Transcriber's Notes:

1. Page scans are from Web Archive: http://www.archive.org/details/serapionbrethren01hoffuoft

2. All footnotes (5 in number) are listed at the end of the book.

THE SERAPION BRETHREN.

GEORGE BELL AND SONS

LONDON PORTUGAL ST., LINCOLN'S INN.
CAMBRIDGE: DEIGHTON, BELL AND CO.
NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN CO.
BOMBAY: A. H. WHEELER AND CO.

THE SERAPION BRETHREN.

BY

ERNST THEODOR WILHELM HOFFMANN

Translated from the German

BY

MAJOR ALEX. EWING,

A.P.D.,

TRANSLATOR OF J. P. RICHTER'S "FLOWER, FRUIT, AND THORN PIECES,"
ETC.

VOLUME I.

LONDON:
GEORGE BELL AND SONS

1908.

[Reprinted from Stereotype plates.]

PREFACE.

Notwithstanding the popularity which several of Hoffmann's tales have obtained in many different countries, we are not aware of any complete or accurate translation of his works. In England they have become known in a very partial form, chiefly by the appearance of a few isolated tales in association with those of other writers, as in the 'Specimens of German Romance,' or in Gillies' 'German Stories,' which were published about 1830. Others are familiar only through the medium of a translation from a previous French version, as is the case with the well-known 'Nutcracker,'--and in this process of double dilution the Author's name has sometimes disappeared altogether.

The most important attempt to present this writer to English readers is the recent publication of two volumes entitled 'Hoffmann's Weird Stories,' which contain eleven tales seven being from the Serapions-Brüder, two from the Nachtstücke, and two from other parts of his works. These stories are all separated from the setting in which, as in the present volume, they for the most part appeared, and the translator has not aimed at any completeness or method in their selection. The first attempt to give English readers a satisfactory idea of Hoffmann's work in its completeness is inaugurated by the present volume, which will be followed by the remaining portion of the Serapion Brethren, and in due course it is hoped by other portions of his works.

Musicians will be interested by the fulness with which the Author's views on musical subjects so much in advance of his age, and so just and accurate are developed in many places, such as the dialogue called "The Poet and the Composer," and the conversation which precedes the tale "Master Martin." It would be of much interest could any of Hoffmann's numerous musical compositions be brought to light at the present day; they appear to have been considerably in advance of their period, although Weber's critique on one of Hoffmann's operas is full of high praise.

A. E.

Taunton, September, 1886.

CONTENTS.

THE SERAPION BRETHREN.

[SECTION I.]

"Look at the question how one will, the bitter conviction is not to be got rid of by persuasion, or by force, that what has been never, never can be again. It is useless to contend with the irresistible power of Time, which goes on continually creating by a process of constant destruction. Nothing survives save the shadowy reflected images left by that part of our lives which has set, and gone far below our horizon; and they often haunt and mock us like evil, ghostly dreams. But we are fools, and expect that matters which, in reality, were nothing but our ideas, parts and portions of our own individualities, are to be found actually existent in the world outside us, and blooming in perpetual youth! The woman we have loved and parted from, the friend to whom we have said good-bye, are both lost to us for ever. The people whom, perhaps years afterwards, we meet as being them, are not the same whom we left, neither are we ever the same to them."

So saying, Lothair got up from his seat, and folding his arms on the mantel-piece, gazed, with gloomy sadness, into the fire which was blazing and crackling merrily.

