In the hospitable house of this agreeable family I had heard the composer Vieuxtemps play the violin when I was nine years old.

I went home fairly enraptured, and begged my mother to let me take lessons.
My wish was fulfilled, and for many years I exerted myself zealously, without any result, to accomplish something on the violin.

I did, indeed, attain to a certain degree of skill, but I was so little satisfied with my own performances that I one day renounced the hope of becoming a practical musician, and presented my handsome violin--a gift from my grandmother--to a talented young virtuoso, the son of my sisters' French teacher.
The actress Crelinger, when she came to see my mother, made a great impression on me, at this time, by her majestic appearance and her deep, musical voice.

She, and her daughter, Clara Stich, afterward Frau Liedtcke, the splendid singer, Frau Jachmann-Wagner, and the charming Frau Schlegel-Koster, were the only members of the theatrical profession who were included among the Gepperts' friends, and whose acquaintance we made in consequence.
Frau Crelinger's husband was a highly respected jurist and councillor of justice, but among all the councillors' wives by whom she was surrounded I never heard her make use of her husband's title.

She was simply "Frau" in society, and for the public Crelinger.