On the following morning (Monday, 8th May) I tried again to get information as to the state of affairs by forcing my way to the Town Hall from my house, which was cut off from the place of action.  As in the course of my journey I was making my way over a barricade near St. Ann’s Church, one of the Communal Guard shouted out to me, ’Hullo, conductor, your der Freude schoner Gotterfunken [Footnote:  These words refer to the opening of the Ninth Symphony chorus:  ’Freude, Freude, Freude, schoner gotterfunken Tochter aus Elysium’—­(Praise her, praise oh praise Joy, the god-descended daughter of Elysium.) English version by Natalia Macfarren.—­Editor.] has indeed set fire to things.  The rotten building is rased to the ground.’  Obviously the man was an enthusiastic member of the audience at my last performance of the Ninth Symphony.  Coming upon me so unexpectedly, this pathetic greeting filled me with a curious sense of strength and freedom.  A little further on, in a lonely alley in the suburb of Plauen, I fell in with the musician Hiebendahl, the first oboist in the royal orchestra, and a man who still enjoyed a very high reputation; he was in the uniform of the Communal Guards, but carried no gun, and was chatting with a citizen in a similar costume.  As soon as he saw me, he felt he must immediately make an appeal to me to use my influence against Rockel, who, accompanied by ordnance officers of the revolutionary party, was instituting a search for guns in this quarter.  As soon as he realised that I was making sympathetic inquiries about Rockel, he drew back frightened, and said to me in tones of the deepest anxiety:  ’But, conductor, have you no thought for your position, and what you may lose by exposing yourself in this fashion?’ This remark had the most drastic effect upon me; I burst into a loud laugh, and told him that my position was not worth a thought one way or the other.  This indeed was the expression of my real feelings, which had long been suppressed, and now broke out into almost jubilant utterance.  At that moment I caught sight of Rockel, with two men of the citizen army who were carrying some guns, making his way towards me.  He gave me a most friendly greeting, but turned at once to Hiebendahl and his companion and asked him why he was idling about here in uniform instead of being at his post.  When Hiebendahl made the excuse that his gun had been requisitioned, Rockel cried out to him, ’You’re a fine lot of fellows!’ and went away laughing.  He gave me a brief account as we proceeded of what had happened to him since I had lost sight of him, and thus spared me the obligation of giving him a report of his Volksblatt.  We were interrupted by an imposing troop of well-armed young students of the gymnasium who had just entered the city and wished to have a safe conduct to their place of muster.  The sight of these serried ranks of youthful figures, numbering several hundreds, who were stepping bravely to their duty, did not fail