"One thing is certain enough," said Theodore, "that, at all events, you, dear Lothair, are so far actually the same Lothair whom I bade good-bye to twelve years ago, that whenever any little thing vexes or disappoints you at all, you immediately sink down to the lowest depths of gloom and despair. It is quite true--and Cyprian, Ottmar and I feel it as much as you that this first meeting of ours after our twelve years' separation comes short of being quite all that we had pictured it to be. Put the blame on me, who raced through one of those endless streets of ours after another, leaving no stone unturned to get you all assembled here to-night by my fireside. Perhaps I had better have left it to chance. But I could not bear the idea that we--who had spent so many years together in such close friendship, joined by the bonds of our common pursuits in art and knowledge, and only driven asunder by the hurricane which raged during that fateful time--that we, I say, should come to cast anchor in the same harbour, for so much as a single day, and yet not look upon each other with the eyes of the body, as we had with the eyes of the spirit in the interval. And now, we have been sitting here together for some hours, wearying ourselves to death over the enthusiastic quality of our revived friendship, yet not one of us has said anything worth listening to: we have talked tedious, tiresome stuff, to a perfectly astonishing extent. And why is this, but because we are a set of very childish children, thinking we were going to take up the old tune which we sang twelve years ago, at the point where we broke off with it, and go on singing it as we were doing then. Lothair, we will say, should have read Tieck's 'Zerbino' aloud to us for the first time, to our astonished delight; or Cyprian should have brought some fanciful poem, or perhaps the text of a whole operatic extravaganza, to which I should then have composed the music on the spot, and thundered it out on the old weak-loined piano of twelve years back; or Ottmar should have told us about some wonderful curiosity he had come across--some remarkable wine, some extraordinary nincompoop, etc., and set us all on fire with projects and ideas how to make the most of our enjoyment of either, or both; and because none of all this has happened, we sit secretly sulking at each other, each thinking (of the other) 'Ay! what a change in the dear old fellow. Well! I never should have believed he could have altered so!' Of course we none of us are the same. I say nothing of the circumstance that we are twelve years older; that, no doubt, every year lays more earth upon us, which weighs us down from aerial regions, till we go under the earth at last. But whom of us, all this time, has not the wild whirlpool carried surging on from event to event, and from action to action? The terror, the trouble, the anxiety of that stormy time,[¹] could not pass over us without leaving bleeding scars graven on our hearts. The pictures of our early days are pale compared with that, and we cannot revive their colours. No doubt, too, there is much in life and in ourselves which looked very bright and glorious, and has lost its dazzling glitter for our eyes, grown accustomed to a brighter light; but the modes of thinking and feeling which gave rise to our friendship remain pretty much the same. I mean that we all consider each other something rather above the common, in suitability to each other at all events, so as to be worthy of a thorough friendship. So let us leave the old days out of sight, with all the promise and anticipations belonging to them, and, starting from the conviction which I have expressed, see how we can best establish a new bond of union."

"Heaven be thanked," said Ottmar, "that Lothair could no longer endure the forced, unnatural condition in which we were, and that you, Theodore, have at once exorcised the malignant little fiend which was vexing and teasing us. This constrained feeling of 'You are bound to be enjoying yourself, whether you really are or not,' was beginning to stifle me, and I was just getting fearfully out of temper, when Lothair broke out as he did. But now that Theodore has pointed out so clearly what it was that was amiss, I seem to be brought much nearer to you all, and things appear as if the old kindly unconstrained comfort, with which we used to meet, were getting the upper hand. Theodore is right; though Time has altered a good many things, our belief in each other remains untouched. And with this, I solemnly declare the preliminaries of our new League established; and it is laid down as a rule that we come together once every week on a certain day--otherwise we shall lose sight of each other in this big town, and be further asunder than ever."

"A great idea," cried Lothair, "only you should add a few regular rules as to our weekly meetings; for instance, that we are, or are not, to talk upon certain subjects; or that each of us is bound to be three times as witty as usual; or that we must always eat sardine-salad. In this fashion, the fullest blown form of Philistinism that flourishes in any club will burst in upon us. Don't you think, Ottmar, that anything in the shape of a formal stipulation connected with our meetings would at once introduce an element of constraint, destructive, at all events, of my enjoyment in them? Let me remind you of the extreme repugnance which we used to feel towards everything in the shape of a 'club,' or whatever name might be given to absurd institutions of the kind, where all sorts of tedium and wearisomeness are carried forward on system. And now you propose to force and constrain, artificially, this four-bladed clover-plant of ours--which can only flourish and thrive naturally without any gardener's training--into an evil form of this sort."

