Thus it came about that he had the opportunity of busying himself with the work of a member, now grown to man’s estate, of the very family with whom he had spent such pleasant days in his youth.  He greeted me at once as a child of the house, and we two homeless creatures found in our memories of this long-lost home the first common basis to our friendship.  We generally spent our evenings with old Fischer at Heine’s, where, amid hopeful conversation, we regaled ourselves on potatoes and herrings, of which the meal chiefly consisted.  Schroder-Devrient was away on a holiday; Tichatschek, who was also on the point of going away, I had just time to see, and with him I went quickly through a part of his role in Rienzi.  His brisk and lively nature, his glorious voice and great musical talent, gave special weight to his encouraging assurance that he delighted in the role of Rienzi.  Heine also told me that the mere prospect of having many new costumes, and especially new silver armour, had inspired Tichatschek with the liveliest desire to play this part, so that I might rely on him under any circumstances.  Thus I could at once give closer attention to the preparations for practice, which was fixed to begin in the late summer, after the principal singers had returned from their holiday.

I had to make special efforts to pacify my friend Fischer by my readiness to abbreviate the score, which was excessively lengthy.  His intentions in the matter were so honest that I gladly sat down with him to the wearisome task.  I played and sang my score to the astonished man on an old grand piano in the rehearsing-room of the Court Theatre, with such frantic vigour that, although he did not mind if the instrument came to grief, he grew concerned about my chest.  Finally, amid hearty laughter, he ceased to argue about cutting down passages, as precisely where he thought something might be omitted I proved to him with headlong eloquence that it was precisely here that the main point lay.  He plunged with me head over heels into the vast chaos of sound, against which he could raise no objection, beyond the testimony of his watch, whose correctness I also ended by disputing.  As sops I light-heartedly flung him the big pantomime and most of the ballet in the second act, whereby I reckoned we might save a whole half-hour.  Thus, thank goodness, the whole monster was at last handed over to the clerks to make a fair copy of, and the rest was left for time to accomplish.

We next discussed what we should do in the summer, and I decided upon a stay of several months at Toplitz, the scene of my first youthful flights, whose fine air and baths, I hoped, would also benefit Minna’s health.  But before we could carry out this intention I had to pay several more visits to Leipzig to settle the fate of my Dutchman.  On 5th May I proceeded thither to have an interview with Kustner, the new director of the Berlin Opera, who I had been told had just arrived there.  He was now placed in