH="353" HEIGHT="553"> +<H4> +[Illustration: The Princess Carolyne in her later years at Rome.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +One of the billets relates to an incident that has become historic. +Wagner had been obliged, because of his participation in the +revolution, to flee from Dresden. He sought refuge with Liszt in +Weimar, but, learning that the Saxon authorities were seeking to +apprehend him, decided to continue his flight to Switzerland. He was +without means and, at the moment, Liszt, too, was out of funds. In +this extremity, Liszt despatched a few lines to the Princess. "Can you +send me by bearer sixty thalers? Wagner is obliged to flee, and I am +unable at present to come to his aid. <I>Bonne et heureuse nuit</I>." The +money was forthcoming, and Wagner owed his safety to the Princess. +This is but one instance in which, at Liszt's instigation, she was the +good fairy of poor musicians. About a year after the Princess settled +in the Altenburg, Liszt, too, took up his residence there. From that +time until they left it, it was the Mecca of musical Europe. Thither +came Von Bülow and Rubinstein, then young men; Joachim and Wieniawski; +Brahms, on his way to Schumann, who, as the result of this visit from +Brahms, wrote the famous article hailing him as the coming Messiah of +music; Berlioz, and many, many others. The Altenburg was the +headquarters of the Wagner propaganda. From there came material and +artistic comfort to Wagner during the darkest hours of his exile and +poverty. +</P> + +<P> +Wendelin Weissheimer, a German orchestral leader, a friend of Liszt and +Wagner, and of many other notable musicians of his day, has given in +his reminiscences (which should have been translated long ago) a +delightful glimpse of life at the Altenburg. He describes a dinner at +which Von Bronsart, the composer, and Count Laurencin, the musical +writer, were the other guests. At table the Princess did the honors +"most graciously," and her "divinity," Franz Liszt, was in "buoyant +spirits." After the champagne, the company rose and went upstairs to +the smoking-room and music salon, which formed one apartment, "for with +Liszt, smoking and music-making were, on such occasions, inseparable." +One touch in Weissheimer's description recalls the Princess's early +acquired habit of smoking. +</P> + +<P> +"He [Liszt] always had excellent Havanas, of unusual length, ready, and +they were passed around with the coffee. The Princess also had come +upstairs. When Liszt sat down at one of the two pianos, she drew an +armchair close up to it and seated herself expectantly, also with one +of the long Havanas in her mouth and pulling delectably at it. We +others, too, drew up near Liszt, who had the manuscript of his 'Faust' +symphony open before him. Of course he played the whole orchestra; of +course the way in which he did it was indescribable; and—of course we +all were in the highest state of exaltation. After the glorious +'Gretchen' division of the symphony, the Princess sprang up from the +armchair, caught hold of Liszt and kissed him so fervently that we all +were deeply moved. [In the interim her long Havana had gone out.]" +</P> + +<P> +The years which Liszt passed with the Princess at the Altenburg, and +when he was most directly under her influence, were the most glorious +in his career. Besides the "Faust" symphony, he composed during this +period the twelve symphonic poems, thus originating a new and highly +important musical form, which may be said to bear, in their liberation +from pedantry, the same relation to the set symphony that the music +drama does to opera; the "Rhapsodies Hongroises;" his piano sonata and +concertos; the "Graner Messe;" and the beginnings of his "Christus" and +"Legend of the Holy Elizabeth." The Princess ordered the household +arrangements in such a way that the composer should not be disturbed in +his work. No one was admitted to him without her <I>visé</I>; she attended +to the voluminous correspondence which, with a man of so much natural +courtesy as Liszt, would have occupied an enormous amount of his time. +He was the acknowledged head of the Wagner movement, at that time +regarded as nothing short of revolutionary; he was looked upon as the +friend of all progressive propaganda in his art; to play for Liszt, to +have his opinion on performance or composition, was the ambition of +every musical celebrity, or would-be one; his cooperation in +innumerable concerts and music festivals was sought for. His was a +name to conjure with. Between him and these assaults on his almost +proverbial kindness stood the Princess, and the list of his great +musical productions during this period, to say nothing of his literary +work, like the rhapsody on Chopin, is the tale of what the world owes +her for her devotion. The relations between Liszt and the Princess +were frankly acknowledged, and by the world as frankly accepted, as if +they were two exceptional beings in whom one could pardon things which +in the case of ordinary mortals would mean social ostracism. The +nearest approach to this situation was that of George Eliot and Lewes. +But with Liszt and his Princess the world, possibly after the fashion +of the Continent, was far more lenient, and their lives in their +outward aspects were far more brilliant. No exalted mind in +literature, music, art or science passed through Weimar, or came near +it, without being drawn to the Altenburg as by a magnet. There seems +to have been within its walls an almost uninterrupted intellectual +revel, or, to use a trite expression, which here is most apt, a steady +feast of reason and flow of soul. The sojourn of Liszt and the +Princess in the Altenburg was a "golden period" for Weimar, a revival +of the time when Goethe lived there and reflected his glory upon it. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-130"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-130.jpg" ALT="The Altenburg, Weimar, where Liszt and Carolyne lived." BORDER="2" WIDTH="542" HEIGHT="339"> +<H4> +[Illustration: The Altenburg, Weimar, where Liszt and Carolyne lived.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +And yet—convention is the result of the concentrated essence of the +experience of ages; and no one seems able to break through it without +the effort leaving a scar. It cast its shadow even over the life at +the Altenburg. There remained one great longing to the Princess, the +nonfulfilment of which was as a void in her soul. She yearned to bear +the name of the man she adored. During the twelve years of their +Weimar sojourn she battled for it, but in vain. Then she transferred +the battlefield to Rome. +</P> + +<P> +Her husband, a Protestant, had found no difficulty in securing a +divorce from her. She was an ardent Roman Catholic, and the church +stood in her way, her own relatives, who had been scandalized at her +flight, being active in invoking its opposition. She went to Rome in +the spring of 1860, to press her suit at the very centre of churchly +authority. Liszt remained in Weimar awaiting word from her. It took +her more than a year to secure the Papal sanction. Then, when +everything seemed auspiciously settled and her marriage with Liszt a +certainty, her enthusiasm led her to take a step which, at the very +last moment, proved fatal to her long-cherished hope. +</P> + +<P> +Had she returned at once to Weimar, her union with Liszt undoubtedly +would have taken place. But no. In her joy she must go too far. In +Rome, there where the marriage had been interdicted, there where she +had successfully overcome opposition to it, there it should take place. +Her triumph should be complete. +</P> + +<P> +Liszt was sent for. His last two letters to her before their meeting +in Rome are dated from Marseilles in October, 1861. The marriage was +to take place October 22, his fiftieth birthday. He writes her from +the Hotel des Empereurs, himself "<I>plus heureux que tous les empereurs +du monde</I>!" and again, "<I>Mon long exil va finir</I>." Yet it was only +just beginning! +</P> + +<P> +He arrived in Rome on October 20. All arrangements for the ceremony in +the San Carlo al Corso had been made. Then, by a strange fatality, it +chanced that several of the Princess's relations, who were most bitter +against her, entered upon the scene. Of all times, they happened to be +in Rome at this critical moment, and, getting wind of the impending +marriage, they entered a violent protest. When, on the evening of the +21st, Liszt was visiting the Princess, a Papal messenger called and +announced that His Holiness had decided to forbid the ceremony until he +could look into the matter more fully, and requested from her a +resubmission of the documents bearing on the case. +</P> + +<P> +To the Princess, then on the threshold of realizing her most cherished +hopes, this was the last stroke. Her over-wrought nature saw in it a +Judgment of Heaven. She refused to resubmit the papers; and even, when +a few years later, Prince Wittgenstein died and she was free, she +regarded marriage with Liszt as opposed by the Divine will. A strain +of mysticism, nurtured by busy ecclesiastics, developed itself in her; +she became possessed of the idea that she was a chosen instrument in +the Church's hands to further its interests; and with feverish, +desperate energy she devoted herself to literary work as its champion. +She had her own press, which set up each day's work and showed it to +her in proof the next. She did not leave Rome except on one occasion, +and then for less than a day, during the remaining twenty-six years of +her life. +</P> + +<P> +It has been hinted more than once that the Princess's course was not as +completely governed by religious mysticism as might be supposed—that +her sensitive nature had divined in Liszt an unexpressed opposition to +the marriage, as if, possibly, he did not wish to be tied down to her, +yet felt bound in honor, because of the sacrifices she had made for +him, to appear to share her hope. La Mara (Marie Lipsius), the editor +of the Liszt letters and whose interesting notes form the connecting +links in the correspondence, does not take this view. It is +noticeable, however, although Liszt and the Princess saw each other +frequently whenever he was in Rome, and he became an abbé probably +through her influence, that while in some of his letters to her in +later years there are notes of regret, those written after the crisis +in Rome breathe an intellectual rather than a personal affinity. +</P> + +<P> +Be this as it may, it was a tragedy in his life as well as in her own. +Practically the rest of his life was divided, each year, between +Budapest, at the Conservatory there; Weimar, but no longer at the +Altenburg; and Rome, but not at the Princess's residence, Piazza di +Spagna. Thus he had three homes—none of which was home. The "golden +period" of his life, as well as the Altenburg itself, where others now +were installed, were dim shadows of the past. Liszt was the "grand old +man" of the piano, and is a great figure among composers; but whoever +knows the story of the last years of his life, sees him a wandering and +pathetic figure. He died at Bayreuth in July, 1886; Carolyne survived +him less than a year. The literary work of her twenty-six years in +Rome probably will be forgotten; it will be the linking of her name +with Liszt, and its association with the "golden period" of Weimar, +that will cause her to be remembered. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap07"></A> +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +Wagner and Cosima +</H2> + + +<P> +No woman not a professional musician has ever played so important a part +in musical history as "Frau Cosima," the widow of Richard Wagner. In +fact, has any woman, professional musician or not? Bear in mind who +"Frau Cosima" is. She is the daughter of Franz Liszt, the greatest +pianist and one of the great composers of the last century, and was the +wife and, in the most exalted meaning of the term, the helpmeet of the +greatest of all composers! The two men with whom Cosima has thus stood +in such intimate relation are exceptional even among great musicians. +Composers are usually strongly emotional, inspired in all that pertains +to their art, but with a specialist's lack of interest in everything +else. Not so, however, Liszt or Wagner, for not since the time of +Beethoven had there been two musicians who, in the exercise of their art, +approached it from so clear an intellectual standpoint. Beethoven +through the greatness of his mind was able to enlarge the symphonic form, +which had been left by Haydn and Mozart. It became more responsive, more +plastic, in his hands. Form in art is the creation of the intellect; +what goes into it is the outflow of the heart. Thus Liszt created the +Symphonic Poem, and Wagner completely revolutionized the musical stage by +creating the Music-Drama. Into the Symphonic Poem, into the Music-Drama, +they put their hearts; but the creation of these forms was in each an +intellectual <I>tour de force</I>. The musician who thinks as well as feels +is the one who advances his art. In the historic struggle between Wagner +and the classicists Liszt played a large part. He was the first to +produce "Lohengrin"—was, as orchestral conductor, its subtle +interpreter, and, thus, a pioneer of the new school; he was Wagner's +steadfast champion through life, and a beautiful friendship existed +between "Richard" and "Franz." +</P> + +<A NAME="img-140"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-140.jpg" ALT="Richard Wagner. From the original lithograph of the Egusquiza portrait." BORDER="2" WIDTH="350" HEIGHT="556"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Richard Wagner. <BR> +From the original lithograph of the Egusquiza portrait.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +Even now the reader can begin to realize the rôle Cosima has played in +music. That she is the daughter of Liszt is not in itself wonderful, but +that she should have fulfilled the mission to which she was born is one +of the most exquisite touches of fate. Liszt was one of Wagner's first +champions and friends. He came to the composer's aid in the darkest +years of his career—during that long exile after Wagner had been obliged +to flee from Germany because of his participation in the revolution of +1848. It was, in fact, through Liszt that Wagner received the means to +continue his flight from the Saxon authorities and cross the border to +safety in Switzerland. +</P> + +<P> +Nor did Liszt's beneficence stop there. From afar he continued to be +Wagner's good fairy. To fully appreciate Liszt's action at this time, +one must keep in mind the position of the Saxon composer. To-day his +fame is world-wide; we can scarcely realize that there was a time when +his genius was not recognized, but at that time he was not famous at all. +Those who had the slightest premonition of what the future would accord +him were a mere handful of enthusiasts. Such a thing as a Wagner cult +was undreamed of. He had produced three works for the stage. "Rienzi" +had been a brilliant success, "The Flying Dutchman" a mere <I>succès +d'estime</I>, "Tannhäuser" a comparative failure. From a popular point of +view he had not sustained the promise of his first work. We know now +that compared with his second and third works "Rienzi" is trash, and that +rarely has a composer made such wonderful forward strides in his art as +did Wagner with "The Flying Dutchman" and "Tannhäuser." But that was not +the opinion when they were produced. The former, although it is now +acknowledged to be an exquisitely poetic treatment of the weird legend, +was voted sombre and dull, and "Tannhäuser" was simply a puzzle. After +listening to "Tannhäuser," Schumann declared that Wagner was unmusical! +Unless a person is familiar with Wagner's life, it is impossible to +believe how bitter was the opposition to his theories and to his music. +Does it seem possible now that he had to struggle for twenty-five years +before he could secure the production of his "Ring of the Nibelung"? Yet +such was the case. Then, too, he was poor, and sometimes driven to such +straits that he contemplated suicide. +</P> + +<P> +When the public remained indifferent to one of his works and critics +reviled it, Wagner's usual method of reply was to produce something still +more advanced. Thus, when "Tannhäuser" proved caviar to the public, and +seemed to affect the critics like a red rag waved before a bull, he +promptly sat down and wrote and composed "Lohengrin." But how should he, +an exile, secure its production? There it lay a mute score. As he +turned its pages, the notes looked out at him appealingly for a hearing. +It was like a homesick child asking for its own. What did Wagner do? He +wrote a few lines to Liszt. The answer was not long in coming. Liszt +was already making the necessary arrangements to accede to Wagner's +request and produce "Lohengrin" in Weimar, where he was musical director. +Liszt's name gave great <I>éclat</I> to the undertaking; and through the +acclaim which, with the aid of his pupils and admirers, he understood so +well how to create, it attracted widespread attention, musicians from far +and near in Germany coming to hear it. Of course, opinions on the work +were divided, but the band of Wagner enthusiasts received accessions, and +the interest in the production had been too intense not to leave an +impression. The performance was, in fact, epoch-making. It raised a +"Wagner question" which would not down; which kept at least his earlier +works before the public; and which made him, even while still a fugitive +from Germany, and an exile, a prominent figure in the musical circles of +the country that refused him the right to cross its borders. +</P> + +<P> +All this was done by Liszt. Next to Wagner's own genius, which would +eventually have fought its way into the open, the influence that first +brought Wagner some degree of recognition was Franz Liszt. His +assistance to Wagner at this stage in that composer's career cannot be +overestimated. He was his tonic in despair, his solace in his darkest +hours. Few men appear in a nobler rôle than Liszt in his correspondence +with Wagner during this period. Is it not marvellous that some twenty +years later, at another crisis in Wagner's life, another being came to +his aid and became to him as a haven of rest; and that that being should +have been none other than the daughter of his earlier benefactor, Franz +Liszt? Fate often is cruel and often unaccountable, but in this instance +it seems to have acted the rôle of Cupid with an exquisite sense of what +was appropriate, and to have set the crowning glory of a great woman's +love upon Wagner's career. +</P> + +<P> +When Liszt was producing "Lohengrin," aiding Wagner pecuniarily, and +cheering him in his exile, Cosima Liszt was a young girl in Paris, where +she, her elder sister Blandine (afterward the wife of Emile Ollivier, who +became the war minister of Napoleon the Third) and her brother Daniel +lived with Liszt's mother. It was in Mme. Liszt's house that Wagner +first met her. He had gone to Paris in hopes of furthering his cause +there. During his sojourn he held a reading of his libretto to "The Ring +of the Nibelung" at Mme. Liszt's before a choice audience, which included +Liszt, Berlioz and Von Bülow. This occurred in the early fifties. +Cosima, who was among the listeners, was at the time fifteen or sixteen +years old. The mere fact of her presence at the reading is recorded. +Whether she was impressed with the libretto or its author we do not know. +It is probable that their meeting consisted of nothing more than the mere +formal introduction of the composer to the girl who was the daughter of +his friend Liszt, and who was to be one of the small and privileged +gathering at the reading. Wagner soon left Paris, and if she made any +impression on him at that time, he does not mention the fact in his +letters. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-146"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-146.jpg" ALT="Cosima, wife of Wagner. From a portrait bust made before her marriage." BORDER="2" WIDTH="360" HEIGHT="394"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Cosima, wife of Wagner. <BR> +From a portrait bust made before her marriage.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +Whoever takes the trouble to read Liszt's correspondence, which is in +seven volumes and nearly all in French, will have little difficulty in +discerning that Cosima was his favorite child. He speaks of her +affectionately as "Cosette" and "Cosimette." Like his own, her +temperament was artistic and responsive, and she also inherited his charm +of manner and his exquisite tact, which, if anything, her early bringing +up in Paris enhanced. In 1857, when she was twenty, Wagner saw her again +and describes her as "Liszt's wonderful image, but of superior intellect." +</P> + +<P> +Well might Wagner speak of her resemblance to her father as wonderful. I +have seen Liszt and Cosima together, on an occasion to be referred to +later, and was struck with the remarkable likeness between father and +daughter. Both were idealists; if he had his eyes upon the stars, so had +she. Here is a passage from one of Liszt's letters: +</P> + +<P> +"<I>Une pensée favorite de Cosima:' De quelque coté qu'un tourne la torche, +la flamme se redresse et monte vers le ciel.</I>'" ("A favorite thought of +Cosima's: Whichever way you may turn the torch, the flame turns on itself +and still points toward the heavens.'") +</P> + +<P> +A woman whose life holds that motto is in herself an inspiration. +Whatever turn fortune takes, her aspirations still blaze the way. She +herself is the torch of her motto. +</P> + +<P> +Although not a musician, although keeping herself consistently in the +background during Wagner's life (much as a mere private secretary would), +her influence at Bayreuth was continually felt; and since his death she +has been the head and front of the Wagner movement, and yet without +seeking publicity. Her intellectual force quietly assured her the +succession. There have been protests against her absolute rule, but she +has serenely ignored them. She still moulds to her will all the forces +concerned in the Bayreuth productions. +</P> + +<P> +When Mme. Nordica was preparing to sing "Elsa" at Bayreuth, it was Frau +Cosima who went over the rôle with her, sometimes repeating a single +phrase a hundred times in order to assure the correct pronunciation of +one word. It taxed the singer to the utmost; but she found Wagner's +widow willing to work as long and as hard as she herself would. The +performance established Mme. Nordica as a Wagner singer. Despite the +criticisms that have been heaped upon Frau Wagner for assuming to set +herself up as the great conservator of Wagnerian traditions, it is +significant that when, some years later, Mme. Nordica decided to add +"Sieglinde" to her repertoire, but with no special purpose of singing it +at Bayreuth, she arranged with Frau Cosima to go over the rôle with her, +and in order to do so made a trip to Switzerland, where the former was +staying. So far as adding to her reputation was concerned, there was not +the slightest reason for Mme. Nordica to do this. That the American +prima donna elected to study with Frau Cosima shows that she must have +found Wagner's widow a woman of rare temperament. +</P> + +<P> +Cosima was not Wagner's first love, nor even his first wife. For in +November, 1836, he had married Wilhelmina Planer, the leading actress of +the theatre in Magdeburg where he was musical director of opera. Her +father was a spindle-maker. It is said that her desire to earn money for +the household, rather than the impetus of a well-defined histrionic gift, +led her to go on the stage; but, once on the stage, she discovered that +she had unquestionable talent, and played leading characters in tragedy +and comedy with success. +</P> + +<P> +Minna is described as handsome, but not strikingly so; of medium height +and slim figure, with "soft, gazelle-like eyes which were a faithful +index of a tender heart." Later, however, the Princess Sayn-Wittgenstein +wrote to Liszt that she was too stout, but praised her management of the +household and her excellent cuisine. Her nature was the very opposite of +Wagner's. Where he was passionate, strong-willed and ambitious, she was +gentle, affectionate and retiring. Where he yearned for conquest, she +wanted only a well-regulated home. But she could not follow him in his +art theories, and as they assumed more definite shape she became less and +less able to comprehend them and, finally, they became almost a sealed +book to her. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-152"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-152.jpg" ALT="Richard and Cosima Wagner." BORDER="2" WIDTH="329" HEIGHT="457"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Richard and Cosima Wagner.