the representation in order to conduct it himself, which he would not have done if it had been found necessary to cancel the performance on account of my incompetence.  In this wretched position, vexed in mind, exposed to the severe climate, which even on summer evenings struck me as horribly cold, and occupied merely in warding off the most painful troubles of life, my time, as far as any professional advancement was concerned, was completely lost.  At last, on our return to Konigsberg, and particularly under the guardianship of Moller, the question as to what was to be done was more earnestly considered.  Finally, Minna and I were offered a fairly good engagement in Danzig, through the influence of my brother-in-law Wolfram and his wife, who had gone there.

Moller seized this opportunity to induce the director Hubsch, who was anxious not to lose Minna, to sign a contract including us both, and by which it was understood that under any circumstances I should be officially appointed as conductor at his theatre from the following Easter.  Moreover, for our wedding, a benefit performance was promised, for which we chose Die Stumme von Portici, to be conducted by me in person.  For, as Moller remarked, it was absolutely necessary for us to get married, and to have a due celebration of the event; there was no getting out of it.  Minna made no objection, and all my past endeavours and resolutions seemed to prove that my one desire was to take anchor in the haven of matrimony.  In spite of this, however, a strange conflict was going on within me at this time.  I had become sufficiently intimate with Minna’s life and character to realise the wide difference between our two natures as fully as the important step I was about to take necessitated; but my powers of judgment were not yet sufficiently matured.

My future wife was the child of poor parents, natives of Oederan in the Erzgebirge in Saxony.  Her father was no ordinary man; he possessed enormous vitality, but in his old age showed traces of some feebleness of mind.  In his young days he had been a trumpeter in Saxony, and in this capacity had taken part in a campaign against the French, and had also been present at the battle of Wagram.  He afterwards became a mechanic, and took up the trade of manufacturing cards for carding wool, and as he invented an improvement in the process of their production, he is said to have made a very good business of it for some time.  A rich manufacturer of Chemnitz once gave him a large order to be delivered at the end of the year:  the children, whose pliable fingers had already proved serviceable in this respect, had to work hard day and night, and in return the father promised them an exceptionally happy Christmas, as he expected to get a large sum of money.  When the longed-for time arrived, however, he received the announcement of his client’s bankruptcy.  The goods that had already been delivered were lost, and the material that remained on his hands there was no prospect of