^{Note 1 in page 1150} Letters of Irving to Brevoort, edited by G. S. Hellman (New York, 1918), pp. 286–287. The italics are mine.

^{Note 2 in page 1150} In an article in Studies in Philology, July, 1930, entitled “Irving's German Sources in The Sketch Book,” I have discussed Irving's dependence for his Rip Van Winkle story upon the old Peter Klaus legend, his borrowings for his Sleepy-Hollow story from the old tales of Rübezahl, and his gentle burlesquing of the Lenore-motif in his “The Spectre Bridegroom.”

^{Note 3 in page 1150} The Journals of Washington Irving, edited by W. P. Trent and G. S. Hellman (3 vols., Boston, 1919), I, 225.

^{Note 4 in page 1151} Irving's visit to Scott was followed by a wild effort to take German by storm. See P. M. Irving, Life and Letters of Washington Irving (4 vols., New York, 1865), I, 395. See also my study, Studies in Philology, XXVII (July, 1930), 482, 485–489.

^{Note 5 in page 1151} Life and Letters, II, 91.

^{Note 6 in page 1151} Ibid., II, 93.

^{Note 7 in page 1151} Referring to his journey into the neighboring Odenwald, he wrote to his sister: “It is in this latter region you may recollect that I laid the scene of my little story of the Spectre Bridegroom” (Ibid., II, 97).

^{Note 8 in page 1152} Ibid., II, 102.

^{Note 9 in page 1152} Ibid., II, 102–104.

^{Note 10 in page 1152} Ibid., II, 109.

^{Note 11 in page 1152} Ibid., II, 109–119.

^{Note 12 in page 1152} Letter to Ms sister from Vienna, Nov. 10, 1822. See ibid., II, 124.

^{Note 13 in page 1152} Ibid., II, 136.

^{Note 14 in page 1153} Ibid., II, 138. For a full account of Irving's social activities in Dresden, see P. Apetz, Washington Irvings Aufenthalt in Dresden, 1822–1823, Program, Dresden, 1914.

^{Note 15 in page 1153} Life and Letters, II, 138–140.

^{Note 16 in page 1153} Journals, I, 137–138.

^{Note 17 in page 1153} One phase of Irving's literary activity has not received sufficient emphasis by those who have written about him, and that is his vocation as opera and playgoer (for it amounted to a vocation with him) and his work as playwright and libretto writer. The whole matter of Irving's connection with plays and operas had gone unnoticed until G. S. Hellman, after editing the Journals, was attracted to the subject and included a brief chapter on Irving, “The Writer of Plays,” in his biography.

During the seventeen years which Irving spent in Europe he saw a vast number of plays and operas, whose titles, recorded in the diaries, constitute a list—English, French, German, Italian, Spanish—unequalled in the record of any other American man of letters; and as an old man, after his return to the United States, his interest continued, so much so that he would spend whole weeks in the wintertime in New York City in order not to forego the theatre and opera.

After taking an active part in amateur theatricals at the Foster house in Dresden, he met in Paris John Howard Payne, then engaged in the selection and revision of French plays for the London stage. Irving gave advice, probably more than mere advice, in connection with the plays Payne worked on during the years 1823 and 1824; two of them, Charles II. and Richelieu, are largely the handiwork of Irving. With these we may consider Abu Hassan and The Wild Huntsman—adapted by Irving from the German—as the four finished pieces of Irving the playwright.

Early in 1823, Irving decided to write an English libretto—part translation, part adaptation from the, at that time, most popular German opera of Carl Maria von Weber, a man with whom he was soon on intimate terms. He set to work on Sunday morning, April 20, 1823, with the libretto of Abu Hassan by Franz Karl Hiemers before him. That evening he heard Weber playing his own music. During the next five days Irving wrote steadily, finishing the rough draft on April 25. On the 26th his friend, Colonel Livius, played for him the music of Abu Hassan; and notations in the diary for the first half of May indicate how rapidly the writing went on, Irving working with Livius on the songs, until May 28, when the alterations were finished.

