rector to his opera company at Dresden; and on April 21,
1813, Hoffmann's residence in Bamberg, which may be regarded as the
turning-point in his life, came to an end. Four days later he arrived
at his destination without encountering any very serious adventure on
the road, although it swarmed most of the way with scouting Bashkirs,
Cossacks, Prussian hussars, and Russian dragoons, and was thickly lined
with heavy guns and munition-waggons,--massing for the battle of Luetzen
(May 2). On arriving at Dresden Hoffmann found quite unexpectedly his
friend Hippel, and with him spent several right happy days. Then he was
summoned by Seconda to join him at Leipsic, for Seconda seems to have
spent his time between this town and Dresden. But the journey was
postponed until May 20th, owing to the proximity of the contending
forces and the consequent unsettled state of the country. In the
intervals several sharp skirmishes between the Russians and French took
place in and close around Dresden. As might be expected, Hoffmann could
not check his irrepressible desire to be in the thick of the
excitement; on May 9th he was standing close beside one of the town
gates when a ball struck against a wall near him and in the rebound hit
him on the shin; he quietly stooped down and picked up the flattened
"coin," and preserved it as a memento, "being quite satisfied with that
one memento, unselfishly not asking for any more," as he wrote. Even
during these troubled restless days he worked at the _Fantasiestuecke_.
On the way to Leipsic happened a startling occurrence, which probably
served as the prototype for the catastrophe at the end of _Das Majorat_
(The Entail). The coach was upset and a newly married Countess was
taken up dead; Hoffmann's own wife also received a severe wound on the
head. Seconda's troupe only remained in Leipsic a few weeks longer;
permission was given him to play in the Court theatre at Dresden; hence
on 24th June we find Hoffmann on his way back to Dresden, and deriving
in his characteristic fashion much amusement from a waggon heavily
laden with theatrical appurtenances, living and non-living, something
in the style of the carriage scene in _Die Fermate_.

The return, however, was a return into the very hottest scene of the
struggle between the Allies and Napoleon. On August 26th and 27th the
fight raged furiously around the walls of Dresden; the quarter in which
Hoffmann was living was shelled; the people in the hou