the ascent of the Klausen Pass to the Schachen valley, which we had planned for the following day, and induced him to take the easier way home via Fluelen.  When, early in August, my young friend, who was always calm and very deliberate in his manner, set out on his return journey to Dresden, I could detect no signs of exhaustion about him.  He was hoping on his arrival to lighten the heavy burden of life a little by undertaking the conductorship of the entr’acte music at the theatre, which he proposed to organise artistically, and thus set himself free from the oppressive and demoralising service of the opera.  It was with sincere grief that I accompanied him to the mail-coach, and he too seemed to be seized with sudden foreboding.  As a matter of fact, this was the last time we ever met.

But for the present we carried on an active correspondence, and as his communications were always pleasant and entertaining, and for a long time constituted almost my sole link with the outside world, I begged him to write me long letters as often as possible.  As postage was expensive at that time, and voluminous letters touched our pockets severely, Uhlig conceived the ingenious idea of using the parcel post for our correspondence.  As only packets of a certain weight might be sent in this way, a German translation of Beaumarchais’ Figaro, of which Uhlig possessed an ancient copy, enjoyed the singular destiny of acting as ballast for our letters to and fro.  Every time, therefore, that our epistles had swelled, to the requisite length, we announced them with the words:  ‘Figaro brings tidings to-day.’

Uhlig meanwhile found much pleasure in the Mittheilung an meine Freunde (’A Communication to my Friends’), which, immediately after our separation, I wrote as a preface to an edition of my three operas, the Fliegender Hollander, Tannhauser, and Lohengrin.  He was also amused to hear that Hartel, who had accepted the book for publication on payment of ten louis d’or, protested so vigorously against certain passages in this preface, which wounded his orthodoxy and political feelings, that I thought seriously of giving the book to another firm.  However, he finally persuaded me to give way, and I pacified his tender conscience by a few trifling alterations.

With this comprehensive preface, which had occupied me during the whole of the month of August, I hoped that my excursion into the realms of literature would be ended once and for all.  However, as soon as I began to think seriously about taking up the composition of Junger Siegfried, which I had promised for Weimar, I was seized with depressing doubts which almost amounted to a positive reluctance to attempt this work.  As I could not clearly discern the reason of this dejection, I concluded that its source lay in the state of my health, so I determined one day to carry out my theories about the advantages of a water cure, which I had always propounded with great enthusiasm.  I made due inquiries about a neighbouring hydropathic establishment, and informed my wife that I was going off to Albisbrunnen, which was situated about three miles from our abode.  It was then about the middle of September, and I had made up my mind not to come back until I was completely restored to health.