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +Doubtless, the ill success of "The Flying Dutchman" and "Tannhäuser," +works which, after "Rienzi," puzzled people, engendered her first +misunderstanding of Wagner's genius. Some may be surprised that this +lack of appreciation did not bring about a separation sooner, instead of +after nearly a quarter of a century of married life. But when a man is +struggling with poverty, the woman who unobtrusively aids him in bearing +it is regarded by him as an angel of light, and the question as to +whether she appreciates his genius or not becomes a secondary one in the +struggle for existence. +</P> + +<P> +But when at last there is some promise of success, some relief from +drudgery, and with it a little leisure for companionship—then, too, +there is opportunity for an estimate of intellectual quality. Then it is +that the man of genius discovers that the woman who has stood by him +through his poverty lacks the graces of mind necessary to his complete +happiness, and the self-sacrificing wife who has been his drudge, in +order that he might the better meet want, and who has perhaps lost her +youth and her looks in his service, is forgotten for some one else. The +worst of it is that the world forgets her and all she has done for the +great man in her quiet, uncomplaining way. The drudge never finds a page +in the "Loves of the Poets." The woman who comes in and reaps where the +other has sown, does. +</P> + +<P> +Wagner's friend, Ferdinand Praeger, has much to say of Minna's fine +qualities. But he also tells several anecdotes which completely +illustrate how absolutely she failed to comprehend Wagner's genius and +ambition. Praeger visited them in their "trimly kept Swiss chalet" in +Zurich in the summer of 1856. One day when Praeger and Minna were seated +at the luncheon table waiting for Wagner, who was scoring the "Nibelung," +to come down from his study, she asked: "Now, honestly, is Richard really +such a great genius?" Remember that this question was asked about the +composer of "The Flying Dutchman," "Tannhäuser" and "Lohengrin." If she +was unable to discover his genius in these, how could she be expected to +follow its loftier flights in his later works? +</P> + +<P> +On another occasion when Wagner was complaining that the public did not +understand him, she said: "Well, Richard, why don't you write something +for the gallery?" So little did she understand the man whose genius was +founded upon unswerving devotion to artistic truth. +</P> + +<P> +During Praeger's visit, a former singer at the Magdeburg opera and her +two daughters called on Wagner. They sang the music of the +Rhine-daughters from "Rheingold." When they finished singing, Minna +asked Praeger: "Is it really as beautiful as you say? It does not seem +so to me, and I'm afraid it would not sound so to others." +</P> + +<P> +While, as can be shown from passages in his correspondence, Wagner +appreciated the homely virtues of his first wife, and never, even after +they had separated, allowed a word to be spoken against her, the last +years of their married life were stormy. She had been tried beyond her +strength, and, not sharing her husband's enormous confidence in his +artistic powers, she had not the stimulus of his faith in his ultimate +success to sustain her. Moreover a heart trouble with which she was +afflicted resulted, through the strain to which their uncertain material +condition subjected her, in a growing irritability which was accentuated +by jealousy of women who entered the growing circle of Wagner's admirers +as his genius began to be appreciated. +</P> + +<P> +The crisis came in 1858, when they separated, Minna retiring to Dresden. +Two years later, when Wagner was ill in Paris, she went there and nursed +him, but they separated again. An interesting fact, not generally known, +is that, in 1862, when Wagner was in Biebrich on the Rhine composing his +"Meistersinger," Minna came from Dresden as a surprise to pay him a +visit—evidently an effort to effect a reconciliation. Wendelin +Weissheimer, a conductor at the opera in Mayeuse on the opposite bank of +the river and a close friend of Wagner's at that time, has left an +enlightening record of the episode. +</P> + +<P> +Wagner, he says, "the heaven-storming genius, who knew no bounds, tried +to play the rôle of Hausvater—of loving husband and comforter. He had +some cold edibles brought in from the hotel, made tea, and himself boiled +half a dozen eggs. [What a picture! The composer of 'Tristan' boiling +eggs!] Afterwards he put on one of his familiar velvet dressing-gowns and +a fitting barretta, and proceeded to read aloud the book of 'Die +Meistersinger.' +</P> + +<P> +"The first act passed off without mishap save for some unnecessary +questions from Minna. But at the beginning of the second act, when he +had described the stage-setting—'to the right the cobbler shop of Hans +Sachs; to the left,' etc.,—Minna exclaimed: +</P> + +<P> +"'And here sits the audience!' at the same time letting a bread-ball roll +over Wagner's manuscript. That ended the reading." +</P> + +<P> +The visit of course was futile. Minna returned to Dresden, where she +died in 1866. Poor Minna! A good cook, but she did not appreciate his +genius, would seem to sum up her story. Yet it is but just that we +should pay at least a passing salute to this woman who was the love of +Wagner's youth and the drudge of his middle life, and who, from the +distance of her lonely separation, saw him basking in the favor of the +king, who, too late for her, had become his munificent patron.—What a +contrast between her fate and Cosima's! +</P> + +<A NAME="img-156"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-156.jpg" ALT="Richard and Cosima Wagner entertaining in their home Wahnfried, Liszt, and Hans von Wolzogen. Painting by W. Beckmann." BORDER="2" WIDTH="567" HEIGHT="391"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Richard and Cosima Wagner entertaining in their home <BR> +Wahnfried, Liszt, and Hans von Wolzogen. <BR> +Painting by W. Beckmann.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +Were it not for Liszt's letters, meagre would be the information +regarding Cosima before her marriage to Wagner. But by going over his +voluminous correspondence and picking out references to her here and +there, I am able to give at least some idea of her earlier life. +</P> + +<P> +This extraordinary woman, who brought Wagner so much happiness and of +whom it may be said that no other woman ever played so important a part +in the history of music, came to her many graces and accomplishments by +right of birth. She was the daughter of Liszt and the Countess d'Agoult, +a French author, better known under her pen name of "Daniel Stern." Thus +she had genius on one side of her parentage and distinguished talent on +the other; and, on both sides, rare personal charm and tact. +</P> + +<P> +The Countess d'Agoult's father, Viscount Flavigny, was an old Royalist +nobleman. While an émigré during the revolution, he had married the +beautiful daughter of the Frankfort banker, Bethman. After the Flavignys +returned to France, their daughter, an extremely beautiful blonde, was +brought up, partly at the Flavigny château, partly at the Sacré Coeur de +Marie, in Paris. Talented beyond her years, her wit and beauty won her +much admiration. At an early age she married Count Charles d'Agoult, a +French officer, a member of the old aristocracy and twenty years her +senior. +</P> + +<P> +When she first met Liszt she was twenty-nine years old, had been married +six years and was the mother of three children. She still was beautiful, +and in her salon she gathered around her men and women of rank, <I>esprit</I> +and fame. In 1835 Liszt left Paris after the concert season there. The +Countess followed him, and the next heard of them they were in +Switzerland. They remained together six years, Cosima, born in 1837, +being one of the three children resulting from the union. In the +Countess's relations with Liszt there appears to have been a curious +mingling of <I>la grande passion</I> and hauteur. For when, soon after she +had joined him in Switzerland, he urged her to secure a divorce in order +that they might marry, she drew herself up and replied: "<I>Madame la +Comtesse d'Agoult ne sera jamais Madame Liszt</I>!" Certainly none but a +Frenchwoman would have been capable of such a reply under the same +circumstances. Equally French was her husband's remark when, the +Countess's support having been assumed by Liszt, he expressed the opinion +that throughout the whole affair the pianist had behaved like a man of +honor. +</P> + +<P> +After the separation of Liszt and Countess d'Agoult, he entrusted the +care of the three children to his mother. During a brief sojourn in +Paris, Wagner met Cosima, then a girl of sixteen, for the first time. +She formed with Liszt, Von Bülow, Berlioz and a few others the very +small, but extremely select, audience which, at the house of Liszt's +mother, heard Wagner read selections from his "Nibelung" dramas. In +1855, the burden of the care of the children falling too heavily upon +Liszt's mother, the duty of looking after the daughters was cheerfully +undertaken by the mother of Hans von Bülow, who resided in Berlin. +</P> + +<P> +In a letter written by Von Bülow in June, 1856, he speaks of them in +these interesting terms: "These wonderful girls bear their name with +right—full of talent, cleverness and life, they are interesting +personalities, such as I have rarely met. Another than I would be happy +in their companionship. But their evident superiority annoys me, and the +impossibility to appear sufficiently interesting to them prevents my +appreciating the pleasure of their society as much as I would like +to—there you have a confession, the candor of which you will not deny. +It is not very flattering for a young man, but it is absolutely true." +Yet, a year later, he married Cosima, one of the girls whose +"superiority" so annoyed him. +</P> + +<P> +How strange, in view of what happened later, that Von Bülow so planned +his wedding trip that its main objective was a visit to Zurich in order +that he might present Cosima to Wagner, who had not seen her since she +had formed one of his audience at the "Rheingold" reading in Paris. It +is in a letter to his friend, Richard Pohl, written the day before his +wedding, that Von Bülow mentions the "Wagnerstadt," Zurich, as the aim of +his wedding journey. Was it Fate—or fatality—that led him thither with +Cosima? The daughter of Liszt, the bride of Von Bülow, being conducted +on her honeymoon to the very lair of the great composer for whom she was, +within a few years, to leave her husband! What wonderful musical links +destiny wove in the life of this woman who herself was not a musician! +</P> + +<P> +Hans and Cosima arrived at Zurich early in September. "For the last +fortnight," writes Von Bülow, under date of September 19, 1857, "I and my +wife have been living in Wagner's house, and I do not know anything else +that could have afforded me such benefit, such refreshment as being +together with this wonderful, unique man, whom one should worship as a +god." +</P> + +<P> +On his side Wagner was charmed with the Von Bülows. In one of his +letters he speaks of their visit as his most delightful experience of the +summer. "They spent three weeks in our little house; I have rarely been +so pleasantly and delightfully affected as by their informal visit. In +the mornings they had to keep quiet, for I was writing my 'Tristan,' of +which I read them an act aloud every week. If you knew Cosima, you would +agree with me when I conclude that this young pair is wonderfully well +mated. With all their great intelligence and real artistic sympathy, +there is something so light and buoyant in the two young people that one +was obliged to feel perfectly at home with them." +</P> + +<P> +Wagner allowed them to depart only under promise that they would return +next year, which they did, to find a household on the verge of disruption +and to be unwilling witnesses to some of the closing scenes of Wagner's +first marriage. +</P> + +<P> +During her childhood in Paris Cosima was frail and delicate. Liszt, in +one of his letters, confesses that this caused him to regard her with a +deeper affection than he bestowed on her elder sister. Later he speaks +of her as a rare and beautiful nature of great and spontaneous charm. A +friend of Liszt's who saw her at the Altenburg in 1860 writes that she +was pale, slender, wan and thin to a degree, and that she crept through +the room like a shadow. Liszt was greatly concerned about her, for the +year previous her brother Daniel had died of consumption, and he feared +she might be stricken with the same malady. +</P> + +<P> +Daniel's death was a sad experience through which they passed together, +and which strengthened the ties of tenderness that drew Liszt to his +younger daughter. The son died in his father's arms and in her presence. +She had nursed him devotedly in his last illness. "Cosima tells me," +Liszt wrote, before he had seen Daniel on his sick-bed, "that the color +of his beard and of his hair has taken on a touch of brownish red, and +that he looks like a Christ by Correggio." Together, after Daniel's +death, they knelt beside his bed "praying to God that His will be +done—and that He reconcile us to that Divine will, in according us the +grace on our part to accept it without a murmur." +</P> + +<P> +Such a scene was a memory for a lifetime. Cosima herself, in one of her +letters, gives a beautiful description of her brother's passage from +life. "He fell back into the arms of death as into those of a guardian +angel, for whom he had been waiting a long time. There was no struggle; +without a distaste for life, he seemed, nevertheless, to have aspired +ardently toward eternity." +</P> + +<P> +With a pretty touch Liszt gives an idea of Cosima's interest in others. +It seems that a certain Frau Stilke was anxious to possess a gray dress +of moiré antique, and Liszt had persuaded the Princess Sayn-Wittgenstein +to place the necessary sum for buying it at his daughter's disposal. "In +order to estimate the cost," he writes, "Cosette has devised this +excellent formula: It should be a dress such as one would give to persons +who want a dress—only it is necessary that it should be gray and of +moiré antique to satisfy the ideal of taste of the person in question." +</P> + +<P> +Wagner does not seem to have seen Cosima after the Von Bülows' second +visit to him at Zurich until they came to him for a visit at Biebrich +during the summer of 1862. What a contrast Cosima must have seemed to +poor Minna who, in the same house and but a short time before, had +desecrated the manuscript of "Die Meistersinger" by allowing a bread-ball +to roll over it! Wagner's favorable opinion of Hans and Cosima underwent +a great change during their sojourn with him. In a letter, after +speaking of Von Bülow's depression owing to poor health, he writes: "Add +to this a tragic marriage; a young woman of extraordinary, quite +unprecedented, endowment, Liszt's wonderful image, but of superior +intellect." +</P> + +<P> +That this woman who so impressed Wagner was in her turn filled with +admiration for his gifts appears from two letters which, during the +summer of 1862, she wrote from Biebrich to her father. In one of these +she speaks enthusiastically of some of the "Tristan" music. The other +letter concerns "Die Meistersinger:" +</P> + +<P> +"The 'Meistersinger' is to Wagner's other conceptions what the 'Winter's +Tale' is to Shakespeare's other works. Its fantasy is founded on gayety +and drollery, and it has called up the Nuremberg of the Middle Ages, with +its guilds, its poet-artisans, its pedants, its cavaliers, to draw forth +the freshest laughter in the midst of the highest, the most ideal poetry." +</P> + +<P> +It is evident that two souls so sympathetic could not long remain in +proximity without craving a closer union. "Coming events cast their +shadows before," remarks one who often was present during the Biebrich +visit of the Von Bülows to Wagner. +</P> + +<P> +How deeply Cosima sympathized with Wagner's aims even then is shown by +another episode of this visit. One evening the composer outlined to his +friends his plans for "Parsifal," adding that it probably would be his +last work. The little circle was deeply affected, and Cosima wept. +Strange prescience! "Parsifal" was not produced until twenty years +later, yet it proved to be the finale of Wagner's life's labors. +</P> + +<P> +The incident has interest from another point of view. It shows that +Wagner had his plans for "Parsifal" fairly matured in 1862, and that it +was not, as some critics, who see in it a decadence of his powers, claim, +a late afterthought, designed to give to Bayreuth a curiosity somewhat +after the <I>façon</I> of the Oberammergau "Passion Play." Decadence? Henry +T. Finck, the most consistent and eloquent champion Wagner has had in +America, sees in it no falling off in the composer's genius; nor do I. +Wagner's scores always fully voice his dramas,—"Parsifal" as completely +as any. The subject simply required different musical treatment from the +heroic "Ring of the Nibelung" and the impassioned "Tristan." +</P> + +<P> +In a letter written by Wagner in June, 1864, occurs this significant +sentence: "There is one good being who brightens my household." The +"good being" was Cosima, who from now on was destined to fill his life +with the sunshine of love and of devotion to his art. +</P> + +<P> +"Since I last saw you in Munich," Wagner writes to a friend, "I have not +again left my asylum, which in the meanwhile also has become the refuge +of her who was destined to prove that I could well be helped, and that +the axiom of my many friends, that 'I could not be helped,' was false! +She knew that I could be helped, and has helped me: she has defied every +disapprobation and taken upon herself every condemnation." +</P> + +<P> +This was written in June, 1870, a year after Cosima had borne him +Siegfried, and two months before their marriage. For in August, 1870, +the following announcement was sent out: +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"We have the honor to announce our marriage, which took place on the 25th +of August of this year in the Protestant Church in Lucerne. +<BR> +Richard Wagner.<BR> +Cosima Wagner, née Liszt.<BR> +<BR><BR> +"August 25, 1870." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +When, in 1882, I attended the first performance of "Parsifal" in +Bayreuth, I had frequent opportunity of seeing Wagner and Frau Cosima. +Probably the best view I had of them together, and of Franz Liszt at the +same time, was at a dinner given by Wagner to the artists who took part +in the performances. It was in one of the restaurants near the theatre +on the hill overlooking Bayreuth. Wagner's entrance upon the scene was +highly theatrical. All the singers and a few other guests had been +seated, and Liszt, Frau Cosima and Siegfried Wagner were in their places +when the door opened and in shot Wagner. It was as well calculated as +the entrance of the star in a play. On his way to his seat he stopped +and chatted a few moments with this one and that one. Instead of Wagner +sitting at the head of the table and his wife at the foot, they sat +together in the middle. It seemed impossible for him, though, to remain +seated more than a few minutes at a time, and he was jumping up and down +and running about the table all through the banquet. On the other side +of Wagner sat Liszt; on the other side of Frau Cosima, Siegfried Wagner, +then still a boy. Among the four there were two pairs of likenesses. +Liszt was gray; but, although Frau Cosima's hair was blonde, and her face +smooth and fair as compared with her father's, which was furrowed with +age and boldly aquiline, she was his child in every lineament. Moreover, +the quick, responsive lighting up of the features, her graceful bearing, +her tact—that these were inherited from him a brief surveillance of the +two sufficed to disclose. Combined with these fascinating, but after all +more or less superficial characteristics was the stamp of a rare +intellectual force on both faces. No one seeing them together needed to +be told that Cosima was a Liszt. +</P> + +<P> +Nor did any one need to be told that Siegfried was a Wagner. The boy was +as much like his father as his mother was like hers. Feature for +feature, Wagner was reproduced in his son. That there should be no trace +of the mother, and such a mother, in the boy's face struck me as +remarkable; but there was none. Siegfried Wagner was a veritable pocket +edition of his famous father. His later photographs as a young man show +that much of this likeness has disappeared. After dinner, there were +speeches. Wagner, his hand resting affectionately on Liszt's shoulder, +paid a feeling tribute to the man who had befriended him early in his +career and who had given him the precious wife at his side. I remember +as if it had been but last night the tenderness with which he spoke the +words <I>die theure Gattin</I>. +</P> + +<P> +It was a wonderful two or three hours, that banquet, with the numerous +notabilities present, and at least two great men, Liszt and Wagner, and +one great woman, the daughter of Liszt and the wife of Wagner; and the +experience is to be treasured all the more, because few of those present +saw Wagner again. Early in the following year he died at Venice. He is +buried in the garden back of Wahnfried, his Bayreuth villa. He was a +great lover of animals, and at his burial his two favorite dogs, Wotan +and Mark, burst through the bushes that surround the grave and joined the +mourners. One of these pets is buried near him, and on the slab is the +inscription: "Here lies in peace Wahnfried's faithful watcher and +friend—the good and handsome Mark." +</P> + +<P> +What Cosima was to Wagner is best told in Liszt's words, written to a +friend after a visit to Bayreuth, in 1872, when his favorite child had +been married to Wagner two years. "Cosima still is my terrible daughter, +as I used to call her,—an extraordinary woman and of the highest merit, +far above vulgar judgment, and worthy of the admiring sentiments which +she has inspired in all who have known her. She is devoted to Wagner +with an all-absorbing enthusiasm, like Senta to the Flying Dutchman—and +she will prove his salvation, because he listens to her and follows her +with keen perception." +</P> + +<P> +That Bayreuth with Wagner's death did not become a mere tradition, that +the Wagner performances still continue there, is due to Frau Cosima. She +is Bayreuth. No woman has made such an impression on the music of her +time as she. Yet she is not a musician! +</P> + + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + +<hr class="full" noshade> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LOVES OF GREAT COMPOSERS***</p> +<p>******* This file should be named 18138-h.txt or 18138-h.zip *******</p> +<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br /> +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/1/3/18138">http://www.gutenberg.org/1/8/1/3/18138</a></p> +<p>Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed.</p> + +<p>Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution.</p> + + + +<pre> +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/license">http://www.gutenberg.org/license)</a>. + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS,' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/pglaf. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://www.gutenberg.org/about/contact + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/pglaf + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Each eBook is in a subdirectory of the same number as the eBook's +eBook number, often in several formats including plain vanilla ASCII, +compressed (zipped), HTML and others. + +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks replace the old file and take over +the old filename and etext number. The replaced older file is renamed. +VERSIONS based on separate sources are treated as new eBooks receiving +new filenames and etext numbers. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org">http://www.gutenberg.org</a> + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + +EBooks posted prior to November 2003, with eBook numbers BELOW #10000, +are filed in directories based on their release date. If you want to +download any of these eBooks directly, rather than using the regular +search system you may utilize the following addresses and just +download by the etext year. + +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext06/">http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext06/</a> + + (Or /etext 05, 04, 03, 02, 01, 00, 99, + 98, 97, 96, 95, 94, 93, 92, 92, 91 or 90) + +EBooks posted since November 2003, with etext numbers OVER #10000, are +filed in a different way. The year of a release date is no longer part +of the directory path. The path is based on the etext number (which is +identical to the filename). The path to the file is made up of single +digits corresponding to all but the last digit in the filename. For +example an eBook of filename 10234 would be found at: + +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/0/2/3/10234 + +or filename 24689 would be found at: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/4/6/8/24689 + +An alternative method of locating eBooks: +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/GUTINDEX.ALL">http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/GUTINDEX.ALL</a> + +*** END: FULL LICENSE *** +</pre> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-006.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-006.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..3a0fc38 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-006.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-016.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-016.