"Thou teachest yet, then, out of thy vocation. But thou art no more than thou ever hast been,—too much for thy old master. And as wrens fly faster and creep stealthier than owls, so art thou already whole heavens beyond me."
But with tender scornfulness, Seraphael put out his hand in deprecation, and throwing back his hair, buried his head in the cushion of the carriage and shut his eyes. Nor did he again open them until we entered our little town.
I need scarcely say I watched him; and often, as in a glassy mirror, I see that face again upturned to the light,—too beautiful to require any shadow, or to seek it,—see again the dazzling day draw forth its lustrous symmetry, while ever the soft wind tried to lift those deep locks from the lucid temples, but tried in vain; what I am unable to picture to myself in so recalling being the ever restless smile that played and fainted over the lips, while the closed eyes were feeding upon the splendors of the Secret. I shall never forget either, though, how they opened; and he came, as it were, to his childlike self again as the light carriage—light indeed for Germany—dashed round the Kell Platz, where its ponderous contemporaneous contradictions were ranged, and took the fountain square in an unwonted sweep. Then he sat forward and watched with the greatest eagerness, and he sprang out almost before we stopped.
"I think Carl and I could save you these stairs, master mine," he exclaimed. "Let us carry you up between us!"
But what do you think was the reply? Seraphael hadspoken in his gleeful voice. But Aronach wore his gravest frown as he turned and pounced suddenly upon the other,—whipping him up in his arms, and hoisting him to his shoulder, then speeding up the staircase with his guest as if the weight were no greater than a flower or a bird! I could not stir some moments from astonishment and alarm, for I had instantaneous impressions of Seraphael flying over the balusters; but presently, when his laugh came ringing down,—and I realized it to be the laugh of one almost beside himself with fun,—I flew after them, and found them on the dark landing at the foot of our own flight. Seraphael was now upon his feet, and I quite appreciated the delicate policy of the old head here. He said in a moment, when his breath was steady,—
"Now, if they offer to chair thee again at the Quartzmayne Festival, and thou turnest giddy-pate, send for me!"
"I certainly will, if they offer such an honor; but once is quite enough, and they will not do it again."
"Why not?"
"Because I fell into the river, and was picked up by a fisherman; and desiring to know my character after I was dead, I made him cover me with his nets and row me down to Carstein, quite three miles. There I supped with him, and slept too, and the next morning heard that I was drowned."
"Oh! one knows that history, which found its way into a certain paper among the lies, and was published in illustration of the eccentricities of genius."
Aronach said this very cross,—I wondered whether it was with the Press, or his pupil; but if it were with the latter,heonly enjoyed it the more.
Then Aronach bade me conduct his guest into theorgan-room, while he himself put a period to those howlings of the immured ones which yet conscientiously asserted themselves. We waited a few moments upstairs, and then Aronach carried off the Chevalier to his own room,—a sacred region I had never approached, and which I could only suppose to exist. I then rushed to mine, and was so long in collecting my senses that Starwood came to bid me to supper. I did not detain him then, though I had so much to say; but I observed that he had his Sunday coat on,—a little blue frock, braided; and I remembered that I ought to have assumed my own. Still, my wardrobe was in such perfect order (thanks to Clo) that my own week coat was more respectable than many other boys' Sunday ones; and though I have the instinct of personal cleanliness very strong, I cannot say I like to look smart.
