The theatrical season was now over, our company on the point of dissolution, and I myself free from my appointment.  But meanwhile the unhappy director of our theatre had passed from a state of chronic to one of acute bankruptcy.  He paid with paper money, that is to say, with whole sheets of box-tickets for performances which he guaranteed should take place.  By dint of great craft Minna managed to extract some profit even from these singular treasury-bonds.  She was living at this time most frugally and economically.  Moreover, as the dramatic company still continued its efforts on behalf of its members—­only the opera troupe having been dissolved—­she remained at the theatre.  Thus, when I started out on my compulsory return to Leipzig, she saw me off with hearty good-wishes for our speedy reunion, promising to spend the next holidays in visiting her parents in Dresden, on which occasion she hoped also to look me up in Leipzig.

Thus it came about that early in May I once more went home to my own folk, in order that after this abortive first attempt at civic independence, I might finally lift the load of debt with which my efforts in Magdeburg had burdened me.  An intelligent brown poodle faithfully accompanied me, and was entrusted to my family for food and entertainment as the only visible property I had acquired.  Nevertheless, my mother and Rosalie succeeded in founding good hopes for my future career upon the bare fact of my being able to conduct an orchestra.  To me, on the other hand, the thought of returning once more to my former life with my family was very discomfiting.  My relation to Minna in particular spurred me on to resume my interrupted career as speedily as possible.  The great change which had come over me in this respect was more apparent than ever when Minna spent a few days with me in Leipzig on her way home.  Her familiar and genial presence proclaimed that my days of parental dependence were past and gone.  We discussed the renewal of my Magdeburg engagement, and I promised her an early visit in Dresden.  I obtained permission from my mother and sister to invite her one evening to tea, and in this way I introduced her to my family.  Rosalie saw at once how matters stood with me, but made no further use of the discovery than to tease me about being in love.  To her the affair did not appear dangerous; but to me things wore a very different aspect, for this love-lorn attachment was entirely in keeping with my independent spirit, and my ambition to win myself a place in the world of art.

My distaste for Leipzig itself was furthermore strengthened by a change which occurred there at this time in the realm of music.  At the very time that I, in Magdeburg, was attempting to make my reputation as a musical conductor by thoughtless submission to the frivolous taste of the day, Mendelssohn-Bartholdy was conducting the Gewandhaus concerts, and inaugurating a momentous epoch for himself and the musical taste of Leipzig.