Prager also took me to see his friend Sainton, the leader of the London orchestra.  After giving me a very hearty reception he told me the remarkable history of my invitation to London.  Sainton, a southern Frenchman from Toulouse, of naive and fiery temperament, was living with a full-blooded German musician from Hamburg, named Luders, the son of a bandsman, of a brusque but friendly disposition.  I was much affected when I heard, later on, of the incident which had made these two men inseparable friends.  Sainton had been making a concert tour by way of St. Petersburg, and found himself stranded at Helsingfors in Finland, unable to get any further, pursued as he was by the demon of ill-luck.  At this moment the curious figure of the modest Hamburg bandsman’s son had accosted him on the staircase of the hotel, asking whether he would be inclined to accept his offer of friendship and take half of his available cash, as he (Luders) had of course noticed the awkwardness of the other’s position.  From that moment the two became inseparable friends, made concert tours in Sweden and Denmark, found their way back in the strangest fashion to Havre, Paris, and Toulouse, by way of Hamburg, and finally settled down in London—­Sainton to take an important post in the orchestra, while Luders got along as best he could by the drudgery of giving lessons.  Now I found them living together in a pretty house like a married couple, each tenderly concerned for his friend’s welfare.  Luders had read my essays on art, and my Oper und Drama in particular moved him to exclaim, ’Donnerwetter, there’s something in that!’ Sainton pricked up his ears at this, and when the conductor of the Philharmonic concerts (the great Mr. Costa himself), for some unknown reason, quarrelled with the society before the season began and refused to conduct their concerts any longer, Sainton, to whom Mr. Anderson, the treasurer, had gone for advice in this awkward predicament, recommended them, at Luders’ instigation, to engage me.  I now heard that they had not acted upon this suggestion at once.  Only when Sainton happened to remark casually that he had seen me conduct in Dresden did Mr. Anderson decide to make the journey to Zurich to see me (in the fur coat lent by Sainton for the purpose), as a result of which visit I was now here.  I soon discovered, too, that Sainton had in this case acted with the rashness characteristic of his nation.  It had never occurred to Costa that he would be taken seriously in his statement to the Philharmonic Society, and he was thoroughly disgusted at my appointment.  As he was at the head of the same orchestra which was at my disposal for the Philharmonic concerts, he was able to foster an attitude of hostility to the undertakings for which I was responsible, and even my friend Sainton had to suffer from his animosity without actually realising the source of the annoyance.