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..7e64a9a --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-016.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-022.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-022.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..5d69339 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-022.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-028.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-028.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..0726e2a --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-028.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-040.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-040.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..958f4db --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-040.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-048.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-048.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..b20f479 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-048.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-054.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-054.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..380a8c7 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-054.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-058.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-058.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..7563eb5 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-058.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-064.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-064.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..30044b1 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-064.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-080.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-080.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a40eb58 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-080.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-086.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-086.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..7aef3b7 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-086.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-094.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-094.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a987454 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-094.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-098.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-098.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..2b16dc1 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-098.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-106.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-106.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..0d528b8 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-106.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-110.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-110.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..6fdc5a3 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-110.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-116.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-116.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..6acfd6f --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-116.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-120.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-120.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..1e2fb2b --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-120.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-124.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-124.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a83142f --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-124.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-130.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-130.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f512d03 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-130.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-140.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-140.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..918b0a9 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-140.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-146.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-146.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..e3ec442 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-146.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-152.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-152.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..100d0c3 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-152.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-156.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-156.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..09ac59a --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-156.jpg diff --git a/18138-h/images/img-front.jpg b/18138-h/images/img-front.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..4d7766d --- /dev/null +++ b/18138-h/images/img-front.jpg diff --git a/18138.txt b/18138.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..86df917 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2969 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Loves of Great Composers, by Gustav Kobbé + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Loves of Great Composers + + +Author: Gustav Kobbé + + + +Release Date: April 10, 2006 [eBook #18138] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LOVES OF GREAT COMPOSERS*** + + +E-text prepared by Al Haines + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustrations. + See 18138-h.htm or 18138-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/1/3/18138/18138-h/18138-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/1/3/18138/18138-h.zip) + + + + + +THE LOVES OF GREAT COMPOSERS + +by + +GUSTAV KOBBE + + + + + + + +[Frontispiece: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (photogravure)] + + + + + +Thomas Y. Crowell & Co. +New York +Copyright, 1904 and 1905 +By The Butterick Publishing Co. (Limited) +Copyright, 1905, by Thomas Y. Crowell & Co. +Published September, 1905 +Composition and electrotype plates by +D. B. Updike, The Merrymount Press, Boston + + + + + +To Charles Dwyer + + + + +Table of Contents + + + Mozart and his Constance + + Beethoven and his "Immortal Beloved" + + Mendelssohn and his Cecile + + Chopin and the Countess Delphine Potocka + + The Schumanns: Robert and Clara + + Franz Liszt and his Carolyne + + Wagner and Cosima + + + + +List of Illustrations + + + Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (photogravure) . . . . Frontispiece + + Mozart at the Age of Eleven + + Constance, Wife of Mozart + + Ludwig van Beethoven + + Countess Therese von Brunswick + + "Beethoven at Heiligenstadt" + + Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy + + Fanny Hensel, Sister of Mendelssohn + + Cecile, Wife of Mendelssohn + + The Mendelssohn Monument in Leipsic + + Frederic Chopin [missing from book] + + Countess Potocka + + The Death of Chopin + + Robert Schumann + + Robert and Clara Schumann, in 1847 + + Clara Schumann at the Piano + + The Schumann Monument in the Bonn Cemetery + + Franz Liszt + + Liszt at the Piano + + The Princess Carolyne, in her Latter Years at Rome + + The Altenburg, Weimar, where Liszt and Carolyne lived + + Richard Wagner + + Cosima, Wife of Wagner + + Richard and Cosima Wagner + + Richard and Cosima Wagner entertaining in their Home + Wahnfried, Liszt and Hans von Wolzogen + + + + +Mozart and His Constance + + +Nearly eight years after Mozart's death his widow, in response to a +request from a famous publishing house for relics of the composer, +sent, among other Mozartiana, a packet of letters written to her by her +husband. In transmitting these she wrote: + +"Especially characteristic is his great love for me, which breathes +through all the letters. Is it not true--those from the last year of +his life are just as tender as those written during the first year of +our marriage?" She added that she would like to have this fact +especially mentioned "to his honor" in any biography in which the data +she sent were to be used. This request was not prompted by vanity, but +by a just pride in the love her husband had borne her and which she +still cherished. The love of his Constance was the solace of Mozart's +life. + +The wonder-child, born in Salzburg in 1756, and taken by his father +from court to court, where he and his sister played to admiring +audiences, did not, like so many wonder-children, fade from public +view, but with manhood fulfilled the promise of his early years and +became one of the world's great masters of music. But his genius was +not appreciated until too late. The world of to-day sees in Mozart the +type of the brilliant, careless Bohemian, whom it loves to associate +with art, and long since has taken him to its heart. But the world of +his own day, when he asked for bread, offered him a stone. + +Mozart died young; he was only thirty-five. His sufferings were +crowded into a few years, but throughout these years there stood by his +side one whose love soothed his trials and brightened his life,--the +Constance whom he adored. What she wrote to the publishers was +strictly true. His last letters to her breathed a love as fervent as +the first. + +Some six months before he died, she was obliged to go to Baden for her +health. "You hardly will believe," he writes to her, "how heavily time +hangs on my hands without you. I cannot exactly explain my feelings. +There is a void that pains me; a certain longing that cannot be +satisfied, hence never ceases, continues ever, aye, grows from day to +day. When I think how happy and childlike we would be together in +Baden and what sad, tedious hours I pass here! I take no pleasure in +my work, because I cannot break it off now and then for a few words +with you, as I am accustomed to. When I go to the piano and sing +something from the opera ["The Magic Flute"], I have to stop right +away, it affects me so. _Basta_!--if this very hour I could see my way +clear to you, the next hour wouldn't find me here." In another letter +written at this time he kisses her "in thought two thousand times." + +When Mozart first met Constance, she was too young to attract his +notice. He had stopped at Mannheim on his way to Paris, whither he was +going with his mother on a concert tour. Requiring the services of a +music copyist, he was recommended to Fridolin Weber, who eked out a +livelihood by copying music and by acting as prompter at the theatre. +His brother was the father of Weber, the famous composer, and his own +family, which consisted of four daughters, was musical. Mozart's visit +to Mannheim occurred in 1777, when Constance Weber was only fourteen. + +[Illustration: Mozart at the age of eleven. From a painting by Van der +Smissen in the Mozarteum, Salzburg.] + +Of her two older sisters the second, Aloysia, had a beautiful voice and +no mean looks, and the young genius was greatly taken with her from the +first. He induced his mother to linger in Mannheim much longer than +was necessary. Aloysia became his pupil; and under his tuition her +voice improved wonderfully. She achieved brilliant success in public, +and her father, delighted, watched with pleasure the sentimental +attachment that was springing up between her and Mozart. Meanwhile +Leopold Mozart was in Salzburg wondering why his wife and son were so +long delaying their further journey to Paris. + +When he received from Wolfgang letters full of enthusiasm over his +pupil, coupled with a proposal that instead of going to Paris, he and +his mother should change their destination to Italy and take the Weber +family along, in order that Aloysia might further develop her talents +there, he got an inkling of the true state of affairs and was furious. +He had large plans for his son, knew Weber to be shiftless and the +family poor, and concluded that, for their own advantage, they were +endeavoring to trap Wolfgang into a matrimonial alliance. Peremptory +letters sent wife and son on their way to Paris, and the elder Mozart +was greatly relieved when he knew them safely beyond the confines of +Mannheim. + +Mozart's stay in Paris was tragically brought to an end by his mother's +death. He set out for his return to Salzburg, intending, however, to +stop at Mannheim, for he still remembered Aloysia affectionately. +Finding that the Weber family had moved to Munich, he went there. But +as soon as he came into the presence of the beautiful young singer her +manner showed that her feelings toward him had cooled. Thereupon, his +ardor was likewise chilled, and he continued on his way to Salzburg, +where he arrived, much to his father's relief, still "unattached." + +When Mozart departed from Munich, he probably thought that he was +leaving behind him forever, not only the fickle Aloysia, but the rest +of the Weber family as well. How slight our premonition of fate! For, +if ever the inscrutable ways of Providence brought two people together, +those two were Mozart and Constance Weber. Nor was Aloysia without +further influence on his career. She married an actor named Lange, +with whom she went to Vienna, where she became a singer at the opera. +There Mozart composed for her the role of Constance in his opera, "The +Elopement from the Seraglio." For the eldest Weber girl, Josepha, who +had a high, flexible soprano, he wrote one of his most brilliant roles, +that of the Queen of the Night in "The Magic Flute." I am anticipating +somewhat in the order of events that I may correct an erroneous +impression regarding Mozart's marriage, which I find frequently +obtains. He composed the role of Constance for Aloysia shortly before +he married the real Constance; and this has led many people to believe +that he took the younger sister out of pique, because he had been +rejected by Aloysia. Whoever believes this has a very superficial +acquaintance with Mozart's biography. Five years had passed since he +had parted from Aloysia at Munich. The youthful affair had blown over; +and when they met again in Vienna she was Frau Lange. Mozart's +marriage with Constance was a genuine love-match. It was bitterly +opposed by his father, who never became wholly reconciled to the woman +of his son's choice, and met with no favor from her mother. Fridolin +Weber had died. Altogether the omens were unfavorable, and there were +obstacles enough to have discouraged any but the most ardent couple. +So much for the pique story. + +Mozart went to Vienna in 1781 with the Archbishop of Salzburg, by whom, +however, he was treated with such indignity that he left his service. +Whom should he find in Vienna but his old friends the Webers! Frau +Weber was glad enough of the opportunity to let lodgings to Mozart, +for, as in Mannheim and Munich, the family was in straitened +circumstances. As soon as the composer's father heard of this +arrangement, he began to expostulate. Finally Mozart changed his +lodgings; but this step had the very opposite effect hoped for by +Leopold Mozart, for separation only increased the love that had sprung +up between the young people since they had met again in Vienna, and +Mozart had found the little fourteen-year-old girl of his Mannheim +visit grown to young womanhood. + +There seems little doubt that the Webers, with the exception of +Constance, were a shiftless lot. They had drifted from place to place +and had finally come to Vienna, because Aloysia had moved there with +her husband. When Mozart finally decided to marry Constance, come what +might, he wrote his father a letter which shows that his eyes were wide +open to the faults of the family, and by the calm, almost judicial, +manner in which he refers to the virtues of his future wife, that his +was no hastily formed attachment, based merely on superficial +attractions. + +He does not spare the family in his analysis of their traits. If he +seems ungallant in his references to his future Queen of the Night and +to the prima donna of his "Elopement from the Seraglio," to say nothing +of his former attachment for her, one must remember that this is a +letter from a son to a father, in which frankness is permissible. He +admits the intemperance and shrewishness of the mother; characterizes +Josepha as lazy and vulgar; calls Aloysia a malicious person and +coquette; dismisses the youngest, Sophie, as too young to be anything +but simply a good though thoughtless creature. Surely not an +attractive picture and not a family one would enter lightly. + +What drew him to Constance? Let him answer that question himself. +"But the middle one, my good, dear Constance," he writes to his father, +"is a martyr among them, and for that reason, perhaps, the best +hearted, cleverest, and, in a word, the best among them. . . . She is +neither homely nor beautiful. Her whole beauty lies in two small, dark +eyes and in a fine figure. She is not brilliant, but has common sense +enough to perform her duties as wife and mother. She is not +extravagant; on the contrary, she is accustomed to go poorly dressed, +because what little her mother can do for her children she does for the +others, but never for her. It is true that she would like to be +tastefully and becomingly dressed, but never expensively; and most of +the things a woman needs she can make for herself. She does her own +coiffure every day [head-dress must have been something appalling in +those days]; understands housekeeping; has the best disposition in the +world. We love each other with all our hearts. Tell me if I could ask +a better wife for myself?" + +The letter is so touchingly frank and simple that whoever reads it must +feel that the portrait Mozart draws of his Constance is absolutely true +to life. He makes no attempt to paint her as a paragon of beauty and +intellect. It is a picture of the neglected member of a +household--neglected because of her homely virtues, the one fair flower +blooming in the dark crevice of this shiftless menage. And at the end +of the letter is the one cry which, since the world was young, has +defied and brought to naught the doubting counsels of wiser heads: "We +love each other with all our hearts." + +The elder Mozart, fearful for his son's future, had kept himself +informed of what was going on in Vienna. He knew that when his son's +attentions to Constance became marked, her guardian had compelled him +to sign a promise of marriage. In this the father again saw a trap +laid for his son, who in worldly matters was as unversed as a child. +But Leopold Mozart did not know how the episode ended, and little +suspected that future generations would see in it one of the most +charming incidents in the love affairs of great men. For, when her +guardian had left the house, Constance asked her mother for the paper, +and as soon as she had it in her hands, tore it up, exclaiming: "Dear +Mozart, I do not need a written promise from you. I trust your words." + +Frau Weber saw in Mozart, the suitor, a possible contributor to the +household expenses, and as soon as she learned that he and Constance +intended to set up for themselves, she became bitterly opposed to the +match. Finally a titled lady, Baroness von Waldstadter, took the young +people under her protection, and Constance went to live with her to +escape her mother's nagging. Frau Weber then planned to force her +daughter to return to her by legal process. Immediate marriage was the +only method of escape from the scandal this would entail; and so, +August 4, 1782, Mozart and his Constance were married in the Church of +St. Stephen, Vienna. When at last they had all obstacles behind them +and stood at the altar as one, they were so overcome by their feelings +that they began to cry; and the few bystanders, including the priest, +were so deeply affected by their happiness that they too were moved to +tears. + +[Illustration: Constance, wife of Mozart. From an engraving by Nissen.] + +Although poor, Mozart, through his music, had become acquainted with +titled personages and was known at court. He and Constance, shortly +after their wedding, were walking in the Prater with their pet dog. To +make the dog bark, Mozart playfully pretended to strike Constance with +his cane. At that moment the Emperor, chancing to come out of a summer +house and seeing Mozart's action, which he misinterpreted, began +chiding him for abusing his wife so shortly after they had been +married. When his mistake was explained to him, he was highly amused. +Later he could not fail to hear of the couple's devotion. "Vienna was +witness to these relations," wrote a contemporary of Mozart's and +Constance's love for each other; and when Aloysia and her husband +quarrelled and separated, the Emperor, meeting Constance and referring +to her sister's troubles, said, "What a difference it makes to have a +good husband." + +In spite of poverty and its attendant struggles, Mozart's marriage was +a happy one, because it was a marriage of love. Like every child of +genius, he had his moods, but Constance adapted herself to them and +thereby won his confidence and gained an influence over him which, +however, she brought into play only when the occasion demanded. When +he was thinking out a work, he was absent-minded, and at such times she +always was ready to humor him, and even cut his meat for him at table, +as he was apt during such periods of abstraction to injure himself. +But when he had a composition well in mind, to put it on paper seemed +little more to him than copying; and then he loved to have her sit by +him and tell him stories--yes, regular fairy tales and children's +stories, as if he himself still were a child. He would write and +listen, drop his pen and laugh, and then go on with work again. The +day before the first performance of "Don Giovanni," when the final +rehearsal already had been held, the overture still remained unwritten. +It had to be written overnight, and it was she who sat by him and +relieved the rush and strain of work with her cheerful prattle. It is +said that, among other things, she read to him the story of "Aladdin +and the Wonderful Lamp." Be that as it may;--she rubbed the lamp, and +the overture to "Don Giovanni" appeared. + +Would that their life could be portrayed in a series of such charming +pictures! but grinding poverty was there also, and the bitterness of +disappointed hopes. His sensitive nature could not withstand the +repeated material shocks to which it was subjected. And the pity is, +that it gave way just when there seemed a prospect of a change. "The +Magic Flute" had been produced with great success, and that in the face +of relentless opposition from envious rivals; and orders from new +sources and on better terms were coming to him. But the turn of the +tide was too late. When he received an order for a Requiem from a +person who wished his identity to remain unknown--he was subsequently +discovered to be a nobleman, who wanted to produce the work as his +own--Mozart already felt the hand of death upon him and declared that +he was composing the Requiem for his own obsequies. Even after he was +obliged to take to his bed, he worked at it, saying it was to be _his_ +Requiem and must be ready in time. The afternoon before he died, he +went over the completed portions with three friends, and at the +Lachrymosa burst into tears. In the evening he lost consciousness, and +early the following morning, December 5, 1791, he passed away. The +immediate cause of death was rheumatic fever with typhoid +complications, and his distracted widow, hoping to catch the same +disease and be carried away by it, threw herself upon his bed. She was +too prostrated to attend his funeral, which, be it said to the shame of +his friends, was a shabby affair. The day was stormy, and after the +service indoors they left before the actual burial, which was in one of +the "common graves," holding ten or twelve bodies and intended to be +worked over every few years for new interments. When, as soon as +Constance was strong enough, she visited the cemetery there was a new +grave-digger, who upon being questioned could not locate her husband's +grave, and to this day Mozart's last resting-place is unknown. + +It must not be reckoned against Constance that, eighteen years after +Mozart's death, she married again. For she did not forget the man on +whom her heart first was set. Her second husband, Nissen, formerly +Danish charge d'affaires in Vienna, is best known by the biography of +Mozart which he wrote under her guidance. They removed to Mozart's +birthplace, Salzburg, where Nissen died in 1826. Constance's death was +strangely associated with Mozart's memory. It was as if in her last +moments she must go back to him who was her first love. For she died +in Salzburg, on March 6, 1842, a few hours after the model for the +Mozart monument, which adorns one of the spacious squares of the city +where the composer was born, was received there. She had been the +life-love of a child of genius and, without being singularly gifted +herself, had understood how to humor his whims and adapt herself to his +moods in which sunshine often was succeeded by shadow. It was +singularly appropriate that, surviving him many years, she yet died +under circumstances which formed a new link between her and his memory. + + + + +Beethoven and his "Immortal Beloved" + +One day when Baron Spaun, an old Viennese character and a friend of +Beethoven's, entered the composer's lodgings, he found the man, every +line of whose face denoted, above all else, strength of character, +bending over a portrait of a woman and weeping, as he muttered, "You +were too good, too angelic!" A moment later, he had thrust the +portrait into an old chest and, with a toss of his well-set head, was +his usual self again. + +As Spaun was leaving, he said to the composer, "There is nothing evil +in your face to-day, old fellow." + +"My good angel appeared to me this morning," was Beethoven's reply. + +[Illustration: Ludwig van Beethoven] + +After the composer's death, in 1827, the portrait was found in the old +chest, and also a letter, in his handwriting and evidently written to a +woman, whose name, however, was not given, but who was addressed by +Beethoven as his "Immortal Beloved." The letter was regarded as a +great find, and biographer after biographer has stated that it must +have been written to the Countess Giulietta Guicciardi, to whom he +dedicated the famous "Moonlight Sonata." There was, however, one +woman, who survived Beethoven more than thirty years, and who, during +that weary stretch of time, knew whose was the portrait that had been +found in the old chest and the identity of the woman who had returned +to him the letter addressed to his "Immortal Beloved," after the +strange severance of relations which both had continued to hold sacred. +But she suffered in silence, and never even knew what had become of the +picture. + +This precious picture, which Beethoven had held in his hands and wetted +with his tears, passed, with his death, into the possession of his +brother Carl's widow. No one knew who it was, or took any interest in +it. In 1863 a Viennese musician, Joseph Hellmesberger, succeeded in +having Beethoven's remains transferred to a metallic casket, and the +Beethoven family, in recognition of his efforts, made him a present of +the portrait. Later it was acquired by the Beethoven Museum, in Bonn, +where the master was born in 1772. There it hangs beside his own +portrait, and on the back still can be read the inscription, in a +feminine hand: + +"_To the rare genius, the great artist, and the good man, from T. B._" + +Who was "T. B."