On May 30, 1823, he began work translating and adapting from the German of Friederich Kind, the libretto of Weber's most famous opera, Der Freischütz. (Irving had first seen it performed in Darmstadt on September 20, 1822, and again on October 13, 1822.) He worked rapidly, and by June 4, he was revising. We hear no more of it until we come to the Paris journals, October 8 and 11, 1823, when Irving, together with Livius, finally retouched the libretto. It was produced for the first time on the English stage under the title The Wild Huntsman at London, July 22, 1824. One infers that Irving and Livius deserve credit in this connection that does not seem to have been given them by the bibliographers of the opera or the drama. “One may stress the fact,” says Hellman, “that the first version in English of a libretto of the first great Greman opera was written by the first famous American man of letters.”

^{Note 18 in page 1154} Böttiger is mentioned repeatedly by Irving; see Journals, I, 137–138, 139, 144, 168, 170, 184, 217.

^{Note 19 in page 1154} Life and Letters, II, 127–128.

^{Note 20 in page 1154} Journals, I, 143.

^{Note 21 in page 1154} He had previously seen, among a great number of lesser German plays, Lear in German translation. Under the date of November 23, Irving wrote: “King Lear performed at the theatre, translated by Iffland—the part of Lear very well performed, the translation apparently very good and exact” (Journals, I, 123), The comment implies some knowledge of the German language on living's part, The following night he saw a German piece, Alp's Röslein, which he called “tolerable.” On Nov. 25, he left for Dresden.

^{Note 22 in page 1155} Coleridge's translation of Schiller's drama had appeared in 1800, but Irving knew it also in the original German. In a letter to Mrs. Foster (June 8, 1823) he quotes Schiller's line: “Das Herz ist gestorben; die Welt ist leer” (Life and Letters, II, 158).

^{Note 23 in page 1155} I have not been able to identify Herbstag.

^{Note 24 in page 1155} Journals, I, 164.

^{Note 25 in page 1155} Journals, I, 168.

^{Note 26 in page 1155} Journals, I, 182. He had already seen Hamlet performed in German on February 13 (Journals, I, 167); he saw the play again on June 4, at Prague (Journals, I, 209).

^{Note 27 in page 1156} Life and Letters, II, 101; see also Journals, I, 55, note 3.

^{Note 28 in page 1156} In Bracebridge Hall he devotes a separate chapter to Popular Superstitions. All references to Irving's works are to the twelve-volume Sputyen Duyvil edition.

^{Note 29 in page 1156} Journals, I, 49.

^{Note 30 in page 1156} Journals, I, 54.

^{Note 31 in page 1156} Life and Letters, II, 104. Similarly, he found old castles at Heidelberg worth noting because they are “famous in legend and goblin tale” (Ibid., II, 110).

^{Note 32 in page 1157} Journals, I, 60. Goetz von Berlichingen is the hero of Goethe's play, which Irving's friend, Scott, had translated in 1798–1799; and Wallenstein is the hero of Schiller's play, which Coleridge had englished in 1800. Presumably Irving had read the translations.

^{Note 33 in page 1157} Journals, I, 67. Irving's interest in the Fehmgericht probably dates back to his visit to Abbotsford where he could have talked over with Scott the play, The House of Aspen, on which Scott was engaged at the time, and which is built around the Secret Tribunal.

^{Note 34 in page 1157} Journals, I, 73–74.

^{Note 35 in page 1157} Journals, I, 79, 81.

^{Note 36 in page 1157} Journals, I, 104–105.

^{Note 37 in page 1157} Journals, I, 104–105.

^{Note 38 in page 1157} Life and Letters, II, 119.

^{Note 39 in page 1157} Journals, I, 114.

^{Note 40 in page 1157} See, for example, Journals, I, 111, 120, 141, 197, and Life and Letters, II, 119.

