site throughout, but the human interest of the story is after all
slight, and Weber, on whom the hand of death was heavy as he wrote the
score, failed to infuse much individuality into his characters. 'Oberon'
was his last work, and he died in London soon after it was produced.
During the last few years of his life he had been engaged in a desultory
way upon the composition of a comic opera, 'Die drei Pintos,' founded
upon a Spanish subject. He left this in an unfinished state, but some
time after his death it was found that the manuscript sketches and notes
for the work were on a scale sufficiently elaborate to give a proper
idea of what the composer's intentions with regard to the work really
were. The work of arrangement was entrusted to Herr G. Mahler, and under
his auspices 'Die drei Pintos' was actually produced, though with little
success.

At the present time the only opera of Weber which can truthfully be said
to belong to the current repertory is 'Der Freischuetz,' and even this is
rarely performed out of Germany. The small amount of favour which
'Euryanthe' and 'Oberon' enjoy is due, as has been already pointed out,
chiefly to the weakness of their libretti, yet it seems strange that the
man to whom the whole tendency of modern opera is due should hold so
small a place in our affections. The changes which Weber and his
followers effected, though less drastic, were in their results fully as
important as those of Gluck. In the orchestra as well as on the stage
he introduced a new spirit, a new point of view. What modern music owes
to him may be summed up in a word. Without Weber, Wagner would have been
impossible.

Louis Spohr (1784-1859) is now almost forgotten as an operatic composer,
but at one time his popularity was only second to that of Weber. Many
competent critics have constantly affirmed that a day will come when
Spohr's operas, now neglected, will return to favour once more; but
years pass, and there seems no sign of a revival of interest in his
work. Yet he has a certain importance in the history of opera; for, so
far as chronology is concerned, he ought perhaps to be termed the
founder of the romantic school rather than Weber, since his 'Faust' was
produced in 1818, and 'Der Freischuetz' did not appear until 1821. But
the question seems to turn not so much upon whether Spohr or Weber were
first in the field, as whether Spohr is actually a romantic composer at
all. If the subjects which he treated