? If some one who had recently seen the Bonn portrait +should chance to visit the National Museum in Budapest, he would come +upon the bust of a woman whose features seemed familiar to him. They +would grow upon him as those of the woman with the yellow shawl over +her light-brown hair, a drapery of red on her shoulders and fastened at +her throat, who had looked out at him from the Bonn portrait. The +bust, made at a more advanced age, he would find had been placed in the +museum in honor of the woman who founded the first home for friendless +children in the Austrian Empire; and her name? Countess Therese +Brunswick. She was Beethoven's "Immortal Beloved." "T. B."--Therese +Brunswick. She was the woman who knew that the portrait found in the +old chest was hers; and that the letter had been received by her +shortly after her secret betrothal to Beethoven, and returned by her to +him when he broke the engagement because he loved her too deeply to +link her life to his. + +[Illustration: Countess Therese von Brunswick. From the portrait by +Ritter von Lampir in the Beethoven-Haus at Bonn. Redrawn by Reich.] + +The tragedy of their romance lay in its non-fulfilment. Beethoven was +a man of noble nature, yet what had he to offer her in return for her +love? His own love, it is true. But he was uncouth, stricken with +deafness, and had many of the "bad moments" of genius. He foresaw +unhappiness for both, and, to spare her, took upon himself the great +act of renunciation. We need only recall him weeping over the picture +of his Therese. And Therese? To her dying day she treasured his +memory. Very few shared her secret. Her brother Franz, Beethoven's +intimate friend, knew it. Baron Spaun also divined the cause of his +melancholy. Some years after the composer's death, Countess Therese +Brunswick conceived a great liking for a young girl, Miriam Tenger, +whom she had taken under her care for a short period, until a suitable +school was selected for her in Vienna. When the time for parting came, +Miriam burst into tears and clung to the Countess's hand. + +"Child! Child!" exclaimed the lady, "do you really love me so deeply?" + +"I love you, I love you so," sobbed the child, "that I could die for +you." + +The Countess placed her hand on the girl's head. "My child," she said, +"when you have grown older and wiser, you will understand what I mean +when I say that to _live_ for those we love shows a far greater love, +because it requires so much more courage. But while you are in Vienna, +there is one favor you can do me, which my heart will consider a great +one. On the twenty-seventh of every March go to the Wahringer Cemetery +and lay a wreath of immortelles on Beethoven's grave." + +When, true to her promise, the girl went with her school principal to +the cemetery, they found a man bending over the grave and placing +flowers upon it. He looked up as they approached. + +"The child comes at the request of the Countess Therese Brunswick," +explained the principal. + +"The Countess Therese Brunswick! Immortelles upon this grave are fit +from her alone." The speaker was Beethoven's faithful friend, Baron +Spaun. + +In 1860, when the leaves of thirty-three autumns had fallen upon the +composer's grave and the Countess had gone to her last resting-place, a +voice, like an echo from a dead past, linked the names of Beethoven and +the woman he had loved. There was at that time in Germany a virtuosa, +Frau Hebenstreit, who when a young girl had been a pupil of Beethoven's +friend, the violinist Schuppanzigh. At a musical, in the year +mentioned, she had just taken part in a performance of the third +"Leonore" overture, when, as if moved to speak by the beauty of the +music, she suddenly said: "Only think of it! Just as a person sits to +a painter for a portrait, Countess Therese Brunswick was the model for +Beethoven's Leonore. What a debt the world owes her for it!" After a +pause she went on: + +"Beethoven never would have dared marry without money, and a countess, +too--and so refined, and delicate enough to blow away. And he--an +angel and a demon in one! What would have become of them both, and of +his genius with him?" So far as I have been able to discover, this was +the first even semi-public linking of the two names. + +Yet all these years there was one person who knew the secret--the woman +who as a school-girl had placed the wreath of immortelles on +Beethoven's grave for her much-loved Countess Therese Brunswick. +Through this act of devotion Miriam Tenger seemed to become to the +Countess a tie that stretched back to her past, and though they saw +each other only at long intervals, Miriam's presence awakened anew the +old memories in the Countess's heart, and from her she heard piecemeal, +and with pauses of years between, the story of hers and Beethoven's +romance. + +Therese was the daughter of a noble house. Beethoven was welcome both +as teacher and guest in the most aristocratic circles of Vienna. The +noble men and women who figure in the dedications of his works were +friends, not merely patrons. Despite his uncouth manners and +appearance, his genius, up to the point at least when it took its +highest flights in the "Ninth Symphony" and the last quartets, was +appreciated; and he was a figure in Viennese society. The Brunswick +house was one of many that were open to him. The Brunswicks were art +lovers. Franz, the son of the house, was the composer's intimate +friend. The mother had all possible graciousness and charm, but with +it also a passionate pride in her family and her rank, a hauteur that +would have caused her to regard an alliance between Therese and +Beethoven as monstrous. Therese was an exceptional woman. She had an +oval, classic face, a lovely disposition, a pure heart and a finely +cultivated mind. The German painter, Peter Cornelius, said of her that +any one who spoke with her felt elevated and ennobled. The family was +of the right mettle. The Countess Blanka Teleki, who was condemned to +death for complicity in the Hungarian uprising of 1848, but whose +sentence was commuted to life imprisonment--she finally was released in +1858,--was Therese's niece, and is said to have borne a striking +likeness to her. It may be mentioned that Giulietta Guicciardi, of the +"Moonlight Sonata," was Therese's cousin. There seems no doubt that +the composer was attracted to Giulietta before he fell in love with his +"Immortal Beloved." That is why his biographers were so ready to +believe that the letter was addressed to the lady with the romantic +name and identified with one of his most romantic works. + +Therese herself told Miriam that one day Giulietta, who had become the +affianced of Count Gallenberg, rushed into her room, threw herself at +her feet like a "stage princess," and cried out: "Counsel me, cold, +wise one! I long to give Gallenberg his conge and marry the +wonderfully ugly, beautiful Beethoven, if--if only it did not involve +lowering myself socially." Therese, who worshipped the composer's +genius and already loved him secretly, turned the subject off, fearful +lest she should say, in her indignation at the young woman who thought +she would be lowering herself by marrying Beethoven, something that +might lead to an irreparable breach. "Moonlight Sonata," or no +"Moonlight Sonata," there are two greater works by the same genius that +bear the Brunswick name,--the "Appassionata," dedicated to Count Franz +Brunswick, and the sonata in F-sharp major, Opus 78, dedicated to +Therese, and far worthier of her chaste beauty and intellect than the +"Moonlight." + +It will be noticed that Giulietta called Therese the "cold, wise one." +Her purity led her own mother to speak other as an "anchoress." Yet it +was she who from the time she was fifteen years old to the day of her +death cherished the great composer in her heart; and of her love for +him were the mementos that he sacredly guarded. When Therese was +fifteen years old she became Beethoven's pupil. The lessons were +severe. Yet beneath the rough exterior she recognized the heart of a +nobleman. The "cold, wise one," the "anchoress," fell in love with him +soon after the lessons began, but carefully hid her feelings from every +one. There is a charming anecdote of the early acquaintance of the +composer and Therese. + +The children of the house of Brunswick were carefully brought up. +During the music lessons the mother was accustomed to sit in an +adjoining room with the door between open. One bitterly cold winter +day Beethoven arrived at the appointed hour. Therese had practised +diligently, but the work was difficult and, in addition, she was +nervous. As a result she began too fast, became disconcerted when +Beethoven gruffly called out "_Tempo!_" and made mistake after mistake, +until the master, irritated beyond endurance, rushed from the room and +the house in such a hurry that he forgot his overcoat and muffler. In +a moment Therese had picked up these, reached the door and was out in +the street with them, when the butler overtook her, relieved her of +them and hurried after the composer's retreating figure. + +When the girl entered the doorway again, she came face to face with her +mother, who, fortunately, had not seen her in the street, but who was +scandalized that a daughter of the house of Brunswick should so far +have forgotten herself and her dignity as to have run after a man even +if only to the front door, and with his overcoat and muffler. "He +might have caught cold and died," gasped Therese, in answer to her +mother's remonstrance. What would the mother have said had she known +that her daughter actually had run out into the street, and had been +prevented from following Beethoven until she overtook him only by the +butler's timely action! + +Therese's brother Franz was devoted to her. As a boy he had taken his +other sister (afterward Blanka Teleki's mother) out in a boat on the +"Mediterranean," one of the ponds at Montonvasar, the Brunswick country +estate. The boat upset. Therese, who was watching them from the bank, +rushed in and hauled them out. Franz was asked if he had been +frightened. "No," he answered, "I saw my good angel coming." + +When he became intimate with Beethoven, he told the composer about this +incident, and also how, after that stormy music lesson, Therese had +started to overtake him with his coat and muffler. Knowing what a +lonely, unhappy existence the composer led, he could not help adding +that life would be very different if he had a good angel to watch over +him, such as he had in his sister. + +Franz little knew that his words fell upon Beethoven like seed on eager +soil. From that time on he looked at Therese with different eyes. His +own love soon taught him to know that he was loved in return. No +pledge had yet passed between them when, in May, 1806, he went to +Montonvasar on a visit; but one evening there, when Therese was +standing at the piano listening to him play, he softly intoned Bach's-- + + "Would you your true heart show me, + Begin it secretly, + For all the love you trow me, + Let none the wiser be. + Our love, great beyond measure, + To none must we impart; + So, lock our rarest treasure + Securely in your heart." + +Next morning they met in the park. He told her that at last he had +discovered in her the model for his Leonore, the heroine of his opera +"Fidelio." "And so we found each other"--these were the simple words +with which, many years later, Therese concluded the narrative of her +betrothal with Beethoven to Miriam Tenger. + +The engagement had to be kept a secret. Had it become known, it would +have ended in his immediate dismissal by the Countess' mother. In only +one person was confidence reposed, Franz, the devoted brother and +treasured friend. Therese's income was small, and Franz, knowing the +opposition with which the proposed match would meet, pointed out to +Beethoven that it would be necessary for him to secure a settled +position and income before the engagement could be published and the +marriage take place. The composer himself saw the justice of this, and +assented. + +[Illustration: "Beethoven at Heiligenstadt." From the painting by Carl +Schmidt.] + +Early in July Beethoven left Montonvasar for Furen, a health resort on +the Plattensee, which he reached after a hard trip. Fatigued, grieving +over the first parting from Therese, and downcast over his uncertain +future, he there wrote the letter to his "Immortal Beloved," which is +now one of the treasures of the Berlin Library. It is a long letter, +much too long to be given here in full, written for the most part in +ejaculatory phrases, and curiously alternating between love, despair, +courage and hopefulness and commonplace, everyday affairs. Nor will +space permit me to tell how Alexander W. Thayer, an American, who spent +a great part of his life and means in gathering detailed and authentic +data for a Beethoven biography,--which, however, he did not live to +finish,--worked out the year in which this letter was written +(Beethoven gave only the day of the month); showed that it must be +1806; proved further that it could not have been intended for Giulietta +Guicciardi, yet did not venture to state that Countess Therese +Brunswick was the undoubted recipient. Afterward, I believe, he heard +of Miriam Tenger, entered into correspondence with her, and the letters +doubtless will be found among his papers; but he did not live to make +use of the information. + +One of the reasons why the identity of the recipient of Beethoven's +letter remained so long unknown was that he did not address her by +name. The letter begins: "My angel, my all, myself!" In order to +secure a fixed position, Beethoven had decided to try Prussia and even +England, and this intention he refers to when, after apostrophizing +Therese as his "immortal beloved," he writes these burning words: + +"Yes, I have decided to toss abroad so long, until I can fly to your +arms and call myself at home with you, and let my soul, enveloped in +your love, wander through the kingdom of spirits." The letter has this +exclamatory postscript: + + "Eternally yours! + Eternally mine! + Eternally one another's!" + +The engagement lasted until 1810, four years, when the letters, which +through Franz's aid had passed between Beethoven and Therese, were +returned. Therese, however, always treasured as one of her "jewels" a +sprig of immortelle fastened with a ribbon to a bit of paper, the +ribbon fading with passing years, the paper growing yellow, but still +showing the words: "_L'Immortelle a son Immortelle--Luigi_." + +It had been Beethoven's custom to enclose a sprig of immortelle in +nearly every letter he sent her, and all these sprigs she kept in her +desk many, many years. She made a white silken pillow of the flowers; +and, when death came at last, she was laid at rest, her head cushioned +on the mementos of the man she had loved. + + + + +Mendelssohn and his Cecile + +Mendelssohn was a popular idol. On his death the mournful news was +placarded all over Leipsic, where he had made his home, and there was +an immense funeral procession. When the church service was over, a +woman in deep mourning was led to the bier, and sinking down beside it, +remained long in prayer. It was Cecile taking her last farewell of +Felix. + +Mendelssohn was born under a lucky star. The pathways of most musical +geniuses are covered with thorns; his was strewn with roses. The +Mendelssohn family, originally Jewish, was well-to-do and highly +refined, and Felix's grandfather was a philosophical writer of some +note. This inspired the oft-quoted _mot_ of the musician's father: +"Once I was known as the son of the famous Mendelssohn; now I am known +as the father of the famous Mendelssohn." + +Felix was an amazingly clever, fascinating boy. Coincident with his +musical gifts he had a talent for art. Goethe was captivated by him, +and the many distinguished friends of the Mendelssohn house in Berlin +adored him. This house was a gathering place of artists, musicians, +literary men and scientists; his genius had the stimulus found in the +"atmosphere" of such a household. There was one member of that +household between whom and himself the most tender relations +existed,--his sister Fanny, who became the wife of Hensel, the artist. +The musical tastes of Felix and Fanny were alike: she was the +confidante of his ambitions, and thus was created between them an +artistic sympathy, which from childhood greatly strengthened the family +bond. Growing up amid love and devotion, to say nothing of the +admiration accorded his genius in the home circle, with tastes, +naturally refined, cultivated to the utmost both by education and +absorption, he was apt to be most fastidious in the choice of a wife. +Fastidiousness in everything was, in fact, one of his traits. One has +but to recall how, one after another, he rejected the subjects that +were offered him for operatic composition. "I am afraid," said his +father, who was quite anxious to see his famous son properly settled in +life, "that Felix's censoriousness will prevent his getting a wife as +well as a libretto." + +[Illustration: Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy.] + +It may have been a regretful feeling that he had disappointed his +father by not marrying which led him, after the latter's sudden death +in November, 1835, to consider the matter more seriously. He hastened +to Berlin to his mother, and then returned to Leipsic, where he had +charge of the famous Gewandhaus concerts. He settled down to work +again, and especially to finish his oratorio of "St. Paul." In March, +1836, the University of Leipsic made him a Ph.D. + +In May or June of this year a friend and colleague named Schelble, who +conducted the Caecilia Singing Society at Frankfort-on-the-Main, was +taken ill, and, desiring to rest and recuperate, asked Mendelssohn to +officiate in his place. The request came at an inconvenient time, for +he had planned to take some recreation himself, and had mapped out a +tour to Switzerland and Genoa. But Felix was an obliging fellow, and +promptly responded with an affirmative when his colleague called upon +him for aid. The unselfish relinquishment of his intended tour was to +meet with a further reward than that which comes from the satisfaction +of a good deed done at some self-sacrifice, and this reward was the +more grateful because unexpected by his friends, his family, or even +himself. Yet it was destined to delight them all. + +Felix was in Frankfort six weeks. So short a period rarely leads to a +decisive event in a man's life, but did so in Mendelssohn's case. He +occupied lodgings in a house on the Schoene Aussicht (Beautiful View), +with an outlook upon the river. But there was another beautiful view +in Frankfort which occupied his attention far more, for among those he +met during his sojourn in the city on the Main was Cecile,--Cecile +Charlotte Sophie Jeanrenaud. Her father, long dead, had been the +pastor of the French Walloon Reformed Church in Frankfort, where his +widow and children moved in the best social circles of the city. +Cecile, then seventeen (ten years younger than Felix), was a "beauty" +of a most delicate type. Mme. Jeanrenaud still was a fine-looking +woman, and possibly because of this fact, coupled with Felix's shy +manner in the presence of Cecile, now that for the first time his heart +was deeply touched, it was at first supposed that he was courting the +mother; and her children, Cecile included, twitted her on it. + +Now Felix acted in a manner characteristic of his bringing up and of +the bent of his genius. Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Schumann, Liszt, +Wagner--not one of these hesitated a moment where his heart was +concerned. If anything, they were too impetuous. They are the masters +of the passionate expression in music; Mendelssohn's music is of the +refined, delicate type--like his own bringing up. The perfectly +polished "Songs without Words," the smoothly flowing symphonies, the +lyric violin concerto--these are most typical of his genius. Only here +and there in his works are there fitful flashes of deeper significance, +as in certain dramatic passages of the "Elijah" oratorio. And so, when +Felix found himself possessed of a passion for Cecile Jeanrenaud, the +beautiful, he did not throw himself at her feet and pour out a +confession of love to her. Far from it. With a calmness that would +make one feel like pinching him, were it not that after all the story +has a "happy ending," he left Frankfort at the end of six weeks, when +his feelings were at their height, and in order to submit the state of +his affections to a cool and unprejudiced scrutiny, he went to +Scheveningen, Holland, where he spent a month. Anything more +characteristically Mendelssohnian can scarcely be imagined than this +leisurely passing of judgment on his own heart. + +Just what Cecile thought of his sudden departure we do not know. No +doubt by that time she had ceased twitting her mother on Felix's +supposed intentions to make Frau Mendelssohn of Mme. Jeanrenaud, for it +must have become apparent that the attentions of the famous composer +were not directed toward the beautiful mother, but toward the more +beautiful daughter. If, however, she felt at all uneasy at his going +away at the time when he should have been preparing to declare himself, +her doubts would have been dispelled could she have read some of the +letters which he dispatched from Scheveningen. That she herself was +captivated by him there seems no doubt. It was an amusing change from +her preconceived notion of him. She had imagined him a stiff, +disagreeable, jealous old man, who wore a green velvet skull-cap and +played tedious fugues. This prejudice, needless to say, was dispelled +at their first meeting, when she found the crabbed creation of her +fancy a man of the world, with gracious, winning manners, and a +brilliant conversationalist not only on music, but also on other topics. + +[Illustration: Fanny Hensel, sister of Mendelssohn.] + +It is a curious coincidence that when Felix left Frankfort for +Scheveningen, with the image of this fair being in his heart, the +Caecilia Society should have presented him with a handsome +dressing-case marked "F. M.