^{Note 41 in page 1158} For other examples, see Journals, I, 59, 63, 66, 68, 70, 78, 83, 85, 96, 97, 115, 117, 119, 120, 121, 126, 128, 134, 135, 138, 139, 141, 148, 152, 153, 154, 155, 160, 163, 164, 167, 172, 174, 186, 187, 198, 199, 200, 201, 202, 203, 204, 205, 206, 207, 208, 209, etc.

^{Note 42 in page 1158} Journals, I, 97, 96.

^{Note 43 in page 1158} See Studies in Philology, XXVII (July, 1930), 498–504.

^{Note 44 in page 1158} Journals, I, 192. The reference here is to the first of the Legenden von Rübezahl. Flora is one of the Foster girls. That the group sometimes amused themselves with reading and telling German legends and tales is evidenced by the following journal entry: “... passed ev[enin]g at Foster's—read[in]g German legends” (Journals, I, 219).

^{Note 45 in page 1158} Journals, II, 11. See also Washington Irving's Diary, Spain 1828–1829, edited by C. L. Penny (New York, Hispanic Society of America, 1926), intro., xiv.

^{Note 46 in page 1158} Journals, I, 198.

^{Note 47 in page 1158} Journals, I, 183.

^{Note 48 in page 1159} Journals, I, 173–174.

^{Note 49 in page 1159} Note the modification of the term comic to humorous.

^{Note 50 in page 1159} Journals, I, 145.

^{Note 51 in page 1159} Journals, I, 198.

^{Note 52 in page 1159} Journals, I, 187. Among some undated memoranda at the end of Irving's second Dresden diary, he penciled the following list of German books, among which, it will be observed, the name of Jean Paul occurs several times.

Whether Irving had read these books or intended to read them, had bought them or intended to buy them, I do not know, neither is there any indication in the diary as to the significance of the list. I quote it here for what it is worth.

^{Note 53 in page 1160} Journals, I, 151.

^{Note 54 in page 1160} Journals, I, 189. This must have been the son of Heinrich Kleist (1771–1811).

^{Note 55 in page 1160} Life and Letters, II, 130–131. On March 7, 1823, Irving wrote to his sister, Mrs. Van Wart, complaining that he had composed nothing, that the ideas would not come. “But,” he adds, “I am getting very familiar with the German language; and there is a lady here who is so kind as to give me lessons in Italian [Mrs. Foster], which language I have nearly forgotten, but which I am fast regaining. Another lady is superintending my French [Emily Foster], so that if I am not acquiring ideas, I am at least acquiring a variety of modes of expressing them when they do come” (Life and Letters, II, 137–138).

^{Note 56 in page 1160} Journals, I, 194.

^{Note 57 in page 1160} Journals, I, 195.

^{Note 58 in page 1161} See, for examples, Journals, II, 9–10 (Aug. 19, 1824); II, 11 (Aug. 21, 1824); II, 19 (Sept. 1, 1824); II, 47 (Oct. 24, 1824); II, 50 (Oct. 31, 1824); II, 86 (Jan. 31, 1825); II, 107 (Mar. 25, 1825); II, 156 (Sept. 17, 1825); III, 190 (Dec. 24, 1825).

^{Note 59 in page 1161} See supra, note 17.

^{Note 60 in page 1161} Journals, I, 184.

^{Note 61 in page 1162} Journals, I, 101 (Nov. 2, 1822).

^{Note 62 in page 1162} Life and Letters, II, 137–138.

^{Note 63 in page 1162} Journals, II, 146.

^{Note 64 in page 1162} Irving was, during 1823 and 1824, projecting for himself a number of literary plans which he hoped to do something with when the next “fit of scribbling” came upon him. One of these may owe its inception to Goethe's Faust.

