This was the end of my career as director and composer in Magdeburg, which in the beginning had seemed so full of promise and had been started at the cost of considerable sacrifice. The serenity of art now gave way completely before the stern realities of life. My position gave food for meditation, and the outlook was not a cheerful one. All the hopes that I and Minna had founded upon the success of my work had been utterly destroyed. My creditors, who had been appeased by the anticipation of the expected harvest, lost faith in my talents, and now counted solely on obtaining bodily possession of me, which they endeavoured to do by speedily instituting legal proceedings. Now that every time I came home I found a summons nailed to my door, my little dwelling in the Breiter Weg became unbearable; I avoided going there, especially since my brown poodle, who had hitherto enlivened this retreat, had vanished, leaving no trace. This I looked upon as a bad sign, indicating my complete downfall.
At this time Minna, with her truly comforting assurance and firmness of bearing, was a tower of strength to me and the one thing I had left to fall back upon. Always full of resource, she had first of all provided for her own future, and was on the point of signing a not unfavourable contract with the directors of the theatre at Königsberg in Prussia. It was now a question of finding me an appointment in the same place as musical conductor; this post was already filled. The Königsberg director, however, gathering from our correspondence that Minna’s acceptance of the engagement depended upon the possibility of my being taken on at the same theatre, held out the prospect of an approaching vacancy, and expressed his willingness to allow it to be filled by me. On the strength of this assurance it was decided that Minna should go on to Königsberg and pave the way for my arrival there.
Ere these plans could be carried out, we had still to spend a time of dreadful and acute anxiety, which I shall never forget, within the walls of Magdeburg. It is true I made one more personal attempt in Leipzig to improve my position, on which occasion I entered into the transactions mentioned above with the director of the theatre regarding my new opera. But I soon realised that it was out of the question for me to remain in my native town, and in the disquieting proximity of my family, from which I was restlessly anxious to get away. My excitability and depression were noticed by my relations. My mother entreated me, whatever else I might decide to do, on no account to be drawn into marriage while still so young. To this I made no reply. When I took my leave, Rosalie accompanied me to the head of the stairs. I spoke of returning as soon as I had attended to certain important business matters, and wanted to wish her a hurried good-bye: she grasped my hand, and gazing into my face, exclaimed, “God alone knows when I shall see you again!” This cut me to the heart, and I felt conscience-stricken. The fact that she was expressing the presentiment she felt of her early death I only realised when, barely two years later, without having seen her again, I received the news that she had died very suddenly.
I spent a few more weeks with Minna in the strictest retirement in Magdeburg: she endeavoured to the best of her ability to relieve the embarrassment of my position. In view of our approaching separation, and the length of time we might be parted, I hardly left her side, our only relaxation being the walks we took together round the outskirts of the town. Anxious forebodings weighed upon us; the May sun which lit the sad streets of Magdeburg, as if in mockery of our forlorn condition, was one day more clouded over than I have ever seen it since, and filled me with a positive dread. On our way home from one of these walks, as we were approaching the bridge crossing the Elbe, we caught sight of a man flinging himself from it into the water beneath. We ran to the bank, called for help, and persuaded a miller, whose mill was situated on the river, to hold out a rake to the drowning man, who was being swept in his direction by the current. With indescribable anxiety we waited for the decisive moment—saw the sinking man stretch out his hands towards the rake, but he failed to grasp it, and at the same moment disappeared under the mill, never to be seen again. On the morning that I accompanied Minna to the stage-coach to bid her a most sorrowful farewell, the whole population was pouring from one of the gateways of the town towards a big field, to witness the execution of a man condemned to be put to death on the wheel ‘from below.’[7] The culprit was a soldier who had murdered his sweetheart in a fit of jealousy. When, later in the day, I sat down to my last dinner at the inn, I heard the dreadful details of the Prussian mode of execution being discussed on all sides. A young magistrate, who was a great lover of music, told us about a conversation he had had with the executioner, who had been procured from Halle, and with whom he had discussed the most humane method of hastening the death of the victim; in telling us about him, he recalled the elegant dress and manners of this ill-omened person with a shudder.
[7] _Durch das Rod van unten_. The punishment of the wheel was usually inflicted upon murderers, incendiaries, highwaymen and church robbers. There were two methods of inflicting this: (1) ‘from above downwards’ (_von oben nach unten_), in which the condemned man was despatched instantly owing to his neck getting broken from the start; and (2) ‘from below upwards’ (_von unten nach oben_), which is the method referred to above, and in which all the limbs of the victim were broken previous to his body being actually twisted through the spokes of the wheel.—Editor
These were the last impressions I carried away from the scene of my first artistic efforts and of my attempts at earning an independent livelihood. Often since then on my departure from places where I had expected to find prosperity, and to which I knew I should never return, those impressions have recurred to my mind with singular persistence. I have always had much the same feelings upon leaving any place where I had stayed in the hope of improving my position.
Thus I arrived in Berlin for the first time on the 18th May, 1836, and made acquaintance with the peculiar features of that pretentious royal capital. While my position was an uncertain one, I sought a modest shelter at the Crown Prince in the Königstrasse, where Minna had stayed a few months before. I found a friend on whom I could rely when I came across Laube again, who, while awaiting his verdict, was busying himself with private and literary work in Berlin. He was much interested in the fate of my work Liebesverbot, and advised me to turn my present situation to account for the purpose of obtaining the production of this opera at the Konigstadt theatre. This theatre was under the direction of one of the most curious creatures in Berlin: he was called ‘Cerf,’ and the title of Commissionsrath had been conferred upon him by the King of Prussia. To account for the favours bestowed upon him by royalty, many reasons of a not very edifying nature were circulated. Through this royal patronage he had succeeded in extending considerably the privileges already enjoyed by the suburban theatre. The decline of grand opera at the Theatre Royal had brought light opera, which was performed with great success at the Konigstadt theatre, into public favour. The director, puffed up by success, openly laboured under the delusion that he was the right man in the right place, and expressed his entire agreement with those who declared that one could only expect a theatre to be successfully managed by common and uneducated men, and continued to cling to his blissful and boundless state of ignorance in the most amusing manner. Relying absolutely upon his own insight, he had assumed an entirely dictatorial attitude towards the officially appointed artists of his theatre, and allowed himself to deal with them according to his likes and dislikes. I seemed destined to be favoured by this mode of procedure: at my very first visit Cerf expressed his satisfaction with me, but wished to make use of me as a ‘tenor.’ He offered no objection whatever to my request for the production of my opera, but, on the contrary, promised to have it staged immediately. He seemed particularly anxious to appoint me conductor of the orchestra. As he was on the point of changing his operatic company, he foresaw that his present conductor, Glaser, the composer of Adlershorst, would hinder his plans by taking the part of the older singers: he was therefore anxious to have me associated with his theatre, that he might have some one to support him who was favourably disposed towards the new singers.
All this sounded so plausible, that I could scarcely be blamed for believing that the wheel of fortune had taken a favourable turn for me, and for feeling a sense of lightheartedness at the thought of such rosy prospects. I had scarcely allowed myself the few modifications in my manner of living which these improved circumstances seemed to justify, ere it was made clear to me that my hopes were built upon sand. I was filled with positive dread when I soon fully realised how nearly Cerf had come to defrauding me, merely it would seem for his own amusement. After the manner of despots, he had given his favours personally and autocratically; the withdrawal and annulment of his promises, however, he made known to me through his servants and secretaries, thus placing his strange conduct towards me in the light of the inevitable result of his dependence upon officialdom.