-B. and Caecilia.'" [1] He had come to +Frankfort to conduct the Caecilia; he had met Caecilia; and now he was +at the last moment reminded that he was leaving Caecilia behind; yet he +was carrying Caecilia with him. If there is anything prophetic in +coincidences, everything pointed to the fact that Caecilia was to play +a more prominent part in his life than that of a mere name. + +Even before Felix left Frankfort there were some who were in his +secret. Evidently the Mendelssohn family had received reports of his +attentions to the fair Cecile Jeanrenaud and were all a-flutter with +happy anticipation. For there is a letter from Felix to his sister +Rebecca which must have been written in answer to one from her +containing something in the nature of an inquiry regarding the state of +his feelings. "The present period in my life," he writes to her, "is a +very strange one, for I am more desperately in love than I ever was +before, and I do not know what to do. I leave Frankfort the day after +to-morrow, but I feel as if it would cost me my life. At all events I +intend to return here and see this charming girl once more before I go +back to Leipsic. But I have not an idea whether she likes me or not, +and I do not know what to do to make her like me, as I already have +said. But one thing is certain--that to her I owe the first real +happiness I have had this year, and now I feel fresh and hopeful again +for the first time. When away from her, though, I always am sad--now, +you see, I have let you into a secret which nobody else knows anything +about; but in order that you may set the whole world an example in +discretion, I will tell you nothing more about it." He adds that he is +going to detest the seashore, and ends with the exclamation, "O +Rebecca! What shall I do?" Rebecca might have answered, "Tell Cecile, +instead of me;" and, indeed, I wonder if she did not take occasion to +drop a few hints to Cecile during her brother's absence in Holland. + +There was another who might have told Cecile how Felix felt toward +her,--his mother. For to her he wrote from Scheveningen that he gladly +would send Holland, its dykes, sea baths, bathing-machines, Kursaals +and visitors to the end of the world to be back in Frankfort. "When I +have seen this charming girl again, I hope the suspense soon will be +over and I shall know whether we are to be anything--or rather +everything--to each other, or not." Evidently his scrutiny of his own +feelings was leading him to a very definite conclusion. He was in +Scheveningen, but his heart was in the city on the Main, and he was +wishing himself back in the Schoene Aussicht--longing for that +"beautiful view" once more. + +Back to Frankfort he hied himself as soon as the month in Holland was +happily over. It was not only back to Frankfort, it was back to +Cecile, in every sense of the words; for if Rebecca and his mother had +not conveyed to the delicate beauty some suggestion of the feelings she +had inspired in Felix's heart, she herself must have become aware of +them, and of something very much like in her own, since matters were +not long in coming to a point after his return. He spent August at +Scheveningen; in September his suspense was over, for his engagement to +Cecile formally took place at Kronberg, near Frankfort. Three weeks +later he was obliged to go back to his duties at Leipsic. How much he +was beloved by the public appears from the fact that at the next +Gewandhaus concert the directors placed on the programme, "Wer ein +Holdes Weib Errungen" (He who a Lovely Wife has Won) from "Fidelio," +and that when the number was reached, and Felix raised his baton, the +audience burst into applause which continued a long time. It was their +congratulations to their idol on his betrothal. + +[Illustration: Cecile, wife of Mendelssohn.] + +"Les Feliciens" was the title given to Felix and Cecile by his sister +Fanny later in life. At this time Mendelssohn himself was +indescribably happy. At least, he could not himself find words in +which to express all he felt. It is pleasant to find that a great +composer is no exception to the rule which makes lovers "too happy for +words." "But what words am I to use in describing my happiness?" he +writes to his sister. "I do not know and am dumb, but not for the same +reason as the monkeys on the Orinoco--far from it." + +We gain an idea of Cecile's social position from Felix's statement, +contained in this same letter, that he and his fiancee are obliged to +make one hundred and sixty-three calls in Frankfort. This was written +before he had returned to his duties in Leipsic. Christmas again found +him with his betrothed and again writing to Fanny--this time about a +portrait of Cecile, which her family had given him. "They gave me a +portrait of her on Christmas, but it only stirred up afresh my wrath +against all bad artists. She looks like an ordinary young woman +flattered." (Rather a good bit of criticism.) "It really is too bad +that with such a sitter the fellow could not have shown a spark of +poetry." It is quite evident that Felix was much in love with his fair +fiancee. + +He and Cecile were married in her father's former church in March, +1837. During their honeymoon Felix wrote to his friend, Eduard +Devrient, the famous actor, from the Bavarian highlands. A rare spirit +of peace and contentment breathes through the letter. "You know that I +am here with my wife, my dear Cecile, and that it is our wedding tour; +that we already are an old married couple of six weeks' standing. +There is so much to tell you that I know not how to make a beginning. +Picture it to yourself. I can only say that I am too happy, too glad; +and yet not at all beside myself, as I should have expected to be, but +calm and accustomed, as though it could not be otherwise. But you +should know my Cecile!" Evidently such a love as was here described +was not a mere sentimental flash in the pan. It was an affection +founded on reciprocal tastes and sympathies, the kind that usually +lasts. Cecile was refined and delicate, and beautiful. She was just +the woman to grace the home that a fastidious man like Mendelssohn +would want to establish. + +The most insistent note to be observed in his correspondence from this +time on is that of a desire to remain within his own four walls. Fanny +had been advised to go to the seashore for her health, but had delayed +doing so because loath to leave her husband. "Think of me," writes +Felix, urging her to go, "who must in a few weeks, though we have not +been married four months yet, leave Cecile here and go to England by +myself--all, too, for the sake of a music festival. Gracious me! All +this is no joke. But possibly the death of the King of England will +intervene and put a stop to the whole project." The life of a king +meant little to Felix in the distressing prospect of being obliged to +leave his Cecile. Felix, the husband, was not as eager to travel as +Felix, the bachelor, had been. + +There are various "appreciations" of Cecile. The least enthusiastic, +perhaps, is that of Hensel, Felix's brother-in-law. He says that she +was not a striking person in anyway, neither extraordinarily clever, +brilliantly witty, nor exceptionally accomplished. But to this +somewhat indefinite observation he adds that she exerted an influence +as soothing as that of the open sky, or running water. Indeed, +Hensel's first frigid reserve yielded to the opinion that Cecile's +gentleness and brightness made Felix's life one continued course of +happiness to the end. It was some time after the marriage before +Mendelssohn's sisters saw Cecile for the first time. The good they +heard of her made them the more impatient to meet her. "I tell you +candidly," the clever Fanny writes to her, "that by this time, when +anybody comes to talk to me about your beauty and your eyes, it makes +me quite cross. I have had enough of hearsay, and beautiful eyes were +not made to be heard." When at last Fanny did see Cecile, this fond +sister of Felix's, who naturally would be most critical, was +enthusiastic over her. "She is amiable, simple, fresh, happy and +even-tempered, and I consider Felix most fortunate. For though loving +him inexpressibly, she does not spoil him, but when he is moody, meets +him with a self-restraint which in due course of time will cure him of +his moodiness altogether. The effect of her presence is like that of a +fresh breeze, she is so light and bright and natural." + +To my mind, however, Devrient has drawn the best word portrait of her. +After their first meeting he wrote: "How often we had pictured the kind +of woman that would be a true second half to Felix; and now the lovely, +gentle being was before us, whose glance and smile alone promised all +that we could desire for the happiness of our spoilt favorite." Later, +Devrient finished the picture: "Cecile was one of those sweet, womanly +natures whose gentle simplicity, whose mere presence, soothed and +pleased. She was slender, with strikingly beautiful and delicate +features; her hair was between brown and gold; but the transcendent +lustre of her great blue eyes, and the brilliant roses on her cheeks, +were sad harbingers of early death. She spoke little and never with +animation, and in a low, soft voice. Shakespeare's words, 'my gracious +silence,' applied to her, no less than to Cordelia." + +[Illustration: The Mendelssohn Monument in Leipsig.] + +Thus, while Cecile does not seem to have been an extraordinarily gifted +woman from an artistic or intellectual point of view, it is quite +evident that she possessed a refinement that must have appealed +forcibly to a man brought up in such genteel surroundings and as +sensitive as Mendelssohn. Such a woman must have been, after all, +better suited to his delicate genius than a wife of unusual gifts would +have been. For it is a helpmeet, not another genius, that a man of +genius really needs most. The woman who, without being prosy or +commonplace and without allowing herself to retrograde in looks or in +personal care, can run a household in a systematic, orderly fashion is +the greatest blessing that Providence can bestow upon genius. +Evidently Cecile was just such a woman. Her tact seems to have been as +delicate as her beauty. Without, perhaps, having directly inspired any +composition of her husband's, her gentleness, her simple grace, +doubtless left their mark on many bars of his music. + +It seems doubly cruel that death should have cut Felix down when he had +enjoyed but ten happy years with his Cecile. Yet had his life been +long, the pang of separation would soon have come to him. Devrient had +not been mistaken when he spoke of "those sad harbingers of early +death;" and Cecile survived Felix scarcely five years. + +Felix's death occurred at Leipsic in 1847. In September, while +listening to his own recently composed "Nacht Lied" he swooned away. +His system, weakened by overwork, succumbed, nervous prostration +followed, and on November 4 he died. Sudden death had carried off his +grandfather, father, mother and favorite sister; and he had a +presentiment that his end would come about in the same way. During the +dull half-sleep preceding death he spoke but once, and then to Cecile +in answer to her inquiry how he felt--"Tired, very tired." + +Devrient tells how he went to the house of mutual friends in Dresden +for news of Mendelssohn's condition, when Clara Schumann came in, a +letter in her hand and weeping, and told them that Felix had died the +previous evening. Devrient hastened to Leipsic, and Cecile sent for +him. I cannot close this article more fittingly than with his +description of their meeting in the presence of the illustrious +dead--the cherished friend of one, the husband of the other. + +"She received me with the tenderness of a sister, wept in silence, and +was calm and composed as ever. She thanked me for all the love and +devotion I had shown to her Felix, grieved for me that I should have to +mourn so faithful a friend, and spoke of the love with which Felix +always had regarded me. Long we spoke of him; it comforted her, and +she was loath for me to depart. She was most unpretentious in her +sorrow, gentle, and resigned to live for the care and education of her +children. She said God would help her, and surely her boys would have +the inheritance of some of their father's genius. There could not be a +more worthy memory of him than the well-balanced, strong and tender +heart of this mourning widow." + + +[1] The "-B" on the dressing-case stands for "-Bartholdy." When the +Mendelssohn family changed from Judaism to Protestantism, it added the +mother's family name. + + + + +Chopin and the Countess Delphine Potocka + +"Her voice was destined to be the last which should vibrate upon the +musician's heart. Perhaps the sweetest sounds of earth accompanied the +parting soul until they blended in his ear with the first chords of the +angels' lyres." + +It is thus Liszt describes the voice of Countess Delphine Potocka as it +vibrated through the room in which Chopin lay dying. Witnesses +disagree regarding details. One of the small company that gathered +about his bed says she sang but once, others that she sang twice; and +even these vary when they name the compositions. Yet however they may +differ on these minor points, they agree as to the main incident. That +the beautiful Delphine sang for the dying Chopin is not a mere pleasing +tradition; it is a fact. Her voice ravished the ear of the great +composer, whose life was ebbing away, and soothed his last hours. + +"Therefore, then, has God so long delayed to call me to Him. He wanted +to vouchsafe me the joy of seeing you." These were the words Chopin +whispered when he opened his eyes and saw, beside his sister Louise, +the Countess Delphine Potocka, who had hurried from a distance as soon +as she was notified that his end was drawing near. She was one of +those rare and radiant souls who could bestow upon this delicate child +of genius her tenderest friendship, perhaps even her love, yet keep +herself unsullied and an object of adoration as much for her purity as +for her beauty. Because she was Chopin's friend, because she came to +him in his dying hours, because along paths unseen by those about them +her voice threaded its way to his very soul, no life of him is complete +without mention of her, and in the mind of the musical public her name +is irrevocably associated with his. Each succeeding biographer of the +great composer has sought to tell us a little more about her--yet +little is known of her even now beyond the fact that she was very +beautiful--and so eager have we been for a glimpse of her face that we +have accepted without reserve as an authentic presentment of her +features the famous portrait of a Countess Potocka who, I find, died +some seven or eight years before Delphine and Chopin met. + +[Illustration: Frederic Chopin (missing from book)] + +But we have portraits of Delphine by Chopin himself, not drawn with +pencil or crayon, or painted with brush, but her face as his soul saw +it and transformed it into music. Listen to a great virtuoso play his +two concertos. Ask yourself which of the six movements is the most +beautiful. Surely your choice will fall on the slow movement of the +second--dedicated to the Countess Delphine Potocka, and one of the +composer's most tender and exquisite productions; or play over the +waltzes--the one over which for grace and poetic sentiment you will +linger longest will be the sixth, dedicated to the Countess Delphine +Potocka. + +Liszt, who knew Chopin, tells us that the composer evinced a decided +preference for the _Adagio_ of the second concerto and liked to repeat +it frequently. He speaks of the _Adagio_, this musical portrait of +Delphine, as almost ideally perfect; now radiant with light, now full +of tender pathos; a happy vale of _Tempe_, a magnificent landscape +flooded with summer glow and lustre, yet forming a background for the +rehearsal of some dire scene of mortal anguish, a contrast sustained by +a fusion of tones, a softening of gloomy hues, which, while saddening +joy, soothes the bitterness of sorrow. + +What a lifelike portrait Chopin drew in this "beautiful, deep-toned, +love-laden cantilena"! For was it not the incomparable Delphine who +was destined to "soothe the bitterness of sorrow" during his final +hours on earth? + +But while hers was a soul strung with chords that vibrated to the +slightest breath of sorrow, she could be vivacious as well. She was a +child of Poland, that land of sorrow, but where sorrow, for very excess +of itself, sometimes reverts to joy. And so she had her brilliant +joyous moments. Chopin saw her in such moments, too, and, that the +recollection might not pass away, for all time fixed her picture in her +vivacious moods in the last movement, the _Allegro vivace_ of the +concerto, with what Niecks, one of the leading modern biographers of +the composer, calls its feminine softness and rounded contours, its +graceful, gyrating, dance-like motions, its sprightliness and +frolicsomeness. In the same way in the waltz, there is an obvious +mingling of the gay and the sad, the tender and the debonair. Chopin +thought he was writing a waltz. He really was writing "Delphine +Potocka." He, too, was from Poland, and that circumstance of itself +drew them to each other from the time when they first met in France. + +One of Chopin's favorite musical amusements, when he was a guest at the +houses of his favorite friends, was to play on the piano musical +portraits of the company. At the salon of the Countess Komar, +Delphine's mother, he played one evening the portraits of the two +daughters of the house. When it came to Delphine's he gently drew her +light shawl from her shoulders, spread it over the keyboard, and then +played through it, his fingers, with every tone they produced, coming +in touch with the gossamer-like fabric, still warm and hallowed for him +from its contact with her. + +It seems to have been about 1830 that Delphine first came into the +composer's life. In that year the Count and Countess Komar and their +three beautiful daughters arrived in Nice. Count Komar was business +manager for one of the Potockas. The girls made brilliant matches. +Marie became the Princess de Beauvau-Craon; Delphine became the +Countess Potocka, and Nathalie, the Marchioness Medici Spada. The last +named died a victim to her zeal as nurse during a cholera plague in +Rome. + +Chopin was a man who attracted women. His delicate physique,--he died +of consumption,--his refined, poetic temperament, and his exquisite art +as a composer combined with his beautiful piano playing, so well suited +to the intimate circle of the drawing-room, to make his personality a +thoroughly fascinating one. Moreover, he was, besides an artist, a +gentleman, with the reserve yet charm of manner that characterizes the +man of breeding. In men women admire two extremes,--splendid physical +strength, or the delicacy that suggests a poetic soul. Chopin was a +creator of poetic music and a gentle virtuoso. His appearance +harmonized with his genius. He was one of his own nocturnes in which +you can feel a vague presentiment of untimely death. + +He is described as a model son, an affectionate brother and a faithful +friend. His eyes were brown; his hair was chestnut, luxuriant and as +soft as silk. His complexion was of transparent delicacy; his voice +subdued and musical. He moved with grace. Born near Warsaw, in 1809, +he was brought up in his father's school with the sons of aristocrats. +He had the manners of an aristocrat, and was careful in his dress. + +But despite his sensitive nature, he could resent undue familiarity or +rudeness, yet in a refined way all his own. Once when he was a guest +at dinner at a rich man's house in Paris, he was asked by the host to +play--a patent violation of etiquette toward a distinguished artist. +Chopin demurred. The host continued to press him, urging that Liszt +and Thalberg had played in his house after dinner. + +"But," protested Chopin, "I have eaten so little!" and thus put an end +to the matter. + +Some twenty or thirty of the best salons in Paris were open to him. +Among them were those of the Polish exiles, some of whom he had known +since their school-days at his father's. He was in the truest sense of +the word a friend of those who entertained him--in fact, one of them. +For a list of those among whom he moved socially read the dedications +on his music. They include wealthy women, like Mme. Nathaniel de +Rothschild, but also a long line of princesses and countesses. In the +salon of the Potocka he was intimately at home, and it was especially +there he drew his musical portraits at the piano. Delphine, his +brilliant countrywoman, vibrated with music herself. She possessed +"_une belle voix de soprano_," and sang "_d'apres la methode des +maitres d'Italie_." + +[Illustration: Countess Potocka. From the famous pastel in the Royal +Berlin Gallery. Artist unknown.] + +In her salon were heard such singers as Rubini, Lablache, Tamburini, +Malibran, Grisi and Persiani. Yet it was her voice Chopin wished to +hear when he lay dying! Truly hers must have been a marvellous gift of +song! At her salon it was his delight to accompany her with his highly +poetical playing. From what is known of his delicate art as a pianist +it is possible to imagine how exquisitely his accompaniments must have +both sustained and mingled with that "_belle voix de soprano_." He had +a knack of improvising a melody to any poem that happened to take his +fancy, and thus he and Delphine would treat to an improvised song the +elite of the musical, artistic, literary and social world that gathered +in her salon. It is unfortunate that these improvisations were lightly +forgotten by the composer, for he has left us few songs. Delphine +"took as much trouble in giving choice musical entertainments as other +people did in giving choice dinners." Her salon must have been a +resort after the composer's own heart. + +Liszt, who knew Delphine well during Chopin's lifetime, and from whose +letters, as yet untranslated into English, I have been able to unearth +a few references to her (the last in May, 1861, nearly twelve years +after Chopin died, and the last definite reference to her which I have +been able to discover), says that her indescribable and spirited grace +made her one of the most admired sovereigns of the society of Paris. +He speaks of her "ethereal beauty" and her "enchanting voice" which +enchained Chopin. Delphine was, in fact, "famous for her rare beauty +and fascinating singing." + +No biography of Chopin contains so much as the scrap of a letter either +from him to her, or from her to him. That he should not have written +is hardly to be wondered at, considering that letter writing was most +repugnant to him. He would take a long walk in order to accept or +decline an invitation in person, rather than indite a brief note. +Moreover, in addition to this trait, he was so often in the salon of +the Countess Potocka that much correspondence with her was unnecessary. +I have, however, discovered two letters from her to the composer. One, +written in French, asks him to occupy a seat in her box at a Berlioz +concert. The other is in Polish and is quite long. It is undated, and +there is nothing to show from where it was written. Evidently, +however, she had heard that he was ailing, for she begs him to send her +a few words, _poste restante_, to Aix-la-Chapelle, letting her know how +he is. From this request it seems that she was away from Paris +(possibly in or near Poland), but expected to start for the French +capital soon and wished to be apprised of his condition at the earliest +moment. The anxious tone of the letter leads me to believe that it was +written during the last year of the composer's life, when the insidious +nature of the disease of which he was a victim had become apparent to +himself and his friends. . . . "I cannot," she writes, "wait so long +without news of your health and your plans for the future. Do not +attempt to write to me yourself, but ask Mme. Etienne, or that +excellent grandma, who dreams of chops, to let me know about your +strength, your chest, your breathing." + +Delphine also was well aware of the unsatisfactory state of his +finances, for she writes that she would like to know something about +"that Jew; if he called and was able to be of service to you." What +follows is in a vein of sadness, showing that her own life was not +without its sorrows. "Here everything is sad and lonely, but my life +goes on in much the usual way; if only it will continue without further +bitter sorrows and trials, I shall be able to support it. For me the +world has no more happiness, no more joy. All those to whom I have +wished well ever have rewarded me with ingratitude or caused me other +_tribulations_." (The _italics_ are hers.) "After all, this existence +is nothing but a great discord." Then, with a "_que Dieu vous garde_," +she bids him _au revoir_ till the beginning of October at the latest. + +Note that it was in October, 1849, that Chopin took to his deathbed; +that in another passage of the letter she advised him to think of Nice +for the winter; and that it was from Nice she was summoned to his +bedside. It would seem as if she had received alarming advices +regarding his health; had hastened to Paris and then to the Riviera to +make arrangements for him to pass the winter there; and then, learning +that the worst was feared, had hurried back to solace his last hours. + +Then came what is perhaps the most touching scene that has been handed +down to us from the lives of the great composers. When Delphine +entered what was soon to be the death chamber, Chopin's sister Louise +and a few of his most intimate friends were gathered there. She took +her place by Louise. When the dying man opened his eyes and saw her +standing at the foot of his bed, tall, slight, draped in white, +resembling a beautiful angel, and mingling her tears with those of his +sister, his lips moved, and those nearest him, bending over to catch +his words, heard him ask that she would sing. + +Mastering her emotion by a strong effort of the will, she sang in a +voice of bell-like purity the canticle to the Virgin attributed to +Stradella,--sang it so devoutly, so ethereally, that the dying man, +"artist and lover of the beautiful to the very last," whispered in +ecstasy, "How exquisite! Again, again!" + +Once more she sang--this time a psalm by Marcello. It was the haunted +hour of twilight. The dying day draped the scene in its mysterious +shadows. Those at the