Three composers preëminently continued Weber’s work as composer of German opera--Conradin Kreutzer (1780-1849), Albert Lortzing (1801-1851), and Heinrich Marschner (1795-1861). Of these, Kreutzer was peculiarly close to the German popular genius. His settings of Uhland’s _Wanderlieder_ are very fine, _In die Ferne_ being particularly worthy of study. Kreutzer, too, was one of the most successful composers of male choruses; his elaborate chorale, _Das ist der Tag des Herrn_, will probably be remembered as long as German music exists. Lortzing and Marschner freely introduced simple strophic songs into their operas, and by these are chiefly known. Their style was as simple as Weber’s and the historical development of song at their hands (slight in any case) is in a different direction from that which Schubert took. Their melodies are not inappropriate, but we look in vain in them for any of the close emotional interpretation which we find so abundantly in Schubert. But the finest songs of this semi-popular style (_volkstümliche Lieder_) were written by men who have no other claim to greatness. We may mention F. H. Himmel (1765-1814), Methfessel (1785-1869), Nägeli (1773-1836), Lindpainter (1791-1861), and Silcher (1789-1860). These are the true writers of modern German folk-songs. The energy of their music is of an elementary sort which the more highly trained composer rarely equals. They live to-day in every gathering of German students, in every Männerchor, in every nursery. Ten people are familiar with their songs to one who knows who the composers were. But the gifts these composers have left to their people are co-extensive with German culture. Methfessel is direct and virile, the singer of battles and of the manly virtues of the great ancestors. How compelling is the vigor of ‘_Stimmt an, mit hellem Klang_’! And what a boiling of the blood is in his fiery setting of Arndt’s ‘The God Who Made the Iron Grow!’ Nägeli is softer and more sentimental. We remember him chiefly by _Freut euch des Lebens_ and the charming ‘Good-Night.’ Lindpainter was less talented, and his songs, which partook of a romantic nature, have almost disappeared. But Himmel is among the greatest. His setting of Körner’s ‘Prayer on the Eve of Battle’ (vastly superior to Schubert’s) is one of the deepest expressions of religious faith in all song literature. His ‘Ballad of the Three Tailors,’ from _Des Knaben Wunderhorn_, is a delightful example of the typical Studentenlied. And one should not overlook his four songs from _Alexis und Ida_, in which he shows a delicacy of sentiment approaching that of Schubert though he wrote them some years before the composition of the ‘Erl King.’