When I reached our parlor, I was quite dazzled. There was a sumptuous banquet, as I took it, arranged upon a cloth, the fineness and whiteness of which so far transcended our daily style that I immediately apprehended it had proceeded from the secret hoards in that wonderful closet of Aronach's. The tall glasses were interspersed with silver flagons, and the usual garnishings varied by all kinds of fruits and flowers, which appeared to have sprung from a magic touch or two of that novel magic presence. For the rest, there were delicious milk porridge on our accounts, and honey and butter, and I noticed those long-necked bottles, one like which Santonio had emptied, and which I had never seen upon that table since; for Aronach was very frugal, and taught us to be so. I was so from taste and by habit, but Iskar would have liked to gorge himself with dainties, I used to think. When I saw this last seated at the table I was highly indignant, for he hadset his stool by Seraphael's chair. He had fished from his marine store of clothes a crumpled white-silk waistcoat, over which he had invested himself with a tarnished silver watch-chain. But I would not, if I could, recall his audacious manner of gazing over everything upon the table and everybody in the room, with those legs of his stretched out for any one to stumble over, or rather on purpose to make me stumble. I knew this very well, and avoided him by placing my stool on the opposite edge of the board, where I could still look into the eyes I loved if I raised my own.
This insignificant episode will prove that Iskar had not grown in my good graces, nor had I acquainted myself better with him than on the first night of my arrival. I knew him not, but I knewofhim, for every voice in the house was against him; and he gave promise of no small power upon his instrument, together with small promise of musical or mental excellence, as all he did was correct to caricature and inimitably mechanical. Vain as he was of his playing, his vanity had small scope on that score under that quiet roof shadow, so it spent itself upon his person, which was certainly elegant, if vulgar. I am not clear but that one of these personal attractions always infers the other. But why I mention Iskar is that I may be permitted to recall the expressions with which our master's guest regarded him. It was a grieved, yet curious glance, with that child-like scrutiny of what is not true all abashing to the false,unlessthe false has lost all child-likeness. Iskar must, I suppose, have lost it, for he was not the least abashed, and was really going to begin upon his porridge before we had all sat down, if Aronach had not awfully, but serenely, rebuked him. Little Starwood, by my side, looked as fair and as pretty as ever, rather moreshy than usual. Seraphael, now seated, looked round with that exquisitely sweet politeness I have never met with but in him, and asked us each whether we would eat some honey, for he had the honey-pot before him. I had some, of course, for the pleasure of being helped by him, and he dropped it into my milk in a gold flowing stream, smiling as he did so. It was so we always ate honey at Aronach's, and it is so I eat it to this day. Little Star put out his bowl too. Oh! those great heavy wooden bowls! it was just too much for him, and he let it slip. Aronach was rousing to thunder upon him, and I felt as if the ceiling were coming down (for I knew he was angry on account of that guest of his), when we heard that voice in its clear authority,—"Dear Aronach, do nothing! the milk is not spoiled." And turning all of us together, we saw that he had caught the bowl on his outstretched hands, and that not a drop had fallen. I mention it as illustrative of that miraculous organization in which intent and action were simultaneous, the motions of whose will it seemed impossible to retard or anticipate. Even Iskar looked astonished at this feat; but he had not long to wonder, for Aronach sternly commended us to great haste in the disposal of our supper.
I needed not urging, for it was natural to feel that the master and his master must wish to be alone,—indeed, I should have been thankful to escape eating, though I was very hungry, that I might not be in the way; but directly I took pains to do away with what I had before me, I was forbidden by Aronach to "bolt."
I lay awake many hours in a vague excitement of imaginary organ sounds welling up to heaven from heaven's under-springs. I languished in a romantic vision of that face, surrounded with cloud-angels, itselftheir out-shining light. I waited to hear his footsteps upon the stairs when he should at length depart; but so soft was that departing motion that even I, listening with my whole existence, heard it not, nor heard anything to remind my heart-silence that he had come and gone.
I think I can relate nothing else of that softest month of summer, nor of sultry June. It was not until the last week I was to change my quarters; but long as it seemed in coming, it came when I was hardly prepared for the transfer. Aronach returned to his stricter self again after that supper, but I felt certain he had heard a great deal after we had left the table, as an expression of softer character forsook not his eyes and smile for many days. I could not discover whether anything had passed concerning Starwood, who remained my chief anxiety, as I felt if I left him there alone, he would not get on at all. Iskar and I preserved our mutual distance, though I would fain have been more often with him, for I wanted to make him out. He practised harder than ever, and hardly took time to eat and drink, and only on Sundays a great while to dress. He was always very jauntily put together when we set out to church, and looked like a French manikin. But for his upper lip and the shallow width of his forehead, I thought him very handsome, while, yet so young, he was so; but his charm consisted for me in his being unapproachable, and as I thought, mysterious.
