Shortly afterwards Hiller was present at a performance of Rienzi, which was again given before a crowded and enthusiastic house.  When, at the end of the second act, and after frantic recalls from the audience, I left the orchestra in a great state of excitement, Hiller, who was waiting for me in the passage, took the opportunity of adding to his very hasty congratulations, ’Do give my Traum once more!’ I promised him laughingly to do this if I had the chance, but I cannot remember whether it came off or not.  While he was waiting for the creation of an entirely new plot for his next opera, Hiller devoted himself to the study of chamber music, to which his large and well-furnished room lent itself most admirably.

A beautiful and solemn event added to the seriousness of the mood in which I finished the music to Tannhauser towards the end of the year, and neutralised the more superficial impressions made upon me by the stirring events above described.  This was the removal of the remains of Carl Maria von Weber from London to Dresden in December, 1844.  As I have already said, a committee had for years been agitating for this removal.  From information given by a certain traveller, it had become known that the insignificant coffin which contained Weber’s ashes had been disposed of in such a careless way in a remote corner of St. Paul’s, that it was feared it might soon become impossible to identify it.

My energetic friend, Professor Lowe, whom I have already mentioned, had availed himself of this information in order to urge the Dresden Glee Club, which constituted his hobby, to take the matter in hand.  The concert of male singers arranged to this end had been a fair success financially, and they now wanted to induce the theatre management to make similar efforts, when suddenly they met with serious opposition from this very quarter.  The management of the Dresden theatre told the committee that the King had religious scruples with regard to disturbing the peace of the dead.  However much we felt inclined to doubt the genuineness of these reasons, nothing could be done, and I was next approached on the subject, in the hope that my influential position might lend weight to my appeal.  I entered into the spirit of the enterprise with great fervour.  I consented to be made president; Herr Hofrat Schulz, director of the ’Antiken-Cabinet,’ who was a well-known authority on artistic matters, and another gentleman, a Christian banker, were also elected members of the committee, and the movement thus received fresh life.  Prospectuses were sent round, exhaustive plans were made, and numerous meetings held.  Here, again, I met with opposition on the part of my chief, Luttichau; if he could have done so, he would have forbidden me to move in the matter by making the most of the King’s scruples referred to above.  But he had had a warning not to pick a quarrel with me after his experience in the summer, when, contrary to his expectations, the music written