Louis Spohr (1784-1859) is now almost forgotten as an operatic composer, but at one time his popularity was only second to that of Weber.  Many competent critics have constantly affirmed that a day will come when Spohr’s operas, now neglected, will return to favour once more; but years pass, and there seems no sign of a revival of interest in his work.  Yet he has a certain importance in the history of opera; for, so far as chronology is concerned, he ought perhaps to be termed the founder of the romantic school rather than Weber, since his ‘Faust’ was produced in 1818, and ‘Der Freischuetz’ did not appear until 1821.  But the question seems to turn not so much upon whether Spohr or Weber were first in the field, as whether Spohr is actually a romantic composer at all.  If the subjects which he treated were all that need be taken into account, the matter could easily be decided.  No composer ever dealt more freely in the supernatural than Spohr.  His operas are peopled with elves, ghosts, and goblins.  Ruined castles, midnight assassins, and distressed damsels greet us on every page.  But if we go somewhat deeper, we find that the real qualities of romanticism are strangely absent from his music.  His form differs little from that of his classical predecessors, and his orchestration is curiously arid and unsuggestive; in a word, the breath of imagination rarely animates his pages.  Yet the workmanship of his operas is so admirable, and his vein of melody is so delicate and refined, that it is difficult to help thinking that Spohr has been unjustly neglected.  His ‘Faust,’ which has nothing to do with Goethe’s drama, was popular in England fifty years ago; and ‘Jessonda,’ which contains the best of his music, is still occasionally performed in Germany.  The rest of his works, with the exception of a few scattered airs, such as ‘Rose softly blooming,’ from ‘Zemire und Azor,’ seem to be completely forgotten.

Heinrich Marschner (1796-1861), though not a pupil of Weber, was strongly influenced by his music, and carried on the traditions of the romantic school worthily and well.  He was a man of vivid imagination, and revelled in uncanny legends of the supernatural.  His works are performed with tolerable frequency in Germany, and still please by reason of their inexhaustible flow of melody and their brilliant and elaborate orchestration.  ‘Hans Heiling,’ his masterpiece, is founded upon a sombre old legend of the Erzgebirge.  The king of the gnomes has seen and loved a Saxon maiden, Anna by name, and to win her heart he leaves his palace in the bowels of the earth and masquerades as a village schoolmaster under the name of Hans Heiling.  Anna is flattered by his attentions, and promises to be his wife; but she soon tires of her gloomy lover, and ends by openly admitting her preference for the hunter Conrad.  Her resolution to break with Hans is confirmed by an apparition of the queen of the gnomes, Hans Heiling’s mother, surrounded by her attendant sprites, who warns her under fearful