bedside had sunk noiselessly on their knees. +Over the mournful accompaniment of sobs floated the voice of Delphine +like a melody from heaven. + +Chopin died on October 17, 1849, just as the bells of Paris were +tolling the hour of three in the morning. He was known to love +flowers, and in death he literally was covered with them. The funeral +was held from the Madeleine, where Mozart's "Requiem" was sung, the +solos being taken by Pauline Viardot-Garcia, Castellan and Lablache. +Meyerbeer is said to have conducted, but this has been contradicted. +He was, however, one of the pallbearers on the long way from the church +to Pere la Chaise. When the remains were lowered into the grave, some +Polish earth, which Chopin had brought with him from Wola nineteen +years before and piously guarded, was scattered over the coffin. There +is nothing to show what part, save that of a mourner, Delphine Potocka +took in his funeral. But though it was the famous Viardot-Garcia whose +voice rang out in the Madeleine, it was hers that had sung him to his +eternal rest. + +[Illustration: The death of Chopin. From the painting by Barrias.] + +How long did Delphine survive Chopin? In 1853 Liszt met her at Baden, +postponing his intended departure for Carlsruhe a day in order to dine +with her. In May, 1861, he met her at dinner at the Rothschilds'. +When Chopin's pupil, Mikuli, was preparing his edition of the +composer's works, Delphine furnished him copies of several compositions +bearing expression marks and other directions in the hand of Chopin +himself. Mikuli dated his edition 1879. It would seem as if the +Countess still were living at or about that time. + +Besides the aid she thus gave in the preparation of the Mikuli edition +of Chopin's works, there is other evidence that she treasured the +composer's memory. In 1857, when he had been dead eight years, there +was published a biographical dictionary of Polish and Slavonic +musicians, a book now very rare. Although the Potocka was only an +amateur, her name was included in the publication. Evidently the +biographies of living people were furnished by themselves. Chopin's +fame at that time did not approximate what it is now. Yet in the +second sentence of her biography Delphine records that she was "the +intimate friend of the illustrious Chopin." + +Forgetting that the line of the Potockis is a long one, the public for +years has associated with Chopin the famous pastel portrait of Countess +Potocka in the Royal Berlin Gallery. The Countess Potocka of that +portrait had a career that reads like a romance, but she was Sophie, +not Delphine Potocka. My discovery of a miniature of Countess Sophie +Potocka in Philadelphia, painted some fifteen or twenty years later +than the Berlin pastel, and of numerous references to her in the diary +of an American traveller who was entertained by her in Poland early in +the last century, were among the interesting results of my search for +information regarding Delphine, but they have no place here. Probably +the public, which clings to romance, still will cling to the pastel +portrait of Countess Potocka as that of the woman who sang to the dying +Chopin--and so the portrait is reproduced here. + +Barrias, the French historical painter, who was in Paris when Chopin +lived there, painted "The Death of Chopin." It shows Delphine singing +to the dying man. As Barrias had his reputation as a historical +painter to sustain and as the likenesses of others on the canvas are +correct, it is not improbable that he painted Delphine as he saw or +remembered her. If so, this is the only known portrait of Chopin's +faithful friend, the Countess Delphine Potocka. Of course no one who +undertakes to write about Chopin (or only to read about him for that +matter) can escape the episode with Mme. Dudevant,--George Sand,--who +used man after man as living "copy," and when she had finished with him +cast him aside for some new experience. But the story has been +admirably told by Huneker and others and its disagreeable details need +not be repeated here. It may have been love, even passion, while it +lasted, but it ended in harsh discord; whereas Delphine, sweet and pure +and tender, ever was like a strain of Chopin's own exquisite music +vibrating in a sympathetic heart. + + + + +The Schumanns: Robert and Clara + +Robert and Clara Schumann are names as closely linked in music as those +of Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning in literature. Robert +Schumann was a great composer, Clara Schumann a great pianist. In her +dual role of wife and virtuosa she was the first to secure proper +recognition for her husband's genius. Surviving him many years, she +continued the foremost interpreter of his works, winning new laurels +not only for herself but also for him. He was in his grave--yet she +had but to press the keyboard and he lived in her. Despite the fact +that tastes underwent a change and Wagner became the musical giant of +the nineteenth century, Clara, faithful to the ideal of her youth and +her young womanhood, saw to it that the fame of him whose name she bore +remained undimmed. Hers was, indeed, a consecrated widowhood. + +Robert was eighteen years old, Clara only nine, when they first met; +but while he had not yet definitely decided on a profession, she, in +the very year of their meeting, made her debut as a pianist, and thus +began a career which lasted until 1896, a period of nearly seventy +years! When they first met, Schumann was studying law at the Leipsic +University. Born in Zwickau, Saxony, in 1810, he showed both as a boy +and as a youth not only strong musical proclivities, but also decided +literary predilections. In the latter his father, a bookseller and +publisher, who loved his trade, saw a reflection of his own tastes, and +they were encouraged rather more sedulously than the boy's musical +bent. It was in obedience to his father's wishes that he matriculated +at Leipsic, although he composed and played the piano, and his desire +to make music his profession was beginning to get the upper hand. His +meeting with the nine-year-old girl decided him--so early in her life +did she begin to influence his career! + +[Illustration: Robert Schumann.] + +Schumann had been invited by his friends, Dr. and Mrs. Carus, to an +evening of music, and especially to hear the piano playing of a +wonder-child--a "musical fairy," his hostess called her. In the course +of the evening he accompanied Frau Carus in some Schubert songs, when, +chancing to look up, he saw a child dressed in white, her pretty face +framed in dark hair, her expressive eyes raised toward the singer in +rapt admiration. The song over, and the applause having died away, he +stepped up to the child, laid his hand kindly on her head, and asked, +"Are you musical, too, little one?" + +A curious smile played around her lips. She was about to answer, when +a man came to her and led her to the piano, and the first thing +Schumann knew the shapely little hands struck into Beethoven's F-minor +Sonata and played it through with a firm, sure touch and fine musical +feeling. No wonder she had smiled at his question. + +"Was I right in calling her a Musical fairy'?" asked Frau Carus of +Schumann. + +"Her face is like that of a guardian angel in a picture that hangs in +my mother's room at home," was his reply. Little he knew then that +this child was destined to become his own good fairy and "guardian +angel." Had he foreseen what she was to be to him, he could not more +aptly have described her. The most important immediate result of the +meeting was that he became a pupil of her father, Friedrich Wieck, +whose remarkable skill as a teacher had carried his daughter so far at +such an early age. The lessons stopped when Schumann went to +Heidelberg to continue his studies, but he and Wieck, who was convinced +of the young man's musical genius, corresponded in a most friendly +manner. + +Clara, who was born in Leipsic in 1819, became her father's pupil in +her fifth year. It is she who chiefly reflected glory upon him as a +master, but, among his other pupils, Hans von Buelow became famous, and +Clara's half-sister Marie also was a noted pianist. Wieck's system was +not a hard-and-fast one, but varied according to the individuality of +each pupil. He was to his day what Leschetizky, the teacher of +Paderewski, is now. Very soon after her meeting with Schumann, Clara +made her public debut, and with great success. Among those who heard +and praised her highly during this first year of her public career was +Paganini. + +In 1830, two years after the first meeting of Robert and Clara, +Schumann, his father having died, wrote to his mother and his guardian +and begged them to allow him to choose a musical career, referring them +to Wieck for an opinion as to his musical abilities. The mother wrote +to Wieck a letter which is highly creditable to her heart and judgment, +and Wieck's reply is equally creditable to him as a friend and teacher. +Evidently his powers of penetration led him to entertain the highest +hopes for Schumann. Among other things he writes that, with due +diligence, Robert should in a few years become one of the greatest +pianists of the day. Why Wieck's hopes in this particular were not +fulfilled, and why, for this reason, Clara's gifts as a pianist were +doubly useful to Schumann, we shall see shortly. + +[Illustration: Robert and Clara Schumann in 1847. From a lithograph in +possession of the Society of Friends of Music, Vienna.] + +Schumann entered with enthusiasm upon the career of his choice. He +left Heidelberg and took lodgings with the Wiecks in Leipsic. Clara, +then a mere girl, though already winning fame as a concert pianist, +certainly was too young for him to have fallen seriously in love with, +or for her to have responded to any such feeling. Even at that early +age, however, she exercised a strange power of attraction over him. +His former literary tastes had given him a great fund of stories and +anecdotes, and he delighted in the evenings to gather about him the +children of the family, Clara among them, and entertain them with tales +from the Arabian Nights and ghost and fairy stories. + +Among his compositions at this time are a set of impromptus on a theme +by Clara, and it is significant of his regard for her that later he +worked them over, as if he did not consider them in their original +shape good enough for her. Then we have from this period a letter +which he wrote to the twelve-year-old girl while she was concertizing +in Frankfort, and in which the expressions certainly transcend those of +a youth for a child, or of an elder brother for a sister, if one cared +to picture their relations as such. Indeed, he writes to her that he +often thinks other "not as a brother does of a sister, nor as one +friend of another, but as a pilgrim of a distant altar-picture." He +asks her if she has composed much, adding, "In my dreams I sometimes +hear music--so you must be composing." He confides in her about his +own work, tells her that his theoretical studies (with Heinrich Dorn) +have progressed as far as the three-part fugue; and that he has a +sonata in B minor and a set of "Papillons" ready; then jokingly asks +her how the Frankfort apples taste and inquires after the health of the +F above the staff in the "jumpy Chopin variation," and informs her that +his paper is giving out. "Everything gives out, save the friendship in +which I am Fraulein C. W.'s warmest admirer." + +For a letter from a man of twenty-one to a girl of twelve, the above is +remarkable. If Clara had not afterward become Robert's wife, it would +have interest merely as a curiosity. As matters eventuated, it is a +charming prelude to the love-symphony of two lives. Moreover, there +seems to have been ample ground for Schumann's admiration. Dorn has +left a description of Clara as she was at this time, which shows her to +have been unusually attractive. He speaks of her as a fascinating girl +of thirteen, "graceful in figure, of blooming complexion, with delicate +white hands, a profusion of black hair, and wise, glowing eyes. +Everything about her was appetizing, and I never have blamed my pupil, +young Robert Schumann, that only three years later he should have been +completely carried away by this lovely creature, his former +fellow-pupil and future wife." Her purity and her genius, added to her +beauty, may well have combined to make Robert, musical dreamer and +enthusiast on the threshold of his career, think of her, when absent, +"as a pilgrim of a distant altar-picture." + +She was clever, too, and through her concert tours was seeing much of +the world for those days. In Weimar she played for Goethe, the great +poet himself getting a cushion for her and placing it on the piano +stool in order that she might sit high enough; and not only praising +her playing, but also presenting her with his likeness in a medallion. +The poet Grillparzer, after hearing her play in Vienna Beethoven's +F-minor Sonata, wrote a delightful poem. "Clara Wieck and Beethoven's +F-minor Sonata." It tells how a magician, weary of life, locked all +his charms in a shrine, threw the key into the sea, and died. In vain +men tried to force open the shrine. At last a girl, wandering by the +strand and watching their vain efforts, simply dipped her white fingers +into the sea and drew forth the key, with which she opened the shrine +and released the charms. And now the freed spirits rise and fall at +the bidding of their lovely, innocent mistress, who guides them with +her white fingers as she plays. The imagery of this tribute to Clara's +playing is readily understood. In Paris she heard Chopin and +Mendelssohn. All these experiences tended to her early development, +and there is little wonder if Schumann saw her older than she really +was. + +In 1834 Schumann's early literary tastes asserted themselves, but now +in connection with music. He founded the "Neue Zeitschrift fuer Musik," +which under his editorship soon became one of the foremost musical +periodicals of the day. Among his own writings for it is the +enthusiastic essay on one of Chopin's early works, in which Schumann, +as he did later in the case of Brahms, discovered the unmistakable +marks of genius. The name of Chopin brings me back to Wieck's prophecy +regarding Schumann as a pianist. The latter in his enthusiasm devised +an apparatus for finger gymnastics which he practised so assiduously +that he strained one of his fingers and permanently impaired his +technique, making a pianistic career an impossibility. Through this +accident he was unable to introduce his own piano works to the public, +so that the importance of the service rendered him by Clara, in taking +his compositions into her repertoire, both before and after their +marriage, was doubled. + +One evening at Wieck's, Schumann was anxious to hear some new Chopin +works which he had just received. Realizing that his lame finger +rendered him incapable of playing, he called out despairingly: + +"Who will lend me fingers?" + +"I will," said Clara, and sat down and played the pieces for him. She +"lent him her fingers;" and that is precisely what she did for him +through life in making his piano and chamber music compositions known. +Familiarity with Schumann's music enables us of to-day to appreciate +its beauty. But for its day it was, like Brahms' music later, of a +kind that makes its way slowly. Left to the general musical public, it +probably would have been years in sinking into their hearts. Such +music requires to be publicly performed by a sympathetic interpreter +before receiving its meed of merit. Schumann had hoped to be his own +interpreter. He saw that hope vanish, but a lovely being came to his +aid. She saw his works come into life; their creation was part of her +own existence; she fathomed his genius to its utmost depths; her whole +being vibrated in sympathy with his, and when she sat down at the piano +and pressed the keys, it was as though he himself were the performer. +She was his fingers--fingers at once deft and delicate. She played +with a double love--love for him and love for his music. And why +should she not love it? She was as much the mother of his music as of +his children. I have already indicated that Clara probably developed +early. At all events, there are letters from Schumann to her, at +fourteen, which leave no doubt that he was in love with her then, or +that she could have failed to perceive this. In one of these letters +he proposes this highly poetic, not to say psychological, method of +communicating with her. "Promptly at eleven o'clock to-morrow +morning," he writes, "I will play the _Adagio_ from the Chopin +variations and will think strongly--in fact only--of you. Now I beg of +you that you will do the same, so that we may meet and see each other +in spirit. . . . Should you not do this, and there break to-morrow at +that hour a chord, you will know that it is I." + +[Illustration: Clara Schumann at the piano.] + +However far the affair may or may not have progressed at this time, +there was a curious interruption during the following year. Robert +appears to have temporarily lost his heart to a certain Ernestine von +Fricken, a young lady of sixteen, who was one of Wieck's pupils. Clara +consoled herself by permitting a musician named Banck to pay her +attention. For reasons which never have been clearly explained, +Schumann suddenly broke with Ernestine and turned with renewed ardor to +Clara, while Clara at once withdrew her affections from Banck and +retransferred them to Schumann. We find him writing to her again in +1835: + +"Through all the Autumn festivals there looks out an angel's head that +closely resembles a certain Clara who is very well known to me." By +the following year, Clara then being seventeen, things evidently had +gone so far that, between themselves, they were engaged. "Fate has +destined us for each other," he writes to her. "I myself knew that +long ago, but I had not the courage to tell you sooner, nor the hope to +be understood by you." + +Wieck evidently had remained in ignorance of the young people's +attachment, for, when on Clara's birthday the following year (1837) +Schumann made formal application in writing for her hand, her father +gave an evasive answer, and on the suit being pressed, he, who had been +almost like a second father to Robert, became his bitter enemy. Clara, +however, remained faithful to her lover through the three years of +unhappiness which her father's sudden hatred of Robert caused them. In +1839 she was in Paris, and from there she wrote to her father: + +"My love for Schumann is, it is true, a passionate love; I do not, +however, love him solely out of passion and sentimental enthusiasm, +but, furthermore, because I think him one of the best of men, because I +believe no other man could love me as purely and nobly as he or so +understandingly; and I believe, also, on my part that I can make him +wholly happy through allowing him to possess me, and that I understand +him as no other woman could." + +This love obviously was one not lightly bestowed, but Wieck remained +obdurate and refused his consent. Then Schumann took the only step +that under the circumstances was possible. Wieck's refusal of his +consent being a legal bar to the marriage, Robert invoked the law to +set his future father-in-law's objections aside. The case was tried, +decided in Schumann's favor, and on September 12, 1840, Robert Schumann +and Clara Wieck were married in the village of Schoenefeld, near +Leipsic. That year Schumann composed no less than one hundred and +thirty-eight songs, among them some of his most beautiful. They were +his wedding gift to Clara. + +After their marriage his inspiration blossomed under her very eyes. +She was the companion of his innermost thoughts and purposes. +Meanwhile his musical genius and critical acumen ever were at her +command in her work as a pianist. Happily, too, a reconciliation was +effected with Wieck, and we find Clara writing to him about the first +performance of Schumann's piano quintet (now ranked as one of the +finest compositions of its class), on which occasion she, of course, +played the piano part. + +Four years after their marriage the Schumanns removed to Dresden, +remaining there until 1850, when they settled in Duesseldorf, where +Robert had been appointed musical director. There was but one shadow +over their lives. At times a deep melancholy came over him, and in +this Clara discerned with dread possible symptoms of coming mental +disorder. Her fears were only too well founded. Early in February, +1854, he arose during the night and demanded light, saying that +Schubert had appeared to him and given him a melody which he must write +out forthwith. On the 27th of the same month, he quietly left his +house, went to the bridge across the Rhine and threw himself into the +river. Boatmen prevented his intended suicide. When he was brought +home and had changed his wet clothes for dry ones, he sat down to work +on a variation as if nothing had happened. Within less than a week he +was removed at his own request to a sanatorium at Endenich, where he +died July 29, 1856. + +[Illustration: The Schumann Monument in the Bonn Cemetery.] + +Clara survived him forty years, wearing a crown of laurels and +thorns--the laurels of a famous pianist, the thorns of her widowhood. +It was a widowhood consecrated, as much as her wifehood had been, to +her husband's genius. She died at Frankfort, May 19, 1896, and is +buried beside her husband in Bonn. + + + + +Franz Liszt and his Carolyne + +In the famous Wagner-Liszt correspondence, Liszt writes from Weimar, +under date of April 8, 1853, "Daily the Princess greets me with the lines +'Nicht Gut, noch Geld, noch Goettliche Pracht.'" The lines are from +"Goetterdaemmerung," the whole passage being-- + + "Nor goods, nor gold, nor godlike splendor; + Nor house, nor home, nor lordly state; + Nor hollow contracts of a treach'rous race, + Its cruel cant, its custom and decree. + Blessed, in joy and sorrow, + Let love alone be." + +The lady who according to Liszt daily greeted him with these significant +lines was the Princess Carolyne Sayn-Wittgenstein. Since 1848 she and +her young daughter Marie had been living with Liszt at the Altenburg in +Weimar. She remained there until 1860, twelve years, when she went to +Rome, whither, in due time, Liszt followed her, to make the Eternal City +one of his homes for the rest of his life. His last letter to her is +dated July 6, 1886, the year and month of his death, so that for a period +of nearly forty years he enjoyed the personal and intellectual +companionship of this remarkable woman. Their relations form one of the +great love romances of the last century. + +[Illustration: Franz Liszt. Painting by Ary Scheffer.] + +Liszt's letters to the Princess, written in French and still +untranslated, are in four volumes. They were published by the Princess's +daughter, Princess Marie Hohenlohe, as a tribute to Liszt the musician +and the man. They teem with his musical activities--information +regarding the numerous celebrities with whom he was intimate, the +musicians he aided, his own great works. But their rarest charm to me +lies in the fact that from them the careful reader can glean the whole +story of the romance of Liszt and Carolyne, from its very beginnings to +his death. + +We know the fascinating male figure in this romance--the extraordinary +combination of unapproached virtuoso, great composer, and man of the +world; but who was the equally fascinating woman? + +Carolyne von Iwanowska was born near Kiew, Russian Poland, in February, +1819. When she still was young her parents separated, and she divided +her time between them. Her mother possessed marked social graces, +travelled much, was a favorite at many courts, and, as a pupil of +Rossini's in singing, was admired by Spontini and Meyerbeer, and was +sought after in the most select salons, including that of Metternich, the +Austrian chancellor. From her Carolyne inherited her charm of manner. + +Intellectually, however, she was wholly her father's child; and he was +her favorite parent. He was a wealthy landed proprietor, and in the +administration of his estates, he frequently consulted her. Moreover he +had an active, studious mind, and he found in her an interested companion +in his pursuits. Often they sat up until late into the night discussing +various questions, and both of them--smoking strong cigars! + +In 1836 her hand was asked in marriage by Prince Nicolaus von +Sayn-Wittgenstein. She thrice refused, but finally accepted him at her +father's instigation. The prince was a handsome but otherwise +commonplace man, and not at all the husband for this charming, mentally +alert and finely strung woman. The one happiness that came to her +through this marriage was her daughter Marie. + +Liszt came to Kiew on a concert tour in February, 1847. He announced a +charity concert, for which he received a contribution of one hundred +rubles from Princess Carolyne. He already had heard other, but she had +been described to him as a miserly and peculiar person. The gift +surprised him the more for this. He called on her to thank her, found +her a brilliant conversationalist, was charmed with her in every way, and +concluded that what the gossips considered peculiarities were merely the +evidences of an original and positive mentality. Upon the woman, who was +in revolt against the restraints of an unhappy married life, Liszt, from +whose eyes shone the divine spark, who was as much _au