On September 11, 1824, Charles Kemble asked Irving to write a play for him. The diaries do not reveal assent or refusal, but in the following month Irving conceived the plan of a play to be entitled The Cavalier. Though nothing came of it, there have been discovered certain notes of a play, called El Embozado, based on a suggestion given to Irving the preceding March by Byron's friend, Medwin. El Embozado: The Cloaked Figure was to be a drama of the dual nature of man,—a story of crime and seduction in which the young offender is finally saved by the intervention of his better self. (A similar theme Irving later treated in his “Don Juan, a Spectral Research.”) Hellman connects Irving's El Embozado with Goethe's Faust, for which, Irving remarks, Goethe apparently got suggestions from the Magico Prodigioso of Calderon, Irving was familiar with Goethe's play, having read and having heard it read in the German. He heard Emily Foster read Faust on May 28, 1823 (Journals, I, 173); he also owned a copy of Faust for which he paid six francs twelve sous on Sept. 17, 1825, as his memorandum on the title-page indicates (G. S. Hellman, Washington Irving, 166–167; see also Journals, II, 156).

^{Note 65 in page 1162} On April 27, 1823, the Queen of Saxony sent for Irving and intimated to him that she expected “he would write something about Dresden, etc.” (Journals, I, 185.)

^{Note 66 in page 1163} One suspects that the reference is to the books mentioned in the following notation of Irving's under the date of December 15, 1823: “Return home, and find parcel from Mrs. Foster, with German books ....” (The Works of Washington Irving, 27 vols., Geoffrey Crayon edition, London, 1882, XXV, 409–410).

^{Note 67 in page 1163} Life and Letters, II, 166.

^{Note 68 in page 1163} Ibid., II, 164.

^{Note 69 in page 1163} Ibid., II, 55.

^{Note 70 in page 1163} Ibid., II, 20.

^{Note 71 in page 1163} Ibid., II, 178.

^{Note 72 in page 1164} Ibid., II, 178–179.

^{Note 73 in page 1164} Ibid., II, 168–169.

^{Note 74 in page 1164} Ibid., II, 181–182.

^{Note 75 in page 1164} Ibid., II, 183.

^{Note 76 in page 1164} Ibid., II, 185–186.

^{Note 77 in page 1164} Diary entries quoted in Life and Letters, II, 187–191.

^{Note 78 in page 1165} Life and Letters, II, 191.

^{Note 79 in page 1165} Ibid., II, 205.

^{Note 80 in page 1165} Ibid., II, 206.

^{Note 1 in page 1166} Memoirs, Journal, and Correspondence of Thomas Moore, ed. by Lord John Russell (8 vols., London, 1853–1856), III, 252–253 (July 9, 1821).

^{Note 2 in page 1166} Journals, I, 143–211, passim.

^{Note 3 in page 1166} Journals, I, 173: “Friday [March], 29th [1823]—... dine at Mrs. F.'s. Rehearsal—pass evening there—Emily reading Faust, etc. early part of day triste—Emily delightful.”

^{Note 4 in page 1166} Journals, I, 180: “Thursday [April] 17th [1823]—Take lesson in German from seven to nine. ... Ital. lesson at Mrs. F.'s—dine there—converse at dinner about Egmont. E[mily] makes excellent observations.”

^{Note 5 in page 1166} Journals, I, 183.

^{Note 6 in page 1167} Compare Tales of a Traveller, 182 and Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre, bk. i, chaps. iv and vi, Goethes Werke (Weimar edition, 103 vols., 1887–1918), XXI, 18–24.

^{Note 7 in page 1167} Compare Tales of a Traveller, 184–185 and Goethes Werke, XXI (bk. i, chap. xv), 88.

^{Note 8 in page 1167} Compare Tales of a Traveller, 187–188 and Goethes Werke, XXI (bk. ii, chaps. ii and xii), 122–133, 211–216.

^{Note 9 in page 1168} Goethes Werke, XXII (bk. v, chap. xvi), 238–239.

^{Note 10 in page 1168} Tales of a Traveller, 92.