We saw about as little of each other as it was possible to see, living in the same house and dining in the same room; but we never talked at meals, we had no time.
It is but fair to allow myself an allusion to my violin, as it was becoming a very essential feature in my history. With eight hours' practice a day I had made some solid progress; but it did not convict me of itself yet, as I was not allowed to play, only to acquaint myself with the anatomy of special compositions, as exercises in theory. Iskar played so easily, and gave such an air of playing to practice, that it never occurred to me I was getting on, though it was so, as I found in time. At this era I hated the violin, just as pianoforte students hate the pianoforte during the period of apprenticeship to mechanism. I hated the sound that saluted me morning, noon, and night; I shrank from it ever unaccustomed, for the penetralia of my brain could never be rendered less susceptible by piercing and searching its recesses. I believe my musical perception was as sensitive as ever, all through this epidemic dislike, but I felt myself personally very musically indisposed. I could completely dissociate my ideal impression of that I loved from my absolute experience of what I served. I was patient, because waiting; content, because faithful; and I pleased myself albeit with reflecting that my violin—my own property, my very own—had a very different soul from that thing I handled and tortured every day, from which the soul had long since fled. For all the creators of musical forms have not power to place in them the soul that lives for ages, and a little wear and tear separates the soul from the body. As for my Amati, I knew its race so pure that I feared for it no premature decay. In its dark box I hoped it was at least not unhappy, but I dearly longed for a sight of it, and had I dared, I would have crept into the closet, but that whenever it was unlocked I was locked up. The days flew, though they seemed to me so long,as ever in summer; and I felt how ravishing must the summer be without the town. I wearied after it; and although the features of German scenery are quite without a certain bloom I have only found in England, they have some mystic beauty of their own unspeakably more touching; and as I lived then, all life was a fairy-tale book, with half the leaves uncut. I was ever dreaming, but healthfully,—the dreams forgotten as soon as dreamed; so it chanced that I can tell you nothing of all I learned or felt, except what was tangibly and wakingly presented to myself. I remember, however, more than distinctly all that happened the last evening I passed in that secluded house, to my sojourn in which I owe all the benisons bestowed upon my after artist life. We had supped at our usual hour, but when I arose and advanced to salute Aronach as usual, and sighed to see how bright the sun was still upon everything without and within, he whispered in my ear,—an attention he had never before paid me,—"Stay up by me until the other two are off; for I wish to speak to thee and to give thee some advice."
Iskar saw him whisper, and looked very black because he could not hear; but Aronach waved him out, and bade me shut the door upon him and Starwood. I trembled then, for I was not used to be along with himtête-à-tête; we usually had a third party present in the company of Marpurg or Albrechtsberger.[17]He went into the closet first, and rummaged a few minutes, and then returning, appeared laden with a bottle of wine and my long hid fiddle-case. Oh, how I flew to relieve him of it! But he bade me again sit down, while he went back into the closet and rummaged again; this time for acouple of glasses and two or three curious jars, rich china, and of a beautiful form. He uncorked the bottle and poured me, as I expected, a glass of wine.
It was not the wine that agitated me, but the rarity of the attention, so much so that I choked instead of wishing him his health, as I ought to have done. But he was quite unmoved at my excitation, and leaned back to pour glass after glass down his own throat. I was so unused to wine that the sip I took exhilarated me, though it was the slightest wine one can imbibe for such purpose. And then he uncovered the odd gay jars, and helped me profusely to the exquisite preserves they contained. They were so luscious and delicate that they reminded me of Eden fruits; and almost before my wonder had shaped itself into form, certainly before it could have betrayed itself in my countenance, Aronach began to speak,—
"They pique thee, no doubt, and not only thy palate, for thou wast ever curious. They come from him of whom thou hast never spoken since thy holiday."
