Life of Henriette Sontag, Countess de Rossi.: with Interesting Sketches by Scudo, Hector Berlioz, Louis Boerne, Adolphe Adam, Marie Aycard, Julie de Margueritte, Prince Puckler-Muskau & Theophile Gautier.
General
Life of Henriette Sontag, Countess de Rossi.: with Interesting Sketches by Scudo, Hector Berlioz, Louis Boerne, Adolphe Adam, Marie Aycard, Julie de Margueritte, Prince Puckler-Muskau & Theophile Gautier.
Sontag, Henriette, 1806-1854
"The first compliment paid to her in subjugated Frankfort was the
announcement in the published list of arrivals, 'M'lle Sontag, Singer to
his Majesty the King of Prussia, with her suite and attendants.'
Princely personages travel 'with suite and attendants,' and by
attributing the same to M'lle Sontag, she was raised to the very steps
of the throne; and without rebellion, no higher honor could have been
paid her.
"To this first compliment the last she received here was perfectly
suited. The landlord at whose house she was lodged for a fortnight, at
her departure refused all compensation, and thereby renewed and ennobled
the old hotel of the Roman Emperor into a Prytaneum, where, in the name
of the Fatherland, famous Germans are entertained. Between these two
compliments extend a countless wilderness of others. Even the Jews
experienced a slight dizziness, and when at the Exchange you heard them
speak of Eighths and Quarters, you were doubtful whether they meant
musical beats or per cents. The price of tickets to the theatre was
doubled, a thing unheard of, for we Frankforters, rich as we are, regard
every unusual expense as intolerable. Spectators poured along in vast
crowds, not merely the inhabitants of the town, not merely the people of
the neighboring cities; but from a distance, from Cologne and Hanover,
came flocks of strangers. It was like the Olympian games. An Englishman,
who could not get a place in the boxes, wanted to take the entire
parquette, and when told it was impossible, gave loud vent to his
astonishment at this strange Continental scrupulosity. A young man came
on foot from Wiesbaden, a distance of sixteen miles, and arrived just as
the house was opened; with great difficulty he procured a seat, but was
good enough to give it up to a wearied lady; he stood up, fainted before
the performance began, and, as there was no place for him to fall, he
was carried lifeless in the fainting-fit, from hand to hand, to the
door; he recovered just as the curtain fell on the last act, and walked
back to Wiesbaden the same night. An inhabitant of the city was so
exhausted by the closeness and the heat, that he had to go home, and
died the same evening. We have heard of other injuries and maladies, and
of persons who were obliged to keep their beds for many days. Through
the whole time, the _Intelligencer_ was filled with advertisements of
lost chains, rings, bracelets, veils, and other articles which ladies
lose in a crowd. On the first day of Sontag's appearance, I went to the
optician's to get my opera glass, which had been left to be repaired,
and he had to look for it among fifty others, left there for the same
purpose. There was a universal arming of the eyes of the entire
masculine gender in Frankfort, and under the gleam of the new
chandelier, hundreds of glasses, directed at a weak girl, offered a
terribly warlike aspect. But never was artillery so poorly served, for
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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