ay with my aunt, who
occupied a summer residence on the estate of Privy-Councillor von
Adelsson, which was divided into building lots long ago, but at that
time was the scene of the gayest social life in both residences.

The owner and his wife were on the most intimate terms with my
relatives, and their daughter Lina seemed to me the fairest of all the
flowers in the Adelsson garden. If ever a girl could be compared to a
violet it was she. I knew her from childhood to maidenhood, and rejoiced
when I saw her wed in young Count Uexkyll-Guldenbrand a life companion
worthy of her.

There were many other charming girls, too, and my aunt, besides old
friends, entertained the leaders of literary life in Dresden.

Gutzkow surpassed them all in acuteness and subtlety of intellect, but
the bluntness of his manner repelled me.

On the other hand, I sincerely enjoyed the thoughtful eloquence of
Berthold Auerbach, who understood how to invest with poetic charm not
only great and noble subjects, but trivial ones gathered from the dust.
If I am permitted to record the memories of my later life, I shall
have more to say of him. It was he who induced me to give to my first
romance, which I had intended to call Nitetis, the title An Egyptian
Princess.

The stars of the admirable Dresden stage also found their way to my
aunt's.

One day I was permitted to listen to the singing of Emmy La Gruas, and
the next to the peerless Schroder-Devrient. Every conversation with
the cultured physician Geheimerath von Ammon was instructive and
fascinating; while Rudolf von Reibisch, the most intimate friend of the
family, whose great talents would have rendered him capable of really
grand achievements in various departments of art, examined our skulls
as a phrenologist or read aloud his last drama. Here, too, I met Major
Serre, the bold projector of the great lottery whose brilliant success
called into being and insured the prosperity of the Schiller Institute,
the source of so much good.

This simple-hearted yet energetic man taught me how genuine enthusiasm
and the devotion of a whole personality to a cause can win victory
under the most difficult circumstances. True, his clever wife shared
her husband's enthusiasm, and both understood how to attract the right
advisers. I afterwards met at their beautiful estate, Maxen, among many
distinguished people, the Danish author Andersen, a man of insignificant
personal appearance, but one who, if he