Volume II Part 10 (1/2)

The wound was notalars ”Oh, those cigars!” We find hi He had risen early to write, ”theardently with his mother to let hi her son's future to Wieck, who, knowing Schumann's attainht and a and the law He went to Mainz on a stealish men and women, and he writes his irl” He did not knoas awaiting him in the hoer, almost as a son

Here he worked like a fiend at his theory and practice He suffered from occasional attacks of the loo intervals But when he threw off the spell, he was hiain, and could write to his mother of still new a in love the day before yesterday The Gods grant that my ideal may have a fortune of 50,000”

In 1830 he flirted with the beautiful Anita Abegg; her naested to him a theme for his Opus I, published in 1831, and based upon the notes A-B-E-G-G He apologised to his fa his first work to theh It is published with an inscription to ”Pauline, Couise which puzzled his family, until he explained that he hi

It o years before he confessed another flirtation In 1833, he went to Frankfort to hear Paganini, and there it was a case of ”pretty girl at the -bush--staring ne”

The next year he was torn between two adhter of the Ger,--her name was Ehly English girl, with black sparkling eyes, black hair, and firnity, and life”

The other was Ernestine von Fricken, daughter--by adoption, though this he did not know--of a rich Bohehtfully pure, child-like htful, deeply attached toartistic, and uncoht wish to have for a wife; and I hisper it in your ear, ood mother, if the Future were to ask ly, 'This one,' But that is all in the dim distance; and even now I renounce the prospect of a h, I dare say, I should find it easy enough”

Ernestine, like Robert, was a pupil and boarder at the home of the Wiecks She and Robert had acted as Godparents to one of Wieck's children, possibly Clara's half-sister, Marie, also in later years a prorew more serious In 1834 he wrote a letter of somewhat formal and timid devotion to her A little later, with fine diplomacy, he also wrote a fatherly letter to her supposed father, praising some of the baron's co, as a _coup de grace_, the state some variations on a theme of the baron's own

The saed He was deeply, joyously fond of her, and he poured out his soul to her friend, as also a distinguished t To her he wrote of Ernestine:

”Ernestine has written to ht She has sounded her father by ives her to me! do you understand that? And yet I ah I feared to accept this jewel, lest it should be in unworthy hands If you ask rief I cannot do it

I think it is grief itself; but alas, itfor Ernestine I really cannot stand it any longer, so I have written to her to arrange a hly happy, then think of two souls who have placed all that is , and whose future happiness is inseparably bound up with your own”

This Madae of thirty-one, once said that on a beautiful su variousthe oars, had sat side by side in complete silence--that deathlike silence which so often enveloped Schumann even in the circles of his friends at the taverns

When they returned after a mute hour, Schumann pressed her hand and exclaimed, ”Today we have understood each other perfectly”

It was under Ernestine's inspiration, which Schumann called ”a perfect Godsend,” that he fashi+oned the various jewels thatfor his theme the name of Ernestine's birthplace, ”Asch,” which he could spell in music in tays: A-ES-C-H, or AS-C-H, for ES is the German name for E flat, while AS is our A flat and H our B natural He was also pleased to note that the letters S-C-H-A were in his own na betrothed was going on in the home of Wieck, there was another member of the same household, another pupil of the saht froreat-hearted, greatly suffering little girl of fifteen was learning, for the first ti thethe most cultured audiences by the ue,--an unheard-of hter kept together, ”This e of twelve, she played with absolute mastery the most difficult music ever written

But her public triu at hoirl over the youth she loved Can't you see her now in her lonely roogios, while the tears gather in her eyes and fall upon her hands?

Four years later she could write to Schumann:

”I must tell you what a silly child I was then When Ernestine came to us I said, 'Just wait till you learn to know Schumann, he is my favorite of all my acquaintances,' But she did not care to know you, since she said she knew a gentleman in Asch, who before she began to like you better and it soon went so far that every tilad to do this since I was pleased that she liked you

But you talked ood deal; but I consoledit was only natural since you ith rown-up than I Still queer feelings filledit was, and so war you talked to Ernestine and poked fun at me Father shi+pped rew hopeful, and I said to myself, 'How pretty it would be if he were only your husband,'”

From Dresden, Clara wrote to ”Lieber Herr Schu hiht into day; to let your girl friends know that you think of them; to compose industriously, and to write more in your paper, since the readers wish it”

Schuh to persuade a child of her years that he loved her ht he was interested only in the marvellous child-artist He found in the ate his high opinion of her It is needless to say that the praises he lavished in print, would be no more cordial than those he bestowed on her in the privacy of the hohter to old Wieck, as also greatly interested in the critical ideals of Schuanisation and conducting of the _Neue Zeitschrift fur Musik_ This, Schumann an that ever existed for art; and in the editing of it he approved himself to posterity as a ood froenius without fear, or without waiting for death to close the lifelong catalogue or to serve as a guide for an estimate For soreat cause, till gradually his fears for the career of the jealously guarded Clara caused a widening rift between the old

Clara was to Schu sister, for whoanini, and Chopin, and for whom he cherished an affectionate concern Yet as early as 1832, when she was only thirteen, and he twenty-two, he could write to his ”Dear honoured Clara,” ”I often think of you, not as a brother of his sister, orof a distant shrine” He began to dedicate compositions to her, and he took her opinion seriously His Opus 5, written in 1833, was based on a the of ”reverence for her genius rather than of love”

He began also to publishher ”the wonder-child,” and ”the first German artist,” one who ”already stands on the topenius In a letter to Wieck, in 1833, he says, ”It is easy to write to you, but I do not feel equal to write to Clara” She was still, however, the child to hihost-stories, especially of his ”Doppelganger,” a name, Clara afterwards took to herself Child as she was, he watched her with so of fascination, and wrote his mother:

”Clara is as fond of me as ever, and is just as she used to be of old, wild and enthusiastic, skipping and running about like a child, and saying the s It is a pleasure to see how her gifts offaster and faster, and, as it were, leaf by leaf The other day, as alking back froo for a two or three hours' tramp almost every day), I heard her say to herself: 'Oh, how happy I am! how happy!' Who would not love to hear that? On this sa about in the , I often look ently pulls ; ory of womanly devotion is here!

Gradually Schumann let himself write to Clara a whit ly yours” He begged her to keepa composition she had dedicated to him, he hinted: