"This day week is my concert," he wrote on the 19th of May. "How my poor heart beats when I think of it! What will be the result? The last chances left me are this concert and my benefit. When I think on all they cost me, should they not turn out so as to meet my modest expectations, it were hard indeed. But I must not let my courage fail me. I will rely on Him, who has already been so infinitely merciful to us. You will think, my beloved life, that I lay far too much stress on this. But remember that my hope of fortune for us was the only purpose of this weary journey. Can you not comprehend, then, why I now hold for so important that which has always played but a subordinate part in my life? Pray, dearest heart, pray that poor old papa's wishes, which are all for your dear sakes, may yet be fulfilled." To complete the mockery of his last days, fashion declined to interest itself in his concert, and, to keep even the common public away, the skies poured down floods of rain. The house was almost empty. The enthusiasm of the few good hearts there were Job's consolation. At the end of the concert he was led to his room, where he sank down, a complete wreck in mind and hope, muttering: "What do you say to that? That, that is 'Weber in London'!" His hand trembled so that he could hardly write any more to his wife; still, in a quivering scrawl, he bade her address her answer not to London, but to a city on the way home, for he is starting homeward--homeward at last! But he is not coming home through Paris, as he had planned. He writes: "What should I do there? I cannot walk--I cannot speak. I will have nothing more to do with business for years to come. So it is far better I should take the straight way home by Calais, through Brussels, Cologne, Coblenz, and thus by the Rhine to Frankfort. What a charming journey! I must travel very slowly, however, and probably rest for half a day now and then. I shall gain a good fortnight thus; and by the end of June I hope to be in your arms. "How will you receive me? In Heaven's name, alone. Let no one disturb my joy of looking again upon my wife and my children, my dearest and my best... Thank God! the end of all is fast approaching." The end of all was fast approaching. He sent his friends out to purchase souvenirs of unhappy London, as gifts for his family. He was so impatient to be off that he would listen to no advice to postpone his starting. "I must go back to my own, I must!" he sobbed incessantly. "Let me see them once more--and then God's will be done." The attempt appeared impossible to all. With great unwillingness he yielded to his friend's request to have a consultation of physicians. "Be it so," he answered. "But come of it what may, I go!"