Evidently it was his notion that at the time of Maria Theresa (in whose early reign the opera is supposed to take place) the Viennese world was given over to the dance.

It was so given over a generation later, so completely, indeed, that at the meetings in the ridotto, for which Mozart, Haydn, Gyrowetz, Beethoven, and others wrote music, retiring rooms had to be provided for ladies who were as unprepared for possible accidents as was one of those described by Pepys as figuring in a court ball in his time; but to put scarcely anything but waltz tunes under the dialogue of "Der Rosenkavalier" is an anachronism which is just as disturbing to the judicious as the fact that Herr Strauss, though he starts his half-dozen or more of waltzes most insinuatingly, never lets them run the natural course which Lanner and the Viennese Strauss, who suggested their tunes, would have made them do.

Always, the path which sets out so prettily becomes a byway beset with dissonant thorns and thistles and clogged with rocks.
All of this is by way of saying that "Der Rosenkavalier" reached New York on December 9, 1913, after having endured two years or so in Europe, under the management of Mr.Gatti-Casazza, and was treated with the distinction which Mr.Conried gave "Parsifal" and had planned for "Salome." It was set apart for a performance outside the subscription, special prices were demanded, and the novelty dressed as sumptuously and prepared with as lavish an expenditure of money and care as if it were a work of the very highest importance.

Is it that?
The question is not answered by the fact that its music was composed by Richard Strauss, even though one be willing to admit that Strauss is the greatest living master of technique in musical composition, the one concerning whose doings the greatest curiosity is felt and certainly the one whose doings are the best advertised.

"Der Rosenkavalier," in spite of all these things, must stand on its merits--as a comedy with music.