"Our friend Lothair," said Theodore, "does not get out of his moods so very quickly, that we all know; as also that when he is in them he sees spectres, and fights with them sturdily until he is dead-beat, and obliged to acknowledge that they were nothing but spectres, the creations of his own brain. How is it possible, Lothair, that Ottmar's harmless and very innocent suggestion should at once set you thinking of clubs, and the Philistinism inherent in them? All the same, you have brought to my memory a very amusing remembrance of our former days. I dare say you remember the time when we first left the Residency and went to the little town of P----? The customs of society made it incumbent on us to join the club which the so-called 'Upper ten' of the place belonged to. We received due notification, in a solemn document, worded in the most formal juridical style, that, after the due formalities, we had been admitted as members; and this notification was accompanied by a great book, of some fifteen to twenty sheets of paper, handsomely bound, containing the Club Rules. They had been drawn up by an old legal luminary, exactly in the style of the Prussian Municipal Code, all divided into titles and paragraphs, and were the most entertaining reading it is possible to conceive. For instance, one title was superscribed, 'Concerning Women and Children, and their Rights, and Privileges,' in which nothing more or less was sanctioned than that the wives and daughters of the members had the privilege of coming to tea within the precincts of the club every Thursday and Sunday evening, and might even dance there some five or six times during the winter. Concerning children the law was still more accurately and critically enunciated, the jurist having handled this subject with even more than his usual care, jealously distinguishing between children under age, children of age, and children under parental tutelage. Those under age were further sub-divided, according to their moral qualities, into well-behaved, and ill-behaved, and the latter were unconditionally debarred from admission, 'good behaviour' being a fundamental principle of the club constitution. The next title was the noteworthy one, 'Concerning Dogs, Cats, and other irrational creatures,' and laid down that nobody might bring into the club any dangerous wild beast. So that, had any member taken to himself (for example) a lion, a tiger, or a panther by way of lapdog, it would have been impossible for him to take it into the club. Even had its mane and claws been cut, a schismatic of this description would have been excluded unconditionally by the committee. Even the cleverest poodles, and the most highly-trained pugs were declared ineligible, and might only, (on exceptional occasions in summer, when dinner was in the open air,) be introduced, on presentation of a card of permission by the committee. We--Lothair and I--invented a number of addenda and declarations supplementary to this deeply-considered codex, which we proposed, with the most solemn gravity, at the next meeting, and, to our great entertainment, carried the thing so far that the most preposterous nonsense was discussed and debated on with the gravest deliberation. But at last one or two saw through our joke, so that all confidence in us was at an end--although our expectations were not realised, for we had thought it a certainty that we should be solemnly expelled from the club."

"I remember it quite well," said Lothair, "and I'm not a little annoyed to feel that nowadays I could not carry out a similar mystification. I have grown much too dull and sluggish, and inclined to be annoyed with matters which used to make me laugh."

"Nothing shall induce me to believe that," said Ottmar; "rather I feel convinced, Lothair, that the echoes of something painful are louder in you to-day than common. But a new life will shortly breathe through you like a breeze of spring; those jarring discords will die away, and you will be the same Lothair that you were twelve years since. Your club at P---- reminds me of another, whose founders must have been witty fellows. It was on the plan of a regular kingdom, with a King, Ministers, a Parliament, &c. Its sole raison d'être was good eating, and better drinking, and its meetings were held in the principal hotel, where the wines and cuisine were of the best. At those meetings, the Minister for Foreign Affairs would give notice of the arrival of some remarkably superior Rhine wine at some merchant's in the town. An embassy would then be despatched, furnished with minute instructions, and provided with necessary credits to be drawn against a special reserve-fund in the hands of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. On occasions when a ragout turned out badly, everything was at sixes and sevens. Pourparlers and diplomatic notes were exchanged relating to the threatening aspect of the affairs of the realm. Then Parliament would meet to decide as to the particular wine to be used on a given day in compounding the cold punch. The decision had to be solemnly laid before His Majesty in Council, and, after due deliberation, the King would bow, in assent; the ordinance concerning the cold punch, duly passed, would be remitted for execution to the Minister of the Interior. Art and Science, also, were represented in these ceremonies; the poet who wrote a new drinking song, and the musician who composed and performed it, receiving a decoration from His Majesty's hands in the shape of a red hen's feather, coupled with the permission to drink an extra bottle of wine--at their own expense. On State occasions the King had a crown, orb, and sceptre of gilt pasteboard, and the dignitaries of the realm wore quaint head-dresses. The symbol of the fraternity was a silver box with a hen sitting on eggs on the lid. At the time when I forgathered with this pleasant company, there was a large proportion of talented people in its ranks, so that it was entertaining enough, as far a it went."