"Everything comes from him, I think, sir."
"No, only the good, not the evil nor the negative; and it is on this point I would advise thee, for thou art as inconsiderate as a fledgling turned out of the nest, and art ware of nothing."
"Pray advise me, sir," I said, "and I shall be glad that I am inconsiderate, to be advised by you."
I looked at him, and was surprised that a deep seriousness overshadowed the constant gravity,—which was as if one entered from the twilight a still more sombre wood.
"I intend to advise thee because thou art ignorant, though pure; untaught, yet not weak. I would not advise thy compeers,—one is too young, the other too old."
"Iskar too old!" I exclaimed.
"Iskar was never a child; whatever thou couldst teach him would only ripen his follies, already too forward. He belongs to the other world."
"There are two worlds then in music," I thought; for it had been ever a favorite notion of my own, but I did not say so, I was watching him. He took from the breast pocket of his coat—that long brown coat—a little leather book, rolled up like a parchment; this he opened, and unfolded a paper that had lain in the curves, and yet curled round unsubmissive to his fingers. He deliberately bent it back, and held it a moment or two, while his eyes gathered light in their fixed gaze upon what he clasped, then smoothed it to its old shape with his palm, and putting on his horn-set eye-glasses, which lent him an owl-like reverendness, he began to read to me. And as I have that little paper still, and as, if not sweet, it is very short, I shall transcribe it here and now:—
"When thou hearest the folks prate about art, be certain thou art never tempted to make friends there; for if they be wise in any other respect, they are fools in this, that they know not when to keep silence and how. For art consists not in any of its representatives, and is of itself alone. To interpret it aright we must let it make its own way, and those who talk about it gainsay its true impressions, which alone remain in the bosom that is single and serene. If thou markest well, thou wilt find how few of those who make a subsistence out of music realize its full significance; for they are too busy to recall that they live for it, and not by it, even though it brings them bread. And just as few are those who set apart their musical life from all ambition, even honorable,—for ambition is of this earth alone, andin a higher yearning doth musical life consist; so the irreligious many are incapable of the fervor of the few. And the few, those I did exclude,—the few who possess in patience this inexhaustible desire,—are those who compose my world."
"You mean, sir," I exclaimed, so warm, so glowing at my heart, that the summer without, brooding over the blossomed lindens, was as winter to the summer in my veins, so suddenly penetrated I felt,—"you mean, sir, that as good people I have heard speak of the world, and of good people who are not worldly, apart, and seem to know them from each other,—in religion I mean,—so it is in music. I am sure my sister thought so,—my sister in England; but she never dared to say so."
"No, of course not; there is no right to say so anywhere now, except in Germany, for here alone has music its priesthood, and here alone, though little enough here, is reverentially regarded as the highest form of life, subserving to the purposes of the soul. But thou art right to believe entirely so, that, young as thou art, thou mayest keep thy purity, and mighty may be thy aptness to discern what is new to thee in the old, no less than what answers to the old in the new.
"And, first, when thou goest out of leading-strings, never accustom thyself to look for faults or feelings differing from thine own in those set over thee. It is certain that many a student of art has lost ground in this indulgence; for oftentimes the student, either from natural imagination, or from the vernal innocence of youth, will be outstripping his instructors in his grand intentions, and giving himself up to them will be losing the present hours in the air that should be informing themselves, with steady progress, in the strictest mechanical course. Never till thou hast mastered every conceivabledifficulty, dream of producing the most distant musical effect.
"But, secondly, lest thine enthusiasm should perish of starvation under this mechanical pressure, keep thy wits awake to contemplate every artist and token of art that come between thee and daylight. And the more thou busiest thyself in mechanical preparation, the more leisure thou shalt discover so to observe; the more serene and brilliant shall thy imagination find itself,—a clear sky filled with the sunshine of that enthusiasm which spreads itself over every object in earth and heaven.
