rium. Caroline's health gave way completely, and "the unhappy
couple lay in neighbouring rooms, where they could only cry 'Comfort!'
to each other through the wall; and where, in the still hours of night,
each smothered the sobs of grief in the pillows, that the other might
not hear."

Caroline was the first to recover. Carl's health and strength were on
the final ebb--the long, slow ebb that made of his last years one dismal
tragedy, which only his superb devotion to his wife and his immitigable
optimism could brighten. In July, 1820, they decided to take a tour.
They met with great success, but he found his weakness almost
unbearable. At Hanover, he and Caroline were both prostrated, and could
not join in the concert planned. On the road to Bremen, the postilion
fell asleep and the coach was overturned into the ditch. The driver was
stunned and the sick Carl had himself to revive the man, untie the
baggage from the roof, unharness the horses, put everything in place
again, and drive the postilion to the next station. At Hamburg,
Caroline was too ill to continue the tour; she was about to become a
mother, and Carl was compelled to go on without her, but he wrote her
daily letters full of devotion. It was the first separation of their
married life.

Later she rejoined him, and at Hamburg, the oyster entered once more
into Weber's domestic career. The Brunetti had cured him of his love for
her by her inordinate fondness for bivalves. Caroline, on the other
hand, hated them. But Weber said:

"There can be no true sympathy between us while you detest a food I
relish. For the love of me, swallow this oyster."

The first three were a severe trial, but, as the French might say, "Ce
n'est pas que la premiere huitre qui coute." Afterward Weber would
groan, "Alas, why did I ever teach you the trick?"

In 1821, there rose a famous operatic war between Spontini and Weber at
Berlin. Caroline was prostrated with terror. Spontini's "Olympic" was
given first with enormous success, and "Der Freischuetz," in which
Caroline had had so large a share, and which meant so much to the two,
was forced into a dramatic comparison. In spite of a somewhat dubious
beginning, the first night was one of the greatest ovations a musician
has ever lived to see. In the midst of the tempestuous applause, every
one looked for the composer, who was "sitting in a dark corner of his
wife's box and kissing away her tears of joy."

When they returned to