penalties to forswear the love of an immortal.  Hans Heiling is furious at the perfidy of Anna, and vows terrible vengeance upon her and Conrad, which he is about to put into execution with the aid of his gnomes.  At the last moment, however, his mother appears, and persuades him to relinquish all hopes of earthly love and to return with her to their subterranean home.  There is much in this strange story which suggests the legend of the Flying Dutchman, and, bearing in mind the admiration which in his early days Wagner felt for the works of Marschner, it is interesting to trace in ‘Hans Heiling’ the source of much that is familiar to us in the score of ‘Der Fliegende Hollaender.’  Of Marschner’s other operas, the most familiar are ‘Templer und Juedin,’ founded upon Sir Walter Scott’s ‘Ivanhoe,’ a fine work, suffering from a confused and disconnected libretto; and ‘Der Vampyr,’ a tale of unmitigated gloom and horror.

Weber and Marschner show the German romantic school at its best; for the lesser men, such as Hoffmann and Lindpaintner, did little but reproduce the salient features of their predecessors more or less faithfully.  The romantic school is principally associated with the sombre dramas, in which the taste of that time delighted; but there was another side to the movement which must not be neglected.  The Singspiel, established by Hiller and perfected by Mozart, had languished during the early years of the century, or rather had fallen into the hands of composers who were entirely unable to do justice to its possibilities.  The romantic movement touched it into new life, and a school arose which contrived by dint of graceful melody and ingenious orchestral device to invest with real musical interest the simple stories in which the German middle-class delights.  The most successful of these composers were Kreutzer and Lortzing.

Conradin Kreutzer (1782-1849) was a prolific composer, but the only one of his operas which can honestly be said to have survived to our times is ‘Das Nachtlager von Granada.’  This tells the tale of an adventure which befell the Prince Regent of Spain.  While hunting in the mountains he falls in with Gabriela, a pretty peasant maiden who is in deep distress.  She confides to him that her affairs of the heart have gone awry.  Her lover, Gomez the shepherd, is too poor to marry, and her father wishes her to accept the Croesus of the village, a man whom she detests.  The handsome huntsman—­for such she supposes him to be—­promises to intercede for her with his patron the Prince, and when her friends and relations, a band of arrant smugglers and thieves, appear, he tries to buy their consent to her union with Gomez by means of a gold chain which he happens to be wearing.  The sight of so much wealth arouses the cupidity of the knaves, and they at once brew a plot to murder the huntsman in his sleep.  Luckily Gabriela overhears their scheming, and puts the Prince upon his guard.  The assassins find him prepared for their assault, and ready to