my mother introduced me to him, and he asked me what I was going
to be, whether I wanted perhaps to be a musician, my mother told
him that, though I was indeed quite mad on Freischutz, yet she
had as yet seen nothing in me which indicated any musical talent.

This showed correct observation on my mother's part; nothing had
made so great an impression on me as the music of Freischutz, and
I tried in every possible way to procure a repetition of the
impressions I had received from it, but, strange to say, least of
all by the study of music itself. Instead of this, I contented
myself with hearing bits from Freischutz played by my sisters.
Yet my passion for it gradually grew so strong that I can
remember taking a particular fancy for a young man called Spiess,
chiefly because he could play the overture to Freischutz, which I
used to ask him to do whenever I met him. It was chiefly the
introduction to this overture which at last led me to attempt,
without ever having received any instruction on the piano, to
play this piece in my own peculiar way, for, oddly enough, I was
the only child in our family who had not been given music
lessons. This was probably due to my mother's anxiety to keep me
away from any artistic interests of this kind in case they might
arouse in me a longing for the theatre.

When I was about twelve years old, however, my mother engaged a
tutor for me named Humann, from whom I received regular music
lessons, though only of a very mediocre description. As soon as I
had acquired a very imperfect knowledge of fingering I begged to
be allowed to play overtures in the form of duets, always keeping
Weber as the goal of my ambition. When at length I had got so far
as to be able to play the overture to Freischutz myself, though