fait_ in the salon +as at the piano, and who already had been worshipped by a long succession +of women, made a deep impression. Thus they were drawn to each other at +this very first meeting. + +When, a little later, Liszt took her into his confidence regarding his +ambition to devote more time to composition, and communicated to her his +idea of composing a symphony on Dante's "Divine Comedy" with scenic +illustrations, she offered to pay the twenty thousand thalers which these +would cost. Liszt subsequently changed his mind regarding the need of +scenery to his "Dante," but the Princess's generous offer increased his +admiration for her. It was a tribute to himself as well as to his art, +and an expression of her confidence in his genius as a composer (shared +at that time by but few) which could not fail to touch him deeply. It at +once created a bond of artistic and personal sympathy between them. She +was carried away by his playing, and the programme of his first concert +which she attended was treasured by her, and after her death, forty years +later, was found among her possessions by her daughter. + +[Illustration: Liszt at the piano.] + +If it was not love at first sight between these two, it must have been +nearly that. Liszt came to Kiew in February, 1847. The same month +Carolyne invited him to visit her at one of her country seats, Woronince. +Brief correspondence already had passed between them. To his fifth note +he adds, as a postscript, "I am in the best of humor . . . and find, now +that the world contains Woronince, that the world is good, very good!" + +The great pianist continued his tour to Constantinople. When he writes +to the Princess from there, he already "is at her feet." Later in the +same year he is hers "heart and soul." Early the following year he +quotes for her these lines from "Paradise Lost:" + + "For contemplation he, and valour formed, + For softness she, and sweet attractive grace; + He for God only, she for God in him!" + +She presents him with a baton set with jewels; he writes to her about the +first concert at which he will use it. He transcribes Schubert's lovely +song, "My sweet Repose, My Peace art Thou," and tells her that he can +play it only for her. At the same time their letters to each other are +filled with references to public affairs and literary, artistic and +musical matters. They are the letters of two people of broad and +cultivated taste, who are drawn to each other by every bond of intellect +and sentiment. Is it a wonder that but little more than a year after +they met, the Princess decided to burn her bridges behind her and leave +her husband? Through his friend, Prince Felix Lichnowsky, Liszt arranged +that they should meet at Krzyzanowitz, one of the Lichnowsky country +seats in Austrian Silesia. "May the angel of the Lord lead you, my +radiant morning star!" he exclaims. At the same time he has an eye to +the practical side of the affair, and describes the place as just the one +for their meeting point, because Lichnowsky will be too busy to remain +there, and there will not be a soul about, save the servants. + +It was shortly before the revolution of 1848. To gain permission to +cross the border, the Princess pretended to be bound for Carlsbad, for +the waters. + +Liszt's valet met her and her daughter as soon as they were out of +Russia, took them to Ratibor, where they were received by Lichnowsky, who +conducted them to Liszt. After a few days at this place of meeting, they +went to Graz, where they spent a fortnight in another of the Lichnowsky +villas. Among the miscellaneous correspondence of Liszt is a letter from +Graz to his friend Franz von Schober, councillor of legation at Weimar, +where Liszt was settled as court conductor. In it he describes the +Princess as "without doubt an uncommonly and thoroughly brilliant example +of soul and mind and intelligence (with a prodigious amount of _esprit_ +as well). You readily will understand," he adds, "that henceforth I can +dream very little of personal ambition and of a future wrapped up in +myself. In political relations serfdom may have an end; but the dominion +of one soul over another in the spirit region--should that not remain +indestructible?"--Oh, Liszt's prophetic soul! Thereafter his life was +shaped by this extraordinary woman, for weal and, it must be confessed, +for reasons which will appear later, partly for woe. + +The Grandduchess of Weimar took the Princess under her protection, and +she settled at Weimar in the Altenburg, while Liszt lived in the Hotel +zum Erbprinzen. Many tender missives passed between them. "Bonjour, mon +bon ange!" writes Liszt. "On vous aime et vous adore du matin au soir et +du soir au matin."--"On vous attend et vous benit, chere douce lumiere de +mon ame!"--"Je suis triste comme toujours et toutes les fois que je +n'entends pas votre voix--que je ne regarde pas vos yeux." + +[Illustration: The Princess Carolyne in her later years at Rome.] + +One of the billets relates to an incident that has become historic. +Wagner had been obliged, because of his participation in the revolution, +to flee from Dresden. He sought refuge with Liszt in Weimar, but, +learning that the Saxon authorities were seeking to apprehend him, +decided to continue his flight to Switzerland. He was without means and, +at the moment, Liszt, too, was out of funds. In this extremity, Liszt +despatched a few lines to the Princess. "Can you send me by bearer sixty +thalers? Wagner is obliged to flee, and I am unable at present to come +to his aid. _Bonne et heureuse nuit_." The money was forthcoming, and +Wagner owed his safety to the Princess. This is but one instance in +which, at Liszt's instigation, she was the good fairy of poor musicians. +About a year after the Princess settled in the Altenburg, Liszt, too, +took up his residence there. From that time until they left it, it was +the Mecca of musical Europe. Thither came Von Buelow and Rubinstein, then +young men; Joachim and Wieniawski; Brahms, on his way to Schumann, who, +as the result of this visit from Brahms, wrote the famous article hailing +him as the coming Messiah of music; Berlioz, and many, many others. The +Altenburg was the headquarters of the Wagner propaganda. From there came +material and artistic comfort to Wagner during the darkest hours of his +exile and poverty. + +Wendelin Weissheimer, a German orchestral leader, a friend of Liszt and +Wagner, and of many other notable musicians of his day, has given in his +reminiscences (which should have been translated long ago) a delightful +glimpse of life at the Altenburg. He describes a dinner at which Von +Bronsart, the composer, and Count Laurencin, the musical writer, were the +other guests. At table the Princess did the honors "most graciously," +and her "divinity," Franz Liszt, was in "buoyant spirits." After the +champagne, the company rose and went upstairs to the smoking-room and +music salon, which formed one apartment, "for with Liszt, smoking and +music-making were, on such occasions, inseparable." One touch in +Weissheimer's description recalls the Princess's early acquired habit of +smoking. + +"He [Liszt] always had excellent Havanas, of unusual length, ready, and +they were passed around with the coffee. The Princess also had come +upstairs. When Liszt sat down at one of the two pianos, she drew an +armchair close up to it and seated herself expectantly, also with one of +the long Havanas in her mouth and pulling delectably at it. We others, +too, drew up near Liszt, who had the manuscript of his 'Faust' symphony +open before him. Of course he played the whole orchestra; of course the +way in which he did it was indescribable; and--of course we all were in +the highest state of exaltation. After the glorious 'Gretchen' division +of the symphony, the Princess sprang up from the armchair, caught hold of +Liszt and kissed him so fervently that we all were deeply moved. [In the +interim her long Havana had gone out.]" + +The years which Liszt passed with the Princess at the Altenburg, and when +he was most directly under her influence, were the most glorious in his +career. Besides the "Faust" symphony, he composed during this period the +twelve symphonic poems, thus originating a new and highly important +musical form, which may be said to bear, in their liberation from +pedantry, the same relation to the set symphony that the music drama does +to opera; the "Rhapsodies Hongroises;" his piano sonata and concertos; +the "Graner Messe;" and the beginnings of his "Christus" and "Legend of +the Holy Elizabeth." The Princess ordered the household arrangements in +such a way that the composer should not be disturbed in his work. No one +was admitted to him without her _vise_; she attended to the voluminous +correspondence which, with a man of so much natural courtesy as Liszt, +would have occupied an enormous amount of his time. He was the +acknowledged head of the Wagner movement, at that time regarded as +nothing short of revolutionary; he was looked upon as the friend of all +progressive propaganda in his art; to play for Liszt, to have his opinion +on performance or composition, was the ambition of every musical +celebrity, or would-be one; his cooperation in innumerable concerts and +music festivals was sought for. His was a name to conjure with. Between +him and these assaults on his almost proverbial kindness stood the +Princess, and the list of his great musical productions during this +period, to say nothing of his literary work, like the rhapsody on Chopin, +is the tale of what the world owes her for her devotion. The relations +between Liszt and the Princess were frankly acknowledged, and by the +world as frankly accepted, as if they were two exceptional beings in whom +one could pardon things which in the case of ordinary mortals would mean +social ostracism. The nearest approach to this situation was that of +George Eliot and Lewes. But with Liszt and his Princess the world, +possibly after the fashion of the Continent, was far more lenient, and +their lives in their outward aspects were far more brilliant. No exalted +mind in literature, music, art or science passed through Weimar, or came +near it, without being drawn to the Altenburg as by a magnet. There +seems to have been within its walls an almost uninterrupted intellectual +revel, or, to use a trite expression, which here is most apt, a steady +feast of reason and flow of soul. The sojourn of Liszt and the Princess +in the Altenburg was a "golden period" for Weimar, a revival of the time +when Goethe lived there and reflected his glory upon it. + +[Illustration: The Altenburg, Weimar, where Liszt and Carolyne lived.] + +And yet--convention is the result of the concentrated essence of the +experience of ages; and no one seems able to break through it without the +effort leaving a scar. It cast its shadow even over the life at the +Altenburg. There remained one great longing to the Princess, the +nonfulfilment of which was as a void in her soul. She yearned to bear +the name of the man she adored. During the twelve years of their Weimar +sojourn she battled for it, but in vain. Then she transferred the +battlefield to Rome. + +Her husband, a Protestant, had found no difficulty in securing a divorce +from her. She was an ardent Roman Catholic, and the church stood in her +way, her own relatives, who had been scandalized at her flight, being +active in invoking its opposition. She went to Rome in the spring of +1860, to press her suit at the very centre of churchly authority. Liszt +remained in Weimar awaiting word from her. It took her more than a year +to secure the Papal sanction. Then, when everything seemed auspiciously +settled and her marriage with Liszt a certainty, her enthusiasm led her +to take a step which, at the very last moment, proved fatal to her +long-cherished hope. + +Had she returned at once to Weimar, her union with Liszt undoubtedly +would have taken place. But no. In her joy she must go too far. In +Rome, there where the marriage had been interdicted, there where she had +successfully overcome opposition to it, there it should take place. Her +triumph should be complete. + +Liszt was sent for. His last two letters to her before their meeting in +Rome are dated from Marseilles in October, 1861. The marriage was to +take place October 22, his fiftieth birthday. He writes her from the +Hotel des Empereurs, himself "_plus heureux que tous les empereurs du +monde_!" and again, "_Mon long exil va finir_." Yet it was only just +beginning! + +He arrived in Rome on October 20. All arrangements for the ceremony in +the San Carlo al Corso had been made. Then, by a strange fatality, it +chanced that several of the Princess's relations, who were most bitter +against her, entered upon the scene. Of all times, they happened to be +in Rome at this critical moment, and, getting wind of the impending +marriage, they entered a violent protest. When, on the evening of the +21st, Liszt was visiting the Princess, a Papal messenger called and +announced that His Holiness had decided to forbid the ceremony until he +could look into the matter more fully, and requested from her a +resubmission of the documents bearing on the case. + +To the Princess, then on the threshold of realizing her most cherished +hopes, this was the last stroke. Her over-wrought nature saw in it a +Judgment of Heaven. She refused to resubmit the papers; and even, when a +few years later, Prince Wittgenstein died and she was free, she regarded +marriage with Liszt as opposed by the Divine will. A strain of +mysticism, nurtured by busy ecclesiastics, developed itself in her; she +became possessed of the idea that she was a chosen instrument in the +Church's hands to further its interests; and with feverish, desperate +energy she devoted herself to literary work as its champion. She had her +own press, which set up each day's work and showed it to her in proof the +next. She did not leave Rome except on one occasion, and then for less +than a day, during the remaining twenty-six years of her life. + +It has been hinted more than once that the Princess's course was not as +completely governed by religious mysticism as might be supposed--that her +sensitive nature had divined in Liszt an unexpressed opposition to the +marriage, as if, possibly, he did not wish to be tied down to her, yet +felt bound in honor, because of the sacrifices she had made for him, to +appear to share her hope. La Mara (Marie Lipsius), the editor of the +Liszt letters and whose interesting notes form the connecting links in +the correspondence, does not take this view. It is noticeable, however, +although Liszt and the Princess saw each other frequently whenever he was +in Rome, and he became an abbe probably through her influence, that while +in some of his letters to her in later years there are notes of regret, +those written after the crisis in Rome breathe an intellectual rather +than a personal affinity. + +Be this as it may, it was a tragedy in his life as well as in her own. +Practically the rest of his life was divided, each year, between +Budapest, at the Conservatory there; Weimar, but no longer at the +Altenburg; and Rome, but not at the Princess's residence, Piazza di +Spagna. Thus he had three homes--none of which was home. The "golden +period" of his life, as well as the Altenburg itself, where others now +were installed, were dim shadows of the past. Liszt was the "grand old +man" of the piano, and is a great figure among composers; but whoever +knows the story of the last years of his life, sees him a wandering and +pathetic figure. He died at Bayreuth in July, 1886; Carolyne survived +him less than a year. The literary work of her twenty-six years in Rome +probably will be forgotten; it will be the linking of her name with +Liszt, and its association with the "golden period" of Weimar, that will +cause her to be remembered. + + + + +Wagner and Cosima + +No woman not a professional musician has ever played so important a part +in musical history as "Frau Cosima," the widow of Richard Wagner. In +fact, has any woman, professional musician or not? Bear in mind who +"Frau Cosima" is. She is the daughter of Franz Liszt, the greatest +pianist and one of the great composers of the last century, and was the +wife and, in the most exalted meaning of the term, the helpmeet of the +greatest of all composers! The two men with whom Cosima has thus stood +in such intimate relation are exceptional even among great musicians. +Composers are usually strongly emotional, inspired in all that pertains +to their art, but with a specialist's lack of interest in everything +else. Not so, however, Liszt or Wagner, for not since the time of +Beethoven had there been two musicians who, in the exercise of their art, +approached it from so clear an intellectual standpoint. Beethoven +through the greatness of his mind was able to enlarge the symphonic form, +which had been left by Haydn and Mozart. It became more responsive, more +plastic, in his hands. Form in art is the creation of the intellect; +what goes into it is the outflow of the heart. Thus Liszt created the +Symphonic Poem, and Wagner completely revolutionized the musical stage by +creating the Music-Drama. Into the Symphonic Poem, into the Music-Drama, +they put their hearts; but the creation of these forms was in each an +intellectual _tour de force_. The musician who thinks as well as feels +is the one who advances his art. In the historic struggle between Wagner +and the classicists Liszt played a large part. He was the first to +produce "Lohengrin"--was, as orchestral conductor, its subtle +interpreter, and, thus, a pioneer of the new school; he was Wagner's +steadfast champion through life, and a beautiful friendship existed +between "Richard" and "Franz." + +[Illustration: Richard Wagner. From the original lithograph of the +Egusquiza portrait.] + +Even now the reader can begin to realize the role Cosima has played in +music. That she is the daughter of Liszt is not in itself wonderful, but +that she should have fulfilled the mission to which she was born is one +of the most exquisite touches of fate. Liszt was one of Wagner's first +champions and friends. He came to the composer's aid in the darkest +years of his career--during that long exile after Wagner had been obliged +to flee from Germany because of his participation in the revolution of +1848. It was, in fact, through Liszt that Wagner received the means to +continue his flight from the Saxon authorities and cross the border to +safety in Switzerland. + +Nor did Liszt's beneficence stop there. From afar he continued to be +Wagner's good fairy. To fully appreciate Liszt's action at this time, +one must keep in mind the position of the Saxon composer. To-day his +fame is world-wide; we can scarcely realize that there was a time when +his genius was not recognized, but at that time he was not famous at all. +Those who had the slightest premonition of what the future would accord +him were a mere handful of enthusiasts. Such a thing as a Wagner cult +was undreamed of. He had produced three works for the stage. "Rienzi" +had been a brilliant success, "The Flying Dutchman" a mere _succes +d'estime_, "Tannhaeuser" a comparative failure. From a popular point of +view he had not sustained the promise of his first work. We know now +that compared with his second and third works "Rienzi" is trash, and that +rarely has a composer made such wonderful forward strides in his art as +did Wagner with "The Flying Dutchman" and "Tannhaeuser." But that was not +the opinion when they were produced. The former, although it is now +acknowledged to be an exquisitely poetic treatment of the weird legend, +was voted sombre and dull, and "Tannhaeuser" was simply a puzzle. After +listening to "Tannhaeuser," Schumann declared that Wagner was unmusical! +Unless a person is familiar with Wagner's life, it is impossible to +believe how bitter was the opposition to his theories and to his music. +Does it seem possible now that he had to struggle for twenty-five years +before he could secure the production of his "Ring of the Nibelung"? Yet +such was the case. Then, too, he was poor, and sometimes driven to such +straits that he contemplated suicide. + +When the public remained indifferent to one of his works and critics +reviled it, Wagner's usual method of reply was to produce something still +more advanced. Thus, when "Tannhaeuser" proved caviar to the public, and +seemed to affect the critics like a red rag waved before a bull, he +promptly sat down and wrote and composed "Lohengrin." But how should he, +an exile, secure its production? There it lay a mute score. As he +turned its pages, the notes looked out at him appealingly for a hearing. +It was like a homesick child asking for its own. What did Wagner do? He +wrote a few lines to Liszt. The answer was not long in coming. Liszt +was already making the necessary arrangements to accede to Wagner's +request and produce "Lohengrin" in Weimar, where he was musical director. +Liszt's name gave great _eclat_ to the undertaking; and through the +acclaim which, with the aid of his pupils and admirers, he understood so +well how to create, it attracted widespread attention, musicians from far +and near in Germany coming to hear it. Of course, opinions on the work +were divided, but the band of Wagner enthusiasts received accessions, and +the interest in the production had been too intense not to leave an +impression. The performance was, in fact, epoch-making. It raised a +"Wagner question" which would not down; which kept at least his earlier +works before the public; and which made him, even while still a fugitive +from Germany, and an exile, a prominent figure in the musical circles of +the country that refused him the right to cross its borders. + +All this was done by Liszt. Next to Wagner's own genius, which would +eventually have fought its way into the open, the influence that first +brought Wagner some degree of recognition was Franz Liszt. His +assistance to Wagner at this stage in that composer's career cannot be +overestimated. He was his tonic in despair, his solace in his darkest +hours. Few men appear in a nobler role than Liszt in his correspondence +with Wagner during this period. Is it not marvellous that some twenty +years later, at another crisis in Wagner's life, another being came to +his aid and became to him as a haven of rest; and that that being should +have been none other than the daughter of his earlier benefactor, Franz +Liszt? Fate often is cruel and often unaccountable, but in this instance +it seems to have acted the role of Cupid with an exquisite sense of what +was appropriate, and to have set the crowning glory of a great woman's +love upon Wagner's career. + +When Liszt was producing "Lohengrin," aiding Wagner pecuniarily, and +cheering him in his exile, Cosima Liszt was a young girl in Paris, where +she, her elder sister Blandine (afterward the wife of Emile Ollivier, who +became the war minister of Napoleon the Third) and her brother Daniel +lived with Liszt's mother. It was in Mme. Liszt's house that Wagner +first met her. He had gone to Paris in hopes of furthering his cause +there. During his sojourn he held a reading of his libretto to "The Ring +of the Nibelung" at Mme. Liszt's before a choice audience, which included +Liszt, Berlioz and Von Buelow. This occurred in the early fifties. +Cosima, who was among the listeners, was at the time fifteen or sixteen +years old. The mere fact of her presence at the reading is recorded. +Whether she was impressed with the libretto or its author we do not know. +It is probable that their meeting consisted of nothing more than the mere +formal introduction of the composer to the girl who was the daughter of +his friend Liszt, and who was to be one of the small and privileged +gathering at the reading. Wagner soon left Paris, and if she made any +impression on him at that time, he does not mention the fact in his +letters. + +[Illustration: Cosima, wife of Wagner. From a portrait bust made before +her marriage.] + +Whoever takes the trouble to read Liszt's correspondence, which is in +seven volumes and nearly all in French, will have little difficulty in +discerning that Cosima was his favorite child. He speaks of her +affectionately as "Cosette" and "Cosimette." Like his own, her +temperament was artistic and responsive, and she also inherited his charm +of manner and his exquisite tact, which, if anything, her early bringing +up in Paris enhanced. In 1857, when she was twenty, Wagner saw her again +and describes her as "Liszt's wonderful image, but of superior intellect." + +Well might Wagner speak of her resemblance to her father as wonderful. I +have seen Liszt and Cosima together, on an occasion to be referred to +later, and was struck with the remarkable likeness between father and +daughter. Both were idealists; if he had his eyes upon the stars, so had +she. Here is a passage from one of Liszt's letters: + +"_Une pensee favorite de Cosima:' De quelque cote qu'un tourne la torche, +la flamme se redresse et monte vers le ciel._'" ("A favorite thought of +Cosima's: Whichever way you may turn the torch, the flame turns on itself +and still points toward the heavens.'") + +A woman whose life holds that motto is in herself an inspiration. +Whatever turn fortune takes, her aspirations still blaze the way. She +herself is the torch of her motto. + +Although not a musician, although keeping herself consistently in the +background during Wagner's life (much as a mere private secretary would), +her influence at Bayreuth