"The days of these representations and the dress rehearsal before the King were, without doubt, for Wagner the culminating point in his destiny as composer: they included those ineffable hours that repay for a whole lifetime of efforts, of disappointments, of miseries--his 'ideal realised,' the splendour of his genius shining before his own eyes and penetrating his very being with a glorious certainty.
"And what a magnificent trinity, Richard Wagner, Ludwig II. and the incarnation of Tristan! What a noble joy animated them all! 'How I bless those hours!' cried Schnorr, in a burst of enthusiasm. 'O Master, with your help and the help of this divine king, I also must accomplish something great and glorious!'
"A most unusual interruption brought this splendid manifestation of art to an unforeseen conclusion after the fourth representation. From the first, Wagner had felt for Schnorr's prodigious achievement an astonishment full of respect, which increased to dread and finally became an actual terror. It was unbelievable that the singer could repeat this performance day after day, after the custom of the theatre. The Master felt that it would be a crime, and he therefore declared that this fourth representation of _Tristan_ should be the last; that he would not permit another. So the work was not given again.
"'I feel that I have no right to inflict such a condition of trouble upon a human being,' said Wagner.
"It was not a question of physical fatigue--Schnorr did not experience any: but to live Tristan, to burn with his passions, to suffer his agonies, to thrill with his ecstasies, to die his death!--such superhuman exaltation, such emotion and fever of the soul, all this the Master could not permit again. So the success was interrupted, the big receipts were cut off, for such secondary considerations as these did not concern those generous minds for an instant.
"Then a very great project began to take shape in Wagner's brain.
"'With the certainty of the unspeakable importance of Schnorr for my musical creations, a new springtide of hope entered into my life. The medium was at last found through which my creative power could link itself to the present. The moment was come in which to teach and to make clear. That which had been universally misunderstood, denounced as unplayable, mocked at, covered with contempt, was about to be proved an undeniable artistic reality. To create a German style for representing works of German genius--this was our watchword. And with this consoling hope I found it easier to oppose, for the time, any further productions of _Tristan_. This work and these representations were so different from the usual performances that they would necessitate too sudden a leap into the unknown; the precipices and chasms yawning before it must be approached deliberately. We must begin by carefully roofing them over, by paving the way toward ourselves, the isolated artists, up to our summit, for those associates that were indispensable to us. So then, Schnorr being ours, it was determined to found a Royal College of Music and Dramatic Art.'