"Again, of music, or the tone-art, as thou hast heard me name it, never let thy conception cease. Never believe thou hast adopted the trammels of a pursuit bounded by progress because thine own progress bounds thine own pursuit. In despair at thy slow induction,—be it slow as it must be gradual,—doubt not that it is into a divine and immeasurable realm thou shalt at length be admitted; and if the ethereal souls of the masters gone before thee have thirsted after the infinite, even in such immeasurable space, recall thyself, and bow contented that thou hast this in common with those above thee,—the insatiable presentment of futurity with which the Creator has chosen to endow the choicest of his gifts,—the gift in its perfection granted ever to the choicest, the rarest of the race."
"And that is why it is granted to the Hebrew nation,—why they all possess it like a right!" I cried, almost without consciousness of having spoken. But Aronach answered not; he only slightly, with the least motion, leaned his head so that the silver of his beard trembled, and a sort of tremor agitated his brow, that I observed not in his voice as he resumed.
"Thou art young, and mayest possibly excel early, as a mechanical performer. I need not urge thee to prune the exuberance of thy fancy and to bind thy taste—by nature delicate—to the pure, strong models whose names are, at present, to thee their only revelation. For the scapegrace who figures in thy daily calendar as so magnificently thy superior, will ever stand thee instead of a warning or ominous repulsion, so long as thy style is forming; and when formed, that style itself shall fence thee alike with natural and artful antipathy against the school he serves, that confesses to no restriction, no, not the restraint of rule, and is the servant of its own caprice.
"Thou shalt find that many who profess the art, confess not to that which they yet endure,—a sort of shame in their profession, as if they should ennobleit, and not itthem. Such professors thou shalt ever discover are slaves, not sons; their excellence as performers owing to the accidental culture of their imitative instinct; and they are theripieniof the universal orchestra, whose chief doth appear but once in every age.
"Thou shalt be set on to study by thine instructors, and, as I before hinted, wilt ever repose upon their direction. But in applying to the works they select for thine edification, whether theoretic or practical, endeavor to disabuse thyself of all thy previous impressions and prepossessions of any author whatsoever, and to absorb thyself in the contemplation of that alone thou busiest thyself upon.
"Thus alone shall thine intelligence explore all styles, and so separate each from each as finally to draw the exact conclusion from thine own temperament and taste of that to which thou dost essentially incline.
"In treating of music specifically, remember not to confound its elements. As in ancient mythology many religious seeds were sown, and golden symbols scattered, so may we apply its enforcing fables where the new wisdom denies us utterance, and the nearer towards the expression of the actual than if we observed the literal forms of speech. Thus ever remembering that as the 'aorasia' was a word signifying the invisibility of the gods, and the 'avatar' their incarnation, so istimethe aorasia of music the god-like, andtoneits avatar.
"Then, intime, shalt thou realize that in which the existence of music as infallibly consists as in its manifestation,tone, and thine understanding shall become invested with the true nature ofrhythm, which alike doth exist between time and tone, seeming to connect in spiritual dependence the one with the other inseparably.
"In devoting thine energies to the works of art in ages behind thine own, thou shalt never be liable to depress thy consciousness of those which are meritoriouswiththee, andyetto come before thee. For thou wilt learn that to follow the supreme of art with innocence and wisdom was ever allotted to the few whose labors yet endure; while as to the many whose high-flown perfections in their day seduced the admiration of the myriads to the neglect of the few, exceptbyfew, find we nothing of them at present, but the names alone of their operas, or the mention of their having been, and being now no more. And this is while the few are growing and expanding their fame, as the generations succeed, ever among the few of every generation, but yet betokening in that still, secluded renown, the immortal purpose for which they wrote and diednot.
