tle plump
seductive form, was about twenty years of age, and, in addition to her
undoubted musical talent, was endowed with a fund of gay, sprightly
humour, wholly in sympathy with the youth's own joyous nature. She
became the central point of all his life and aspirations."

Thus the biographer describes the new dissipation, which carried Carl
away from his old riots; the new magnet that dragged from him all the
money he could earn, and more than he could borrow. It was a wild and
reckless crew and addicted to such entertainments as the travesty on
Marc Antony, with music by Carl, who played Cleopatra, while Gretchen
played Antony.

The last straw upon Carl's breaking back was the arrival of his father,
who descended upon him with a bass viol, an enormous basket-bed for his
beloved poodles, and a large bundle of debts, as well as an increased
luggage of eccentricities. While Weber was trying to secure loans to pay
off one of his father's debts, he was innocently implicated in a scandal
of bribery, by which it was made to seem that he had offered a post in
the prince's household, in return for an advance of money. The king had
been driven to despair by the disasters of the German army, and the
increase of discontent of the German people, and desired to gain a
reputation for virtue by the comfortable step of reforming his brother's
household. Learning of the proffered bribe, in which Weber seemed to be
concerned, but of which he was perfectly innocent, the king had him
arrested during a rehearsal of his opera "Sylvana," and had him thrown
into prison for sixteen days. When at last he was examined, there was
nothing found to justify the accusation of dishonesty, he was released
from the prison for criminals, and transferred to the prison for debt,
and then a little later he and his father were placed into a carriage
and driven across the border to exile.

This sudden plunge from the froth of dissipation to the dregs of
disgrace was a fall that Weber could never thereafter think or speak of,
and every mention of it was forbidden.

Almost from this moment Weber's life is one of seriousness, with an
occasional relapse into some of his old qualities, but never a complete
laying aside of earnestness. He gained friends elsewhere, and finally
settled in Darmstadt, where he still found women's hearts susceptible,
in spite of his small, weak frame, his great long neck, and his calfless
legs, of which he writes: "And, oh, my cal