^{Note 11 in page 1169} Goethes Werke, XXII (bk. v, chap. xvi), 238.

^{Note 12 in page 1169} Tales of a Traveller, 253.

^{Note 13 in page 1169} Ibid., 255.

^{Note 14 in page 1169} Compare Tales of a Traveller, “A Strolling Manager,” especially 253–261, and Goethes Werke, XXII (bk. v, chap. xvi), 230–256.

^{Note 15 in page 1170} Tales of a Traveller, 20.

^{Note 16 in page 1170} Ludwig Tieck, Phantasus (vol. IV of Schriften, 28 vols., Berlin, 1828–1854); see especially the “Einleitung” and the links.

^{Note 17 in page 1170} “Er [Tieck] wählte Dresden, welches ihm bereits bekannt war. Im Sommer 1819 fand die Übersiedlung statt. In Dresden wurde Tieck der Mittelpunkt des litterarischen Lebens” (Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie, XXXVIII, 267).

^{Note 18 in page 1170} “Durch seine weit und breit beruhende, viele Freunde anlockende Vorlesungen dramatischer Dichtungen, mehr noch durch seine während der Jahre 1823 und 1824 für die Abendzeitung geschriebenen ‘Theater-kritiken’ gewann er grossen Einfluss auf die Verhältnisse und den Stil des Dresdener Theaters und wurde daher mit gutem Grunde im Jahre 1828 dem Intendanten als Dramaturg beigegeben” (Ludwig Tiecks Ausgewählte Werke, ed. by H. Welti [Stuttgart, n. d.], I, 22–23).

^{Note 19 in page 1170} See supra, note 52.

^{Note 20 in page 1170} Tales of a Traveller, 214.

^{Note 21 in page 1171} See J. G. T. Grässe, Sagenbuch des Preussischen Staates (2 vols., Glogau, 1868–1871), I, 15, 224, 267, 283, 339, 521, 572, 765, 783; II, 76, 366, 479, 664, 779.

^{Note 22 in page 1171} Ibid., I, 572–575.

^{Note 23 in page 1171} Ibid., I, 572–573.

^{Note 24 in page 1172} Jean Paul Friederich Richter, Werke (second edition, 33 vols., Berlin, 1840–1842), XXIX, 241–319, especially 296–307.

^{Note 25 in page 1172} Journals, I, 187 (April 30, 1823).

^{Note 26 in page 1172} Irving was familiar with Schiller's works. See Life and Letters, II, 155; Journals, II, 156, 166, 190, 203.

^{Note 27 in page 1173} See E. Parry, “Schiller in America,” Americana Germanica, vol. III, Philadelphia, 1905; T. Rea, Schiller's Drama and Poems in England (London, Unwin, 1906); M. W. Cooke, “Schiller's Robbers in England,” Modern Language Review, XI, ii (April, 1916), 156–175; L. A. Willoughby, “English Translations and Adaptations of Schiller's Robbers,” Modern Language Review, XVI (July-October, 1921), 297–315.

^{Note 28 in page 1174} Another influence of Die Räuber is found in Tales of a Traveller, the episode in “The Story of the Young Robber,” in which his bride, who falls into the clutches of the gang, is raffled off by the members of the band. Like Carl Moor, the young robber kills her to keep her from becoming common property of the gang. Compare Die Räuber, act V, sc. ii and Tales of a Traveller, 358–363.

^{Note 29 in page 1175} Journals, I, 128.

^{Note 30 in page 1175} Journals, I, 135.

^{Note 31 in page 1176} Life and Letters, II, 50.

^{Note 32 in page 1176} Tales of a Traveller, 322.

^{Note 33 in page 1176} G. S. Hellman, Washington Irving, 28.

^{Note 34 in page 1176} Anne Radcliffe, The Mysteries of Udolpho (London, n. d.), part i, 109.