"Be assured that in all works that have endured thereis something of the nature of truth; therefore acquaint thyself with all, ever reserving the right to honor with peculiar investigation those works in which the author by scientific hold upon forceful imagination intimates that he wrote with the direct intention to illustrate his art, not alone for the love of it, but in the fear of its service. Thus apply thyself to the compositions of Palestrina, of Purcell, of Alessandro Scarlatti, and the indefatigable Corelli; thus lend thyself to the masterpieces of Pergolesi, of Mozart, and Handel; thus lean with thine entire soul upon the might and majesty of John Sebastian Bach. All others in order, but these in chief; and this last generalissimo, until thou hast learnt to govern thyself."
He paused and stayed, and the summer evening-gold crowned him as he sat. That same rich gleam creeping in, for all the deep shade that filled the heavenly vault, seemed to touch me with solemn ecstasy alike with his words. He was folding up that paper, and had nearly settled it before I dared to thank him; but as he held it out, and I grasped it, I also kissed the ivory of his not unwrinkled hand, and he did not withdraw it. Then I said, "My dear master, my dear, dear Herr Aronach, is that for me to keep?"
"It is for thee," he answered; "and perhaps, as there is little of it, thou wilt digest it more conveniently than a more abundant lecture. Thou art imaginative, or I should not set thee laws, and implicit, or thou wouldst not follow them."
"I should like to know, sir, whether those are the sort of rules you gave the Chevalier Seraphael when he was a little boy?"
"No, no; they are not such as I gave him, be certain."
"I thought not, perhaps. Oh, sir, how very surprising he must have been when he was so young and little!"
"He did not rudely declaim, thou mayest imagine, at eight years old, and his voice was so modest to strangers that it was hard to make him heard at all,—this it was that made me set no laws before him."
"How then, sir, did you teach him?" was my bolder question.
"He would discourse of music in its native tongue, when his small fingers conversed with the keys of his favorite harpsichord, so wondrously at home there, from the first time theyfeltthemselves. And in still obedience to the law of that inborn harmony that governed his soul, he would bend his curly pate over the score till all the color fell off his round cheek; and his forehead would work and frown with thoughts strong enough to make a strong man's brain quiver. I was severe with him to save my conscience; but he ever outwitted me, nor could I give him enough to do, for he made play of work, and no light work of play. It was as if I should direct the south wind to blow in summer, or the sunbeams to make haste with the fruit. At length it came to such a pass—his calm attainment—that I gave him up to die! He left off growing too, and there was of him so little that you would have thought him one the pleasant folk had changed at birth: bright enough were his eyes for such suspicion. So I clapped upon him one day as he was lying upon a bit of shade in my garden, his cap of velvet tumbled off, and the feather flying as you please, while over the score of Graun he had fallen fast asleep. When I came to him, I thought the little heart-strings had given way, to let him free altogether, he lay so still and heavy in his slumber, andno breath came through his lips that I could see. So I took him up, never waking him, and laid him away in bed, and locked up every staved sheet that lay about, and every score and note-book, and shut the harpsichord; and when at last he awoke, I took him upon my knee,—for it was then he came to my house for his lessons, and I could do with him as I pleased. 'Now,' said I, 'thou hast been asleep over thy books, and I have carried them all away, for thou art lazy, and shalt see them never again, unless thou art content to do as I shall bid thee.'
"Then he looked into my face with his kind child's eyes, and said,—
"'I wish that thou wert my pupil, master; for if so, I should show thee how I should like to be taught.'
"'Well, thou art now very comfortable on my knee, and mayest pull my watch-chain if thou wilt, and shalt also tell me the story of what thou shouldst teach thine old, grand pupil,—we will make a play of it.'
"'I do not care to pull thy chain now, but I should like to watch thy face while I tell thee.'
"So then, Master Carl, this elf stood upright on my knees, and spread out his arms, and laughed loud till the wet pearls shone; and while I held his feet—for I thought he would fly away—says he to mock me,—
"'Now, Master Aronach, thou mayest go home and play with thy little sister at kings and queens, and never do any more lessons till thou art twelve years old; for that is the time to be a man and do great things: and now thou art a poor baby, who cannot do anything but play and go to sleep. And all the big books are put away, and nobody is to bring them out again until thou art big and canst keep awake.'