"I have no doubt it was," said Lothair, "but I can't comprehend how a thing of the kind could be kept up for any length of time. The best of jokes loses its point if it is kept going so long as it seems to have been in this 'Lodge of the Clucking Hen,' if I may so style it. You have both, Theodore and Ottmar, told us of clubs on a grand scale, with their rules, regulations, and mystifications. Let me direct your attention to what was probably the very minutest club that ever, I should think, existed on this earth. In a certain little town on the Polish frontier, occupied, at the time, by Prussia, the only German officials were an old captain--retired on account of bad health--who was postmaster, and the exciseman. Every evening as the clock struck five, these two repaired to the only inn which there was in the place, to a little room where nobody else was admitted. Generally, the exciseman arrived there before the captain, who would find him smoking his pipe over his jug of beer. The captain, on coming in, would greet him with, 'Fine evening! Any news?' sit down opposite to him at the table; light his pipe--filled beforehand; take the paper out of his pocket, and hand each sheet, as he finished it, across to the exciseman, who would read it with equal care and avidity. They would go on puffing their clouds of smoke into each other's eyes in profound silence, till the clock struck eight, when the exciseman would get up, knock the ashes out of his pipe, and with a 'Not much news, to speak of,' be off to his bed. This they styled, in all seriousness, 'Our Club.'

"Very good indeed," said Theodore, "and our Cyprian here would have been a splendid candidate for membership in that club. He never would have broken the sacred silence by any ill-timed remark. He seems to have taken a vow of silence, like the monks of La Trappe, for up to this moment not a syllable has passed his lips."

Cyprian, who had indeed been completely silent up to this point, heaved a deep sigh, as if awaking from a dream; raised his eyes to the ceiling, and said, with a quiet smile:

"I don't mind confessing that all this day I have been unable to banish from my recollection a certain strange adventure which I met with several years ago; and perhaps when the voices within one are loud, the lips are not very apt to open for speech. But I have been attending to all that has been said, and can give a proper account of it all. In the first place, Theodore was quite right in saying that we had been childish in fancying that we could begin again just where we left off twelve years ago, and were sulking with each other because this was not, and could not be, the case. I maintain that nothing could have so established us as Philistines incarnate as to have gone ambling along in our old track. And this reminds me of two savants--but I must tell this story at full length. Imagine two men--whom I shall call Sebastian and Ptolemy--imagine to yourselves these two studying Kant's philosophy as hard as they could at College at K----, and daily carrying on long discussions as to various points of it. Just at the moment when Sebastian was going to deliver his most clenching blow, and Ptolemy pulling himself together to answer it, they were interrupted; and Fate so arranged matters that they never met again in K----, one going off in one direction, the other, in another. Nearly twenty years afterwards Ptolemy saw in the streets of B----, a figure walking, whom he at once recognised as his friend Sebastian. He rushed after him, slapped him on the shoulder, and when he looked round, Ptolemy said: 'Then you maintain that----'

"In short, struck the (argumentative) blow which he had lifted his arm to deliver twenty years before! Sebastian sprung the mines which he had laid in K----. They argued for two hours, three hours, walking up and down the streets, and in the heat of their discussion, agreed to submit the question to the Professor for his decision, never recollecting that poor old Emanuel had been many a year in his grave. They parted, and never met again. Now to me there is something almost terrific about this story (which has this peculiarity, that it is strictly true). My imagination boggles at a Philistinism of a depth so ghastly! So we are not going to be Philistines. We are not going to insist on spinning on at the thread which we were spinning twelve years ago, nor be annoyed with each other for having on different hats and coats. We will be different to what we were then, and yet the same; so that is settled. What Lothair, without much relevancy, said of clubs is, I dare say true enough, and proves how prone poor Humanity is to dam up the minutest remnants of its freedom, and build an artificial roof to prevent it looking up to the clear blue sky. But what have we to do with this? For my part, I adhere to Ottmar's proposal, that we meet every week on a certain day."

