For further and quite unexpected fruits of my success now appeared with astonishing rapidity, though not so much in the form of material profit, which for the present resolved itself into nine hundred marks, paid me by the General Board as an exceptional fee instead of the usual twenty golden louis.  Nor did I dare to cherish the hope of selling my work advantageously to a publisher, until it had been performed in some other important towns.  But fate willed it, that by the sudden death of Rastrelli, royal director of music, which occurred shortly after the first production of Rienzi, an office should unexpectedly become vacant, for the filling of which all eyes at once turned to me.

While the negotiations over this matter were slowly proceeding, the General Board gave proof in another direction of an almost passionate interest in my talents.  They insisted that the first performance of the Fliegender Hollander should on no account be conceded to the Berlin opera, but reserved as an honour for Dresden.  As the Berlin authorities raised no obstacle, I very gladly handed over my latest work also to the Dresden theatre.  If in this I had to dispense with Tichatschek’s assistance, as there was no leading tenor part in the play, I could count all the more surely on the helpful co-operation of Schroder-Devrient, to whom a worthier task was assigned in the leading female part than that which she had had in Rienzi.  I was glad to be able thus to rely entirely upon her, as she had grown strangely out of humour with me, owing to her scanty share in the success of Rienzi.  The completeness of my faith in her I proved with an exaggeration by no means advantageous to my own work, by simply forcing the leading male part on Wachter, a once capable, but now somewhat delicate baritone.  He was in every respect wholly unsuited to the task, and only accepted it with unfeigned hesitation.  On submitting my play to my adored prima donna, I was much relieved to find that its poetry made a special appeal to her.  Thanks to the genuine personal interest awakened in me under very peculiar circumstances by the character and fate of this exceptional woman, our study of the part of Senta, which often brought us into close contact, became one of the most thrilling and momentously instructive periods of my life.

It is true that the great actress, especially when under the influence of her famous mother, Sophie Schroder, who was just then with her on a visit, showed undisguised vexation at my having composed so brilliant a work as Rienzi for Dresden without having specifically reserved the principal part for her.  Yet the magnanimity of her disposition triumphed even over this selfish impulse:  she loudly proclaimed me ‘a genius,’ and honoured me with that special confidence which, she said, none but a genius should enjoy.  But when she invited me to become both the accomplice and adviser in her really dreadful love affairs, this confidence certainly began to have its risky side; nevertheless there were at first occasions on which she openly proclaimed herself before all the world as my friend, making most flattering distinctions in my favour.