"Then I looked at him hard, to see whether he wasstill mocking me; but when I found he looked rather about to cry, I set him down, and took my hat, and walked out of my house to the lower ramparts. On the lower ramparts stood the fine house of his father, and I rang the bell quite free, and went boldly up the stairs. His mother was alone in her grand drawing-room, and I said that she might either come and fetch him away altogether, or let him stay with me and amuse himself as he cared for; that I would not teach him for those years to come, as he had said. The stately lady was offended, and carried him off from me altogether; and when he went he was very proud, and would not shed one tear, though he clung round my collar and whispered, elf that he was,—'I shall come back when I am twelve. Hush! master, hush!'"
"And did he come back?" I cried, no less in ecstasy at the story than at the confidence reposed in me.
"All in good time—peace," said Aronach. "I never saw him again until the twenty-second morning of May, in the fourth year after his mother carried him off. I heard of the wonder-boy from every mouth,—how he was taken here, and flourished there, to show off; and petted and praised by the king; and I thought often how piteous was it thus to spoil him. On that very morning I was up betimes, and was writing a letter to an old friend of mine whose daughter was dead, when I heard feet like a fawn that was finding quick way up my dark stairs, and I stopped to listen. The door was burst open all in a moment, as if by the wind, and there he stood, in his little hat and feather and his gay new dress, bright as a birthday prince, with a huge lumbering flower-pot in his two little arms. He set that upon the floor and danced up to me directly, climbing upon my knees. 'Will you take me back? For I am twelve,and nobody else can teach me! I know alltheyknow.'
"He folded his little arms together round my collar, and held on there tight. What a minimus he was! scarcely a half-foot taller; but with such a noble air, and those same kind eyes of old. I pinched his fair cheek, which was red as any rose; but it was only a blossom born of the morning air: as he still sat upon my knees, the beauteous color fell, faded quite away, and left him pale,—pale as you now see him, Master Carl."
"Oh, sir! tell me a little, little more. What did he tell you? What did he do?"
"He told me, with the pale face pressed against my coat, 'Thou seest, sweet master, I would not take pains just at first, and mamma was very grand; she never blessed me for a week, and I never kissed her. I did lessons with her, though, and tried to plague her, and played very sad, very ill, and would hardly read a bar. So mamma took it into her head to say thatyouhad not taught me properly; and I grew very wild, angry,—so hurt at least that I burst out, and ran downstairs, and came no more for lessons five whole days. Then I begged her pardon, and she sent for Herr Hümmel to teach me. I played my very best to Herr Hümmel, master mine!'
"'I daresay he did,' thought I, 'the naughty one! the elf!' There he lay back with his pale face, and all the mischief in his starry eyes.
"'And Herr Hümmel,' my loveling went on, pursing his lips, 'said he could not teach me to play, but perhaps he could teach me to write. So I wrote for him ever so many pages, and he could not read them, for I wrote so small, so small; and Herr Hümmel has such very weak eyes!'
"Oh! how naughty he looked, lying across my knees!
"'And then,' he prattled, 'mamma set herself to look for somebody very new and great; and she picked up Monsieur Milans-André, who is a very young master, only nineteen years old; and mamma says he is a great genius. Now, as for me, dear master, I don't know what a great genius is; but if Monsieur André be one,thouart not one, nor I.'
"Oh, the haughty one! still prattling on,—
"'I did take pains, and put myself back, that he might show me over again what you, dear master, had taught me, so that I never forget, and could not forget, if I tried; and in a year I told mamma I would never touch the harpsichord again if she did not promise I should come back to you again. She said she couldn't promise, and, master, I neverdidagain touch the harpsichord, but instead, I learned what was better, to play on Monsieur André's grand pianoforte!'
"'And how didst thou admire that, eh?' I asked, rather curious about the matter.