was continually felt; and since his death she +has been the head and front of the Wagner movement, and yet without +seeking publicity. Her intellectual force quietly assured her the +succession. There have been protests against her absolute rule, but she +has serenely ignored them. She still moulds to her will all the forces +concerned in the Bayreuth productions. + +When Mme. Nordica was preparing to sing "Elsa" at Bayreuth, it was Frau +Cosima who went over the role with her, sometimes repeating a single +phrase a hundred times in order to assure the correct pronunciation of +one word. It taxed the singer to the utmost; but she found Wagner's +widow willing to work as long and as hard as she herself would. The +performance established Mme. Nordica as a Wagner singer. Despite the +criticisms that have been heaped upon Frau Wagner for assuming to set +herself up as the great conservator of Wagnerian traditions, it is +significant that when, some years later, Mme. Nordica decided to add +"Sieglinde" to her repertoire, but with no special purpose of singing it +at Bayreuth, she arranged with Frau Cosima to go over the role with her, +and in order to do so made a trip to Switzerland, where the former was +staying. So far as adding to her reputation was concerned, there was not +the slightest reason for Mme. Nordica to do this. That the American +prima donna elected to study with Frau Cosima shows that she must have +found Wagner's widow a woman of rare temperament. + +Cosima was not Wagner's first love, nor even his first wife. For in +November, 1836, he had married Wilhelmina Planer, the leading actress of +the theatre in Magdeburg where he was musical director of opera. Her +father was a spindle-maker. It is said that her desire to earn money for +the household, rather than the impetus of a well-defined histrionic gift, +led her to go on the stage; but, once on the stage, she discovered that +she had unquestionable talent, and played leading characters in tragedy +and comedy with success. + +Minna is described as handsome, but not strikingly so; of medium height +and slim figure, with "soft, gazelle-like eyes which were a faithful +index of a tender heart." Later, however, the Princess Sayn-Wittgenstein +wrote to Liszt that she was too stout, but praised her management of the +household and her excellent cuisine. Her nature was the very opposite of +Wagner's. Where he was passionate, strong-willed and ambitious, she was +gentle, affectionate and retiring. Where he yearned for conquest, she +wanted only a well-regulated home. But she could not follow him in his +art theories, and as they assumed more definite shape she became less and +less able to comprehend them and, finally, they became almost a sealed +book to her. + +[Illustration: Richard and Cosima Wagner.] + +Doubtless, the ill success of "The Flying Dutchman" and "Tannhaeuser," +works which, after "Rienzi," puzzled people, engendered her first +misunderstanding of Wagner's genius. Some may be surprised that this +lack of appreciation did not bring about a separation sooner, instead of +after nearly a quarter of a century of married life. But when a man is +struggling with poverty, the woman who unobtrusively aids him in bearing +it is regarded by him as an angel of light, and the question as to +whether she appreciates his genius or not becomes a secondary one in the +struggle for existence. + +But when at last there is some promise of success, some relief from +drudgery, and with it a little leisure for companionship--then, too, +there is opportunity for an estimate of intellectual quality. Then it is +that the man of genius discovers that the woman who has stood by him +through his poverty lacks the graces of mind necessary to his complete +happiness, and the self-sacrificing wife who has been his drudge, in +order that he might the better meet want, and who has perhaps lost her +youth and her looks in his service, is forgotten for some one else. The +worst of it is that the world forgets her and all she has done for the +great man in her quiet, uncomplaining way. The drudge never finds a page +in the "Loves of the Poets." The woman who comes in and reaps where the +other has sown, does. + +Wagner's friend, Ferdinand Praeger, has much to say of Minna's fine +qualities. But he also tells several anecdotes which completely +illustrate how absolutely she failed to comprehend Wagner's genius and +ambition. Praeger visited them in their "trimly kept Swiss chalet" in +Zurich in the summer of 1856. One day when Praeger and Minna were seated +at the luncheon table waiting for Wagner, who was scoring the "Nibelung," +to come down from his study, she asked: "Now, honestly, is Richard really +such a great genius?" Remember that this question was asked about the +composer of "The Flying Dutchman," "Tannhaeuser" and "Lohengrin." If she +was unable to discover his genius in these, how could she be expected to +follow its loftier flights in his later works? + +On another occasion when Wagner was complaining that the public did not +understand him, she said: "Well, Richard, why don't you write something +for the gallery?" So little did she understand the man whose genius was +founded upon unswerving devotion to artistic truth. + +During Praeger's visit, a former singer at the Magdeburg opera and her +two daughters called on Wagner. They sang the music of the +Rhine-daughters from "Rheingold." When they finished singing, Minna +asked Praeger: "Is it really as beautiful as you say? It does not seem +so to me, and I'm afraid it would not sound so to others." + +While, as can be shown from passages in his correspondence, Wagner +appreciated the homely virtues of his first wife, and never, even after +they had separated, allowed a word to be spoken against her, the last +years of their married life were stormy. She had been tried beyond her +strength, and, not sharing her husband's enormous confidence in his +artistic powers, she had not the stimulus of his faith in his ultimate +success to sustain her. Moreover a heart trouble with which she was +afflicted resulted, through the strain to which their uncertain material +condition subjected her, in a growing irritability which was accentuated +by jealousy of women who entered the growing circle of Wagner's admirers +as his genius began to be appreciated. + +The crisis came in 1858, when they separated, Minna retiring to Dresden. +Two years later, when Wagner was ill in Paris, she went there and nursed +him, but they separated again. An interesting fact, not generally known, +is that, in 1862, when Wagner was in Biebrich on the Rhine composing his +"Meistersinger," Minna came from Dresden as a surprise to pay him a +visit--evidently an effort to effect a reconciliation. Wendelin +Weissheimer, a conductor at the opera in Mayeuse on the opposite bank of +the river and a close friend of Wagner's at that time, has left an +enlightening record of the episode. + +Wagner, he says, "the heaven-storming genius, who knew no bounds, tried +to play the role of Hausvater--of loving husband and comforter. He had +some cold edibles brought in from the hotel, made tea, and himself boiled +half a dozen eggs. [What a picture! The composer of 'Tristan' boiling +eggs!] Afterwards he put on one of his familiar velvet dressing-gowns and +a fitting barretta, and proceeded to read aloud the book of 'Die +Meistersinger.' + +"The first act passed off without mishap save for some unnecessary +questions from Minna. But at the beginning of the second act, when he +had described the stage-setting--'to the right the cobbler shop of Hans +Sachs; to the left,' etc.,--Minna exclaimed: + +"'And here sits the audience!' at the same time letting a bread-ball roll +over Wagner's manuscript. That ended the reading." + +The visit of course was futile. Minna returned to Dresden, where she +died in 1866. Poor Minna! A good cook, but she did not appreciate his +genius, would seem to sum up her story. Yet it is but just that we +should pay at least a passing salute to this woman who was the love of +Wagner's youth and the drudge of his middle life, and who, from the +distance of her lonely separation, saw him basking in the favor of the +king, who, too late for her, had become his munificent patron.--What a +contrast between her fate and Cosima's! + +[Illustration: Richard and Cosima Wagner entertaining in their home +Wahnfried, Liszt, and Hans von Wolzogen. Painting by W. Beckmann.] + +Were it not for Liszt's letters, meagre would be the information +regarding Cosima before her marriage to Wagner. But by going over his +voluminous correspondence and picking out references to her here and +there, I am able to give at least some idea of her earlier life. + +This extraordinary woman, who brought Wagner so much happiness and of +whom it may be said that no other woman ever played so important a part +in the history of music, came to her many graces and accomplishments by +right of birth. She was the daughter of Liszt and the Countess d'Agoult, +a French author, better known under her pen name of "Daniel Stern." Thus +she had genius on one side of her parentage and distinguished talent on +the other; and, on both sides, rare personal charm and tact. + +The Countess d'Agoult's father, Viscount Flavigny, was an old Royalist +nobleman. While an emigre during the revolution, he had married the +beautiful daughter of the Frankfort banker, Bethman. After the Flavignys +returned to France, their daughter, an extremely beautiful blonde, was +brought up, partly at the Flavigny chateau, partly at the Sacre Coeur de +Marie, in Paris. Talented beyond her years, her wit and beauty won her +much admiration. At an early age she married Count Charles d'Agoult, a +French officer, a member of the old aristocracy and twenty years her +senior. + +When she first met Liszt she was twenty-nine years old, had been married +six years and was the mother of three children. She still was beautiful, +and in her salon she gathered around her men and women of rank, _esprit_ +and fame. In 1835 Liszt left Paris after the concert season there. The +Countess followed him, and the next heard of them they were in +Switzerland. They remained together six years, Cosima, born in 1837, +being one of the three children resulting from the union. In the +Countess's relations with Liszt there appears to have been a curious +mingling of _la grande passion_ and hauteur. For when, soon after she +had joined him in Switzerland, he urged her to secure a divorce in order +that they might marry, she drew herself up and replied: "_Madame la +Comtesse d'Agoult ne sera jamais Madame Liszt_!" Certainly none but a +Frenchwoman would have been capable of such a reply under the same +circumstances. Equally French was her husband's remark when, the +Countess's support having been assumed by Liszt, he expressed the opinion +that throughout the whole affair the pianist had behaved like a man of +honor. + +After the separation of Liszt and Countess d'Agoult, he entrusted the +care of the three children to his mother. During a brief sojourn in +Paris, Wagner met Cosima, then a girl of sixteen, for the first time. +She formed with Liszt, Von Buelow, Berlioz and a few others the very +small, but extremely select, audience which, at the house of Liszt's +mother, heard Wagner read selections from his "Nibelung" dramas. In +1855, the burden of the care of the children falling too heavily upon +Liszt's mother, the duty of looking after the daughters was cheerfully +undertaken by the mother of Hans von Buelow, who resided in Berlin. + +In a letter written by Von Buelow in June, 1856, he speaks of them in +these interesting terms: "These wonderful girls bear their name with +right--full of talent, cleverness and life, they are interesting +personalities, such as I have rarely met. Another than I would be happy +in their companionship. But their evident superiority annoys me, and the +impossibility to appear sufficiently interesting to them prevents my +appreciating the pleasure of their society as much as I would like +to--there you have a confession, the candor of which you will not deny. +It is not very flattering for a young man, but it is absolutely true." +Yet, a year later, he married Cosima, one of the girls whose +"superiority" so annoyed him. + +How strange, in view of what happened later, that Von Buelow so planned +his wedding trip that its main objective was a visit to Zurich in order +that he might present Cosima to Wagner, who had not seen her since she +had formed one of his audience at the "Rheingold" reading in Paris. It +is in a letter to his friend, Richard Pohl, written the day before his +wedding, that Von Buelow mentions the "Wagnerstadt," Zurich, as the aim of +his wedding journey. Was it Fate--or fatality--that led him thither with +Cosima? The daughter of Liszt, the bride of Von Buelow, being conducted +on her honeymoon to the very lair of the great composer for whom she was, +within a few years, to leave her husband! What wonderful musical links +destiny wove in the life of this woman who herself was not a musician! + +Hans and Cosima arrived at Zurich early in September. "For the last +fortnight," writes Von Buelow, under date of September 19, 1857, "I and my +wife have been living in Wagner's house, and I do not know anything else +that could have afforded me such benefit, such refreshment as being +together with this wonderful, unique man, whom one should worship as a +god." + +On his side Wagner was charmed with the Von Buelows. In one of his +letters he speaks of their visit as his most delightful experience of the +summer. "They spent three weeks in our little house; I have rarely been +so pleasantly and delightfully affected as by their informal visit. In +the mornings they had to keep quiet, for I was writing my 'Tristan,' of +which I read them an act aloud every week. If you knew Cosima, you would +agree with me when I conclude that this young pair is wonderfully well +mated. With all their great intelligence and real artistic sympathy, +there is something so light and buoyant in the two young people that one +was obliged to feel perfectly at home with them." + +Wagner allowed them to depart only under promise that they would return +next year, which they did, to find a household on the verge of disruption +and to be unwilling witnesses to some of the closing scenes of Wagner's +first marriage. + +During her childhood in Paris Cosima was frail and delicate. Liszt, in +one of his letters, confesses that this caused him to regard her with a +deeper affection than he bestowed on her elder sister. Later he speaks +of her as a rare and beautiful nature of great and spontaneous charm. A +friend of Liszt's who saw her at the Altenburg in 1860 writes that she +was pale, slender, wan and thin to a degree, and that she crept through +the room like a shadow. Liszt was greatly concerned about her, for the +year previous her brother Daniel had died of consumption, and he feared +she might be stricken with the same malady. + +Daniel's death was a sad experience through which they passed together, +and which strengthened the ties of tenderness that drew Liszt to his +younger daughter. The son died in his father's arms and in her presence. +She had nursed him devotedly in his last illness. "Cosima tells me," +Liszt wrote, before he had seen Daniel on his sick-bed, "that the color +of his beard and of his hair has taken on a touch of brownish red, and +that he looks like a Christ by Correggio." Together, after Daniel's +death, they knelt beside his bed "praying to God that His will be +done--and that He reconcile us to that Divine will, in according us the +grace on our part to accept it without a murmur." + +Such a scene was a memory for a lifetime. Cosima herself, in one of her +letters, gives a beautiful description of her brother's passage from +life. "He fell back into the arms of death as into those of a guardian +angel, for whom he had been waiting a long time. There was no struggle; +without a distaste for life, he seemed, nevertheless, to have aspired +ardently toward eternity." + +With a pretty touch Liszt gives an idea of Cosima's interest in others. +It seems that a certain Frau Stilke was anxious to possess a gray dress +of moire antique, and Liszt had persuaded the Princess Sayn-Wittgenstein +to place the necessary sum for buying it at his daughter's disposal. "In +order to estimate the cost," he writes, "Cosette has devised this +excellent formula: It should be a dress such as one would give to persons +who want a dress--only it is necessary that it should be gray and of +moire antique to satisfy the ideal of taste of the person in question." + +Wagner does not seem to have seen Cosima after the Von Buelows' second +visit to him at Zurich until they came to him for a visit at Biebrich +during the summer of 1862. What a contrast Cosima must have seemed to +poor Minna who, in the same house and but a short time before, had +desecrated the manuscript of "Die Meistersinger" by allowing a bread-ball +to roll over it! Wagner's favorable opinion of Hans and Cosima underwent +a great change during their sojourn with him. In a letter, after +speaking of Von Buelow's depression owing to poor health, he writes: "Add +to this a tragic marriage; a young woman of extraordinary, quite +unprecedented, endowment, Liszt's wonderful image, but of superior +intellect." + +That this woman who so impressed Wagner was in her turn filled with +admiration for his gifts appears from two letters which, during the +summer of 1862, she wrote from Biebrich to her father. In one of these +she speaks enthusiastically of some of the "Tristan" music. The other +letter concerns "Die Meistersinger:" + +"The 'Meistersinger' is to Wagner's other conceptions what the 'Winter's +Tale' is to Shakespeare's other works. Its fantasy is founded on gayety +and drollery, and it has called up the Nuremberg of the Middle Ages, with +its guilds, its poet-artisans, its pedants, its cavaliers, to draw forth +the freshest laughter in the midst of the highest, the most ideal poetry." + +It is evident that two souls so sympathetic could not long remain in +proximity without craving a closer union. "Coming events cast their +shadows before," remarks one who often was present during the Biebrich +visit of the Von Buelows to Wagner. + +How deeply Cosima sympathized with Wagner's aims even then is shown by +another episode of this visit. One evening the composer outlined to his +friends his plans for "Parsifal," adding that it probably would be his +last work. The little circle was deeply affected, and Cosima wept. +Strange prescience! "Parsifal" was not produced until twenty years +later, yet it proved to be the finale of Wagner's life's labors. + +The incident has interest from another point of view. It shows that +Wagner had his plans for "Parsifal" fairly matured in 1862, and that it +was not, as some critics, who see in it a decadence of his powers, claim, +a late afterthought, designed to give to Bayreuth a curiosity somewhat +after the _facon_ of the Oberammergau "Passion Play." Decadence? Henry +T. Finck, the most consistent and eloquent champion Wagner has had in +America, sees in it no falling off in the composer's genius; nor do I. +Wagner's scores always fully voice his dramas,--"Parsifal" as completely +as any. The subject simply required different musical treatment from the +heroic "Ring of the Nibelung" and the impassioned "Tristan." + +In a letter written by Wagner in June, 1864, occurs this significant +sentence: "There is one good being who brightens my household." The +"good being" was Cosima, who from now on was destined to fill his life +with the sunshine of love and of devotion to his art. + +"Since I last saw you in Munich," Wagner writes to a friend, "I have not +again left my asylum, which in the meanwhile also has become the refuge +of her who was destined to prove that I could well be helped, and that +the axiom of my many friends, that 'I could not be helped,' was false! +She knew that I could be helped, and has helped me: she has defied every +disapprobation and taken upon herself every condemnation." + +This was written in June, 1870, a year after Cosima had borne him +Siegfried, and two months before their marriage. For in August, 1870, +the following announcement was sent out: + + +"We have the honor to announce our marriage, which took place on the 25th +of August of this year in the Protestant Church in Lucerne. + Richard Wagner. + Cosima Wagner, nee Liszt. + +"August 25, 1870." + + +When, in 1882, I attended the first performance of "Parsifal" in +Bayreuth, I had frequent opportunity of seeing Wagner and Frau Cosima. +Probably the best view I had of them together, and of Franz Liszt at the +same time, was at a dinner given by Wagner to the artists who took part +in the performances. It was in one of the restaurants near the theatre +on the hill overlooking Bayreuth. Wagner's entrance upon the scene was +highly theatrical. All the singers and a few other guests had been +seated, and Liszt, Frau Cosima and Siegfried Wagner were in their places +when the door opened and in shot Wagner. It was as well calculated as +the entrance of the star in a play. On his way to his seat he stopped +and chatted a few moments with this one and that one. Instead of Wagner +sitting at the head of the table and his wife at the foot, they sat +together in the middle. It seemed impossible for him, though, to remain +seated more than a few minutes at a time, and he was jumping up and down +and running about the table all through the banquet. On the other side +of Wagner sat Liszt; on the other side of Frau Cosima, Siegfried Wagner, +then still a boy. Among the four there were two pairs of likenesses. +Liszt was gray; but, although Frau Cosima's hair was blonde, and her face +smooth and fair as compared with her father's, which was furrowed with +age and boldly aquiline, she was his child in every lineament. Moreover, +the quick, responsive lighting up of the features, her graceful bearing, +her tact--that these were inherited from him a brief surveillance of the +two sufficed to disclose. Combined with these fascinating, but after all +more or less superficial characteristics was the stamp of a rare +intellectual force on both faces. No one seeing them together needed to +be told that Cosima was a Liszt. + +Nor did any one need to be told that Siegfried was a Wagner. The boy was +as much like his father as his mother was like hers. Feature for +feature, Wagner was reproduced in his son. That there should be no trace +of the mother, and such a mother, in the boy's face struck me as +remarkable; but there was none. Siegfried Wagner was a veritable pocket +edition of his famous father. His later photographs as a young man show +that much of this likeness has disappeared. After dinner, there were +speeches. Wagner, his hand resting affectionately on Liszt's shoulder, +paid a feeling tribute to the man who had befriended him early in his +career and who had given him the precious wife at his side. I remember +as if it had been but last night the tenderness with which he spoke the +words _die theure Gattin_. + +It was a wonderful two or three hours, that banquet, with the numerous +notabilities present, and at least two great men, Liszt and Wagner, and +one great woman, the daughter of Liszt and the wife of Wagner; and the +experience is to be treasured all the more, because few of those present +saw Wagner again. Early in the following year he died at Venice. He is +buried in the garden back of Wahnfried, his Bayreuth villa. He was a +great lover of animals, and at his burial his two favorite dogs, Wotan +and Mark, burst through the bushes that surround the grave and joined the +mourners. One of these pets is buried near him, and on the slab is the +inscription: "Here lies in peace Wahnfried's faithful watcher and +friend--the good and handsome Mark." + +What Cosima was to Wagner is best told in Liszt's words, written to a +friend after a visit to Bayreuth, in 1872, when his favorite child had +been married to Wagner two years. "Cosima still is my terrible daughter, +as I used to call her,--an extraordinary woman and of the highest merit, +far above vulgar judgment, and worthy of the admiring sentiments which +she has inspired in all who have known her. She is devoted to Wagner +with an all-absorbing enthusiasm, like Senta to the Flying Dutchman--and +she will prove his salvation, because he listens to her and follows her +with keen perception." + +That Bayreuth with Wagner's death did not become a mere tradition, that +the Wagner performances still continue there, is due to Frau Cosima. She +is Bayreuth. No woman has made such an impression on the music of her +time as she. Yet she is not a musician! + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LOVES OF GREAT COMPOSERS*** + + +******* This file should be named 18138.txt or 18138.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/1/3/18138 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +https://www.gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/pglaf. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at https://www.gutenberg.org/about/contact + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: +https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + diff --git a/18138.zip b/18138.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..0d0b1d3 --- /dev/null +++ b/18138.zip diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..81ba74c --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #18138 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/18138) |
