Yet scientific writings interested me as much as elegant literature, perhaps even more. I read works on ethnography, chemistry, astronomy; but my favorite branch was philosophy. Kant, Schopenhauer, Hartmann (“The Philosophy of the Unconscious”), Strauss, Feuerbach, Pascal, Comte, Littré, Victor Cousin, Jules Janet, Alfred Fouillée,—the three last named in the Revue des deux mondes, which I regularly read from the first page to the last,—these and many others, all of whose names I cannot here enumerate, were my intellectual comrades, in whose company I led a happy double existence quite apart from my personal doings, and in this my soul expanded most comfortably.
The period of iconoclasm had not then arrived, with immense zeal to throw discredit on the works of the earlier poets, and one could rejoice with undiminished pride in the lofty circle. In science, on the other hand, the really noblest of all—I mean natural science—had not as yet attained to the height, the influence, and the revolutionary effect on intellects which it has since won through the theory of evolution. Its application to spiritual and social phenomena was still unknown to me. I knew nothing then of social philosophy and sociology. To be sure, Darwin had already published his “Origin of Species”; the economic problems had already been propounded in the works of Lassalle and Engels; Buckle had already brought out his “Introduction to the History of Civilization”; the battle over Büchner’s “Force and Matter” was already on; Herbert Spencer’s principal works were already issued; yet thus far nothing of all this had reached me. I received with avidity whatever books told me of nature and human society as things existent, but I did not conceive them as things nascent; and, above all, I lacked the idea that social conditions are destined to become different and that man with his eyes open can militantly coöperate toward this evolution.
When the Franco-German War was ended we chanced to be sojourning in Berlin. My studies had brought me to the Prussian capital, for the reason that I desired to make some experiment also in the German method of singing. From an Unter den Linden balcony I saw the entrance of the victorious troops returning from France. The picture remains in my memory full of sunshine, enthusiasm, fluttering banners, scattered flowers, triumphal arches,—a lofty, historic festival of joy. How different would my impression of it be at the present time—but the history of this change will come much later.
XIV
PRINCE WITTGENSTEIN
Duet practice and betrothal · Art journey and—end · Letters from Castle Wittgenstein
Now follows another episode from the days of my youth,—again an engagement romance. When I say “days of my youth,” that is relative; for the romance ran its course during the summer of 1872, when I was already twenty-nine years old, and this age is not called “young” in a girl.
It was in Wiesbaden. A young man—Adolf, Prince Sayn-Wittgenstein-Hohenstein was his name—sought our acquaintance. It appeared that he was favored by nature with a phenomenal tenor voice and was passionately devoted to singing. This naturally formed a basis of acquaintance, and later of attraction. He had once heard me as I was singing by an open window, and this had induced him to make my acquaintance. We asked him to call and bring his music. He willingly acceded to this request. I was astonished that the pieces which he brought were not only songs, but also and for the most part opera airs, and he was no less astonished to find that I too had a supply of scores. The first thing that he sang for us was the aria from Faust,—“O dimora casta e pura.” I accompanied him on the piano. When he had finished the aria—he had sung it wonderfully—I opened my score of Faust and began to sing the soprano part of the duet; he immediately joined in, and we sang the duet through like two regular opera artists.
“Have you been preparing for the stage, Countess?” he asked in amazement.
“I might ask you the same question, Prince.”
The question remained this first time unanswered. We had each found such pleasure in this assured and accurate part-singing that we arranged to have music together assiduously. He now came to our house every day, and the duet from Faust was followed by the duet from Roméo et Juliette and then by the duet between Raoul and Valentine.
Soon the young man confided to us that he had indeed the intention of devoting himself to the art. Within a month he proposed to start for America, and there, under an assumed name, to appear in concerts or perhaps on the stage. It had been a difficult matter to extort permission from his parents, but his passion for singing was so overmastering that he would have been willing to renounce everything in order to make his beloved art his profession. He also had hopes of winning great pecuniary rewards. Being a younger brother of the heir of entail, he had no expectation of inheriting wealth, while in America first-class tenors always reaped an abundant harvest of dollars.