"'Oh! it is very comfortable; I feel quite clear about it, and have written for it some things. But Monsieur André is to go a tour, so he told mamma yesterday, and this morning before he came I ran away, and I am returned to you, and have brought my tree to keep my birthday with you. And, master mine, Iwon'tgo back again!'
"Before I could answer him, as I expected, comes a pull at the bell to draw the house down, and up the stairs creaks Rathsherr Seraphael, the father, a mighty good looking and very grand man. He takes a seat, and looks queer and awful. But the little one, quitting me, dances round and round his chair and kisses away that frown.
"'Dear and beautiful papa, thou must give me leave to stay I am thine only son!'
"'Thou art indeed, and hast never before disobeyed me. Why didst thou run away, my Adonais?'
"'Papa,hecan only teach me; I willnotleave him, for I must obey music before you, and in him music calls me.'
"He ran back to my knee, and there his father left him (but very disconcerted), and I don't know how they settled it at home. But enough for me, there was never any more difficulty, and he and I kept his birthday together; the little candles burned out among the linden-flowers, and beautiful presents came for him and for me from the great house on the ramparts.
"And he never left me," added Aronach, with a prodigious pleasure too big to conceal either by word or look, "he never left me until he set off for his travels all over Europe, during which travels I removed, and came up here a long distance from the old place, where I had him all to myself, and he was all to me."
"Thanks, dear master, if I too may so call you. I shall always feel that you are; but I did not know how very much you had to do with him."
"Thou mayest so name me, because thou art not wanting in veneration, and canst also bemastered."
"Thanks forever. And I may keep this precious paper? In your own writing, sir, it will be more than if you had said it, you know, though I should have remembered every word. And the story, too, is just as safe as if you had written it for me."
And so it was.
END OF VOL. I.
THE LAUREL-CROWNED LETTERS.
The Best Letters of Lord Chesterfield.Edited, with an Introduction, byEdward Gilpin Johnson.
The Best Letters of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu.Edited, with an Introduction, byOctave Thanet.
The Best Letters of Horace Walpole.Edited, with an Introduction, byAnna B. McMahan.
The Best Letters of Madame de Sévigné.Edited, with an Introduction, byEdward Playfair Anderson.
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Abdallah; or, The Four-Leaved Shamrock. By Edouard Laboulaye.Translated byMary L. Booth.
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MONK AND KNIGHT.
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The same material drawn upon by Longfellow for his "New England Tragedies" is here used with greater fulness and with no less historical exactitude. The story has for its background the dark and gloomy pictures of the witchcraft persecution, of which it furnishes a thrilling view. It is remarkable for bold imagination, wonderfully rapid action, and continued and absorbing interest.
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THE BEVERLEYS.
A Story of Calcutta.
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The author has until now been known, so far as we are aware, only by her former story, "Alexia." Unless signs fail which seldomdofail, these two with which her name is now associated are simply the forerunners of works in a like vein of which American literature will have reason to be proud.—Standard, Chicago.
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THE BRIDGE OF THE GODS.
A ROMANCE OF INDIAN OREGON.
ByF. H. Balch.
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This is a masterly and original delineation of Indian life. It is a strong story, charged with the elemental forces of the human heart. The author portrays with unusual power the intense, stern piety of the ministers of colonial New England, and the strange mingling of dignity, superstition, ferocity, and stoicism that characterized the early Indian warriors.
There is no need of romancing, and Mr. Balch's scenic descriptions are for all practical purposes real descriptions. The legends he relates of the great bridge which once spanned the Columbia, for which there is some substantial history, adds to the mystical charms of the story. His Indian characters are as real as if photographed from life. No writer has presented a finer character than the great chief of the Willamettes, Multnomah; Snoqualmie the Cayuse; or Tohomish the Seer. The night visit of Multnomah to the tomb of his dead wife upon that lonely island in the Willamette is a picture that will forever live in the reader's memory.... To those who have traversed the ground, and know something of Indian character and the wild, free life of pioneer days, the story will be charming.—Inter-Ocean, Chicago.
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