The Italian opera, before Weber’s time, had carried everything its own way. Those patriots who longed for the creation of a German operatic art had no sort of tradition to turn to except the _singspiel_. This was never regarded highly, and was considered quite beneath the dignity of the aristocracy and of those who prided themselves on being artistically _comme il faut_. And it was frequently as cheap and thin (not to say coarse) as a second-rate vaudeville ‘skit’ to-day. But it had in it elements of good old German humor, together with occasional doses of German pathos, and cultivated a German type of song, such as then existed. At any rate, it was all there was. Weber had no turn for the Italian ways of doing things, and little knowledge of them. So when he sought to write serious German opera that should appeal to a great mass of the people--the desire for national popularity had already been stirred in him by the success of his _Leyer und Schwert_ songs--he was obliged to write in a tongue that was understood by his fellow men. It is doubtful whether _Der Freischütz_ could have gained its wide popularity had its few pages of spoken dialogue been replaced by musical recitative in the Italian style. Such is the influence of tradition. But he had no need to be ashamed of the true German tradition to which he attached himself. The _singspiel_, which represented all there was of German opera, frequently cultivated a style of music which, if simple, was genuinely musical and highly refined. Reichardt’s singspiel, _Erwin und Elmire_, to Goethe’s text, has been mentioned in the chapter on Romantic Song, and its Mozart-like charm of melody referred to. The singspiel was a repository for German song, and frequently drew upon German folk-lore or ‘house’ lore for its subject matter. It needed only the right genius at the right time to raise it into a supreme art form. As early as 1810, when Weber was still sowing his wild oats and flirting with a literary career, he had run across the story of the _Freischütz_ in Apel’s newly published book of German ‘ghost-tales.’ The subject stirred his imagination and he planned to make an opera of it. But he found other things to turn his hand to, and was unable to hit upon a satisfactory librettist until in 1817 he met Friedrich Kind, who had already become popular with his play, _Das Nachtlager von Granada_. Kind took up with the idea, and in ten days completed his libretto. Weber worked at it slowly, but with great zest. Four years later, on the anniversary of the battle of Waterloo, it was performed for the first time, at the opening of the new Royal Theatre in Berlin. Its electric success, as it went through the length and breadth of Germany, has been described in a previous chapter.