confidential conversations, which continued to the end, he always
carefully refrained from touching on the possibility of my going
away or remaining. In fact, he declared that Holtei had
distinctly told him he would on no account re-engage me, as I
could not get on with the singers. He added that after this one
could not take it amiss if he, who had been inspired with fresh
enthusiasm for the theatre by the success of his Schoffe von
Paris, had seized and turned to his own advantage the chance
offered to him. Moreover, he had gathered from my confidential
communications that I was very awkwardly situated, and that,
owing to my small salary having been cut down by Holtei from the
very beginning, I was in a very precarious position on account of
the demands of my creditors in Konigsberg and Magdeburg. It
appeared that these people had employed against me a lawyer, who
was a friend of Dorn's, and that, consequently, he had come to
the conclusion that I would not be able to remain in Riga.
Therefore, even as my friend, he had felt his conscience quite
clear in accepting Holtei's proposal.

In order not to leave him in the complacent enjoyment of this
self-deception, I put it clearly before him that he could not be
ignorant of the fact that a higher salary had been promised to me
for the third year of my contract; and that, by the establishment
of orchestral concerts, which had already made a favourable
start, I now saw my way to getting free from those long-standing
debts, having already overcome the difficulties of the removal
and settling down. I also asked him how he would act if I saw it
was to my own interest to retain my post, and to call on him to
resign his agreement with Holtei, who, as a matter of fact, after
his departure from Riga, had withdrawn his alleged reason for my