red his enthusiasm
for German music. There he first became familiar with Schumann's
melodies, and made the rare little etching representing his English
friends, Mr. and Mrs. Edwards, playing one of Schumann's compositions,
Edwards with his flute and Mrs. Edwards at the piano. In 1862 he had the
very tempered satisfaction of finding that Wagner, already beloved by
him, had reached the public taste through the labors of the courageous
Pasdeloup. "I always regret," he wrote to Edwards, "seeing the objects
of my adoration adored by others, especially by the masses. I am very
jealous when I love."

In order to celebrate Wagner's triumph over these masses, however, he at
once made the lithograph called _Venusberg_, from which sprang the very
different oil version of the same subject which together with the
_Hommage a Delacroix_, the story of which M. Benedite has recounted, was
admitted to the Salon of 1864. Fantin's lithographs, a number of which
are in the print room of the Lenox Library building in New York City,
show clearly his preoccupation with music, and an interesting article on
this phase of his temperament appeared in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_,
September 15, 1906. Naturally a worshiper, he did not confine himself to
commemorating only the musicians who were his favorites. In lithography
and painting he exalted such diverse heroes of the different arts as
Stendhal, Hugo, Baudelaire, Delacroix, Manet, Schumann, Weber, Berlioz,
and Wagner. In 1877 his enthusiasm for Wagner revived in his work, and
compositions based on the Ring music followed each other in rapid
succession. Wolfram gazing at the evening star, or following with
enchanted eyes Elizabeth's ghostly figure as it moves slowly up the hill
toward the towers of Wartburg; the Rhine maidens playing with rhythmic
motions in the swirling waters, with Alberic, crouched in the
foreground, watching them; Sieglinde, giving Siegmund to drink, as
hounded and pursued he sinks at the door of Hunding's dwelling; the
evocation of Kundry by Klingner; Siegfried blowing his horn and
receding from the enticements of the Rhine maidens--these are among the
subjects that engaged him. It would be difficult to describe his manner
of interpretation. Quite without theatrical suggestion, it combines a
dramatic use of dark and light and a feeling for palpable atmosphere
hardly equaled by Rembrandt himself, with a remarkably certain touch.
Nothing could better emphasize the value of te