^{Note 35 in page 1177} Compare Tales of a Traveller, 275–278 and The Mysteries of Udolpho, part i, 29 and part ii, 15–16.

^{Note 36 in page 1177} O. S. Coad, “The Gothic Element in American Literature,” Journal of English and Germanic Philology, XXIV (1925), 85.

^{Note 37 in page 1177} Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, XVI (Sept., 1824), 295.

^{Note 38 in page 1177} Ibid., XVI (Sept., 1824), 295.

^{Note 39 in page 1177} Ibid., XVII, Jan., 1825), 65.

^{Note 40 in page 1178} Ibid., XVII (Jan., 1825), 66.

^{Note 41 in page 1178} G. P. Krapp, The Sketch Book, intro., 31.

^{Note 42 in page 1178} Tales of a Traveller, 64.

^{Note 43 in page 1178} F. L. Pattee, The Development of the American Short Story (New York, 1923), 17.

^{Note 44 in page 1178} See also Letters of Irving to Brevoort, ed. by G. S. Hellman (New York, 1918), 425–428, 432–434.

^{Note 45 in page 1179} The Alhambra, intro., vii; see also 30, 47, 56–58, 163–165. 351, 405.

^{Note 46 in page 1179} The Alhambra, 165.

^{Note 47 in page 1179} Ibid., 385.

^{Note 48 in page 1179} Ibid., 40.

^{Note 49 in page 1179} Compare Journals, III, 97–100 and The Alhambra, 42–44. See also Life and Letters, II, 95–96, 100–104, 134–137.

^{Note 50 in page 1180} Otmar, pseud., J. C. C. Nachtigal, Volcks-Sagen, nacherzählt von Otmar (Bremen, 1800), 131–140.

^{Note 51 in page 1180} Ibid., 223–238.

^{Note 52 in page 1180} The Alhambra, 36, 40.

^{Note 53 in page 1180} It is possible that Irving's interest in Spain was nourished during his sojourn in Dresden by the enthusiasm for the Spanish past which the German Romantiker felt and expressed.

^{Note 54 in page 1180} Life and Letters, III, 255–269.

^{Note 55 in page 1182} Wolfert's Roost, 244–246.

^{Note 56 in page 1182} The Sketch Book, 25–33.

^{Note 57 in page 1182} Compare the descriptions and characterizations of the villain as found in Irving's tale (Wolfert's Roost, 327–328) and Gottschalck's (Roscoe, The German Novelists, 228–229).

^{Note 58 in page 1182} Thomas Roscoe, The German Novelists, 228–233.

^{Note 59 in page 1183} Wolfert's Roost, 331.

^{Note 60 in page 1183} Journals, II, 111.

^{Note 61 in page 1183} Wolfert's Roost, 118, 129.

^{Note 62 in page 1183} See Irving's statement in Tales of a Traveller, intro., ix and Life and Letters, I, 383.

^{Note 63 in page 1183} Letters of Irving to Brevoort, 398–400 (Dec. 11, 1824).

^{Note 64 in page 1184} The italics are mine.

^{Note 65 in page 1184} Quoted by Irving from a copy of his letter to Scott (The Sketch Book, preface, 9).

^{Note 66 in page 1184} Irving's “fits of sterility” always coincide with his strenuous reading periods. Unfortunately Irving chose not to tell us what he read. His published diaries and letters refer only occasionally to a book which he had read or was reading, and his unpublished letters and diaries are no more illuminating. Irving was amazingly reticent about the whole matter of his reading.

^{Note 67 in page 1185} Compare V. L. Parrington, The Romantic Revolution in America, 1800–1860 (New York, 1927), 211–212.

^{Note 68 in page 1186} O. S. Coad, op. cit., XXIV (1925), 85.

^{Note 69 in page 1187} Letters of Irving to Brevoort, 400–401 (Paris, Dec. 11, 1824).

^{Note 70 in page 1187} This I purpose to attempt in several papers now in preparation.