It is not hard to see in what relation these characters stand to the heroes and female characters of Richard Wagner, and it is not without reason that Francz List has called the _Ring of the Niebelungen_ the _Magic Flute_ of our day. Wagner here filled out the clear outline of the human ideals which Mozart drew in the _Magic Flute_ from his knowledge of the German nature. All the sublime ideal powers which move and lead us, from the conscious emotions of our own hearts to the elemental, primeval forces which determine our will are here found, in the faintest outlines, it is true, but still as the first features of the surest characterization; and as Osmin points to Fafner, the “three boys” who lead Tamino point to the three daughters of the Rhine who warn Siegfried of his death. It was the first time that that which lives in every human breast as the consciousness of the most intimate knowledge of the real constitution of the world, and fills us with the feeling of the eternal, was portrayed with such Rafaelite, ideal art in opera. This it is that gives to the whole work its peculiar tone. Like the golden light of creation’s first morning, it plays about the opera of the _Magic Flute_. The reception accorded to the work, the popularity of which is unequalled in any nation, was in keeping with its merits. The first representation of it took place on the 30th of September, under Mozart’s own direction. After the overture, the audience was perfectly motionless: for who could have expected such solemn, thrilling notes in a _Magic opera_? Schenk, who afterwards composed the _Dorfbarbier_, the teacher of Beethoven, who still occupied a place in the orchestra, crept up to the director’s chair, and kissed Mozart’s hand, who, continuing to beat time with the other, gave him a friendly look of recognition and gently stroked his cheek. Our artist felt that, even here, in this board booth, he was in his own dear Vienna, in his own beloved Austria. But, even after the close of the first act, the applause was not great, and it is said that Mozart went pale and perplexed to Schikaneder, who quieted and consoled him. During the second act, however, this motley multitude discovered the message that this music conveyed to the soul. It was, indeed, with difficulty that Mozart could now be moved to appear on the stage. It wounded him to the quick to think that the best he could do was so little appreciated. But he was soon able to write to his “best and dearest wife” at Baden, that, spite of the fact that it was mail day, the “opera was played before a very full house and met with the usual applause.” His feeling for the work is expressed at the close of the letter, in the words of the incomparable terzetto, when Sarastro dismisses the two lovers to make proof of their love: “The hour is striking farewell! we shall meet again.” With the unconcern of his own magnanimity he himself ushered in his mortal enemy, Salieri, and the latter found the work