These verses are worked into a large number of the ballads, and
since they are Schreiber's own material, his saga must have had
great general influence.
[79] There would be no point in listing all of the books on the legends of the Rhine that treat the story of the Lorelei. Three, however, are important, since it is interesting to see how their compilers were not satisfied with one version of the story, but included, as becomes evident on reading them, the versions of Brentano, Schreiber, Loeben, and Heine: Der Rhein: Geschichten und Sagen, by W. O. von Horn, Stuttgart, 1866, pp. 207-11; Legends of the Rhine, by H. A. Guerber, New York, 1907, pp: 199-206; Eine Sammlung von Rhein-Sagen, by A. Hermann Bernard, Wiesbaden, no year, pp. 225-37.
[80] Mrs. Caroline M. Sawyer wrote a poem entitled "The Lady of Lorlei. A Legend of the Rhine." It is published in The female Poets of America, by Rufus Wilmot Griswold, New York, 1873, p. 221. This is not the first edition of this work, nor is it the original edition of Mrs. Sawyer's ballad. It is an excellent poem. Fr. Hoebel set it to music, and Adolf Strodtmann translated it into German, because of its excellence, and included it in his Amerikanische Anthologie. It was impossible to determine just when Mrs. Sawyer wrote her poem. The writer is deeply indebted to Professor W. B. Cairns, of the department of English in the University of Wisconsin, who located the poem for him.
[81] Cf. Otto Ludwigs gesammelte Schriften, edited by Adolf Stern, Leipzig, 1801, I. 69, 107, 114.
[82] It has been impossible to determine just when Sucher (1789-1860) set Heine's ballad to music, but since he was professor of music at the University of Tübingen from 1817 on, and since he became interested in music while quite young, it is safe to assume that he wrote his music for "Die Lorelei" soon after its publication. The question is of some importance by way of finding out just when the ballad began to be popular. Strangely enough, there is nothing on Silcher in Hobert Eitner's compendious Quellen-Lexicon der Musiker und Musikgelehrten der christlichen Zeitrechnung, Leipzig, 1900-1904. Heine's ballad is included in the Allgemeines deutsches Commersbuch unter musikalischer Redaktion von Fr. Silcher und Fr. Erck, Strassburg, 1858 (17th ed.), but the date of composition is not given.
[83] In Pauls Grundriss der germanischen Philologie, I, 1039, Mogk says: "Die Weiblichen Nixen bezaubern durch ihren Gesang, die Loreley und ähnliche Sagen mögen hierin ihre Wurzel haben." The only trouble is, no one has thus far unearthed this saga.
[84] Wilhelm Hertz gives (pp.229-30) instances of this so that uncertainty as to its accuracy is removed. The passages are striking in that they concern the "Lorberg" and the "Lorleberg."
[85] In chap, XV Eichendorff introduces the ballad as follows: "Leontin, der wenig darauf achtgab, begann folgendes Lied über ein am Rheine bekanntes Märchen." The reference can be only to Brentano, despite the fact that the first two lines are so strongly reminiscent of Goethe's "Erlkonig." Eichendorff and Brentano became acquainted in Heidelberg and then in Berlin they were intimate. There is every reason to believe that Eichendorff knew Bretano's "Rheinmärchen" in manuscript form. For the relation of the two, see the Kosch edition of Eichendorff's works. Briefe and Tagebücher, Vols. XI-XIII.
[86] Niklas Vogt included, to be sure, in his Jugendphantasien üher die Sagen des Rheins (ca. 1811) an amplified recapitulation in prose of Brentano's ballad. Schreiber knew this work, for in his Handbuch there is a bibliography of no fewer than ten pages of "Schriften, welche auf die Rheingegend Bezug haben." So far as one can determine such a matter from mere titles, the only one of these that could have helped him in the composition of his Lorelei-saga is: Rheinische Geschichten und Sagen, von Niklas Vogt. Frankfurt am Main, 1817, 6 Bände.
[87] Eduard Thorn says (p. 89): "Man darf annehmen, dass Heine die Ballade Brentano's kennen gelernt hat, dass er aus ihr den Namen entlehnte, wobei ihm Eichendorff die Fassung 'Lorelei' lieferte, und das ihm erst Loebens Auffassung der Sage zur Gestaltung verhelfen hat." It sounds like a case of ceterum censeo, but Thorn's argument as to Brentano and Heine is so thin that this statement too can be looked upon only as a weakly supported hypothesis.