Who could have foretold that, seven years later, thanks to the unflagging faith of the royal friend, we should see it rise up, triumphant, upon the hill at Bayreuth?
XII
Richard Wagner, while in Munich, had been for a long time the neighbour of Count Friedrich von Schack, and there was a warm friendship between them. I was commissioned to remind Richter not to forget to invite the Count to the dress rehearsal of the Rheingold, and I had promised, also, to pay a visit to his famous collection of paintings.
WAGNER'S THEATRE AT BAYREUTH.
This Count von Schack was a writer of some celebrity—his "History of Literature and Dramatic Art in Spain" Wagner esteemed very highly; he knew Arabic, Persian, Sanscrit, and had translated, among others, the "Book of the Kings" of Ferdousi. At one time the Master contemplated a musical drama founded upon one of the episodes of this work; he was also tempted by a legend contained in "The Voices of the Ganges," a collection also translated by Schack.