The patron saint of musical Germany in 1842 was Mendelssohn and in August of that year he set off on one of his tours in Switzerland. No date is recorded, but we may be sure that Raff seized upon this visit as his opportunity. Mendelssohn, with his customary promptness in recognizing and assisting aspirants, gave the young man a warm letter of recommendation to the great publishing house of Breitkopf & Härtel. So effective were the master’s words that Raff’s first work was published in January, 1843. Thenceforward the current of his life could not be checked, and despite the opposition of his parents, he devoted his future to music. No critical notice of Raff’s opus 1 has been found, but opus 2 (“Trois Pièces Caracteristique” for piano) is mentioned with kindness in Schumann’s journal, the _Neue Zeitschrift für Musik_, of Aug. 5, 1844. The critic found in the composition “something which points to a future for the composer.” One readily discerns here the keen insight of the greatest of all music critics, Schumann himself. Favorable comments were made on the young composer’s works numbered opus 2 to 6 in the _Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung_ of Aug. 21 in the same year, and we may readily understand that with such encouragements Raff bent his whole mind to the production of music. In 1845 the wizard Liszt appeared in Switzerland. The great pianist was not long in discovering Raff’s gifts and was equally quick to see that the young man was struggling against privations that would have overwhelmed a weaker nature. Liszt invited Raff to accompany him on a concert tour, and thus laid the foundations of the beginner’s reputation. Together they travelled in the principal German cities, the tour ending at Cologne. Thence Liszt returned to Paris, but Raff remained. This stay in Cologne was a happy one, for it led to a personal acquaintance with Mendelssohn. The famous master, who had given the young composer his first help, now displayed fresh interest in him and made him a proposition to go to Leipsic and continue his studies under Mendelssohn’s own guidance. Such an offer was not to be refused, but the fates were not propitious. Just as Raff was making his preparations to go to Leipsic in the fall of 1847 Mendelssohn’s untimely death put an end to his hopes. He had not been idle while in Cologne, however, for he had studied composition with great earnestness, and had sent to the _Cäcilia_, published in Berlin by the noted contrapuntist, Siegfried Dehn, many contributions displaying wide knowledge of musical science. Later he published “Die Wagnerfrage” (“The Wagner Question”), a pamphlet which attracted much attention, as did all discussions of the works of the Bayreuth genius.