"I shall oppose it persistently," said Lothair. "But to put an end to this horrible argument and discussion, let Cyprian tell us the strange adventure which is so much in his thoughts to-day."

"My idea," said Cyprian, "is rather that we should try to get into a merrier mood; and it would greatly conduce to this if Theodore would be so kind as to open yon old mysterious vase, which, judging by the delicate aroma it gives out, might have pertained to the Brotherhood of the Clucking Hen. Nothing on earth could have a more opposite effect than my adventure, which you would consider inappropriate, altogether uninteresting--nay, silly and absurd. It is gloomy in its character at the same time, and the part which I play in it is the reverse of distinguished: abundant reasons for saying nothing about it."

"Did I not tell you," cried Theodore, "that our Cyprian, our dear Sunday-child, had been seeing all kinds of questionable spirits again, which he won't allow our utterly carnal eyes to look upon? Out with your adventure, Cyprian, and if you do play rather an ungrateful part in it, I promise that I will soon recollect, and dish you up adventures of my own in which I play a more ungrateful part than you can possibly do. I assure you I have a large stock of them."

"So be it then," said Cyprian; and after gazing reflectively before him for a few seconds, he commenced as follows:--

"[You know that], some years ago I spent a considerable time in B----, a place in one of the pleasantest districts of the South of Germany. As my habit is, I used to take long walks in the surrounding country by myself, without any guide, though I should often have been the better for one. On one of these occasions I got into a piece of thickly wooded country and lost my way; the farther I went, the less could I discover the smallest vestige of a human footstep. At last the wood grew less thick, and I saw, not far from me, a man in a brown hermit's robe, with a broad straw hat on his head, and a long, wild black beard, sitting on a rock, by the side of a deep ravine gazing, with folded hands, thoughtfully into the distance. This sight had something so strange, unexpected, and out of the common about it that I felt a shiver of eeriness and awe. One can scarcely help such a feeling when what one has only heretofore seen in pictures, or read of in books, suddenly appears before one's eyes in actual, every-day life. Here was an anchorite of the early ages of Christianity, in the body, seated in one of Salvator Rosa's wild mountain scenes. But it soon occurred to me that probably a monk on his peregrinations was nothing uncommon in that part of the country. So I walked up to him, and asked if he could tell me the shortest way out of the wood to the high road leading to B----. He looked at me from head to foot with a gloomy glance, and said, in a hollow and solemn voice:

"'I know well that it is merely an idle curiosity to see me, and to hear me speak which has led you to this desert. But you must perceive that I have no time to talk with you now. My friend Ambrosius of Camaldoli is returning to Alexandria. Travel with him.'

"With which he arose and walked down into the ravine.

"I felt as if I must be in a dream. Presently I heard the sound of wheels close by, I made my way through the thickets, and found myself in a forest track, where I saw a countryman going along in a cart. I overtook him, and he shortly brought me to the high road leading to B----. As we went along I told him my adventure, and asked if he knew who the extraordinary man in the forest was?

"'Oh, sir,' he said, 'that was the worthy man who calls himself Priest Serapion, and has been living in these woods for some years, in a little hut which he built himself. People say he's not quite right in his head, but he is a nice, good gentleman, never does any harm, and edifies us of the village with pious discourses, giving us all the good advice that he can.'

"I had come across the anchorite some six or eight miles from B----, so I concluded that something must be known of him there, and this proved to be the case. Dr. S---- told me all the story. This hermit had once been one of the most brilliant intellects, one of the most universally-accomplished men in M----; and belonging, as he did, to a very distinguished family, he was naturally appointed to an important diplomatic post as soon as he had completed his studies: the duties of this office he discharged with great ability and energy. Moreover, he had remarkable poetical gifts, and everything he wrote was inspired by a most brilliant fancy, a mind and imagination which sounded the profoundest depths of all subjects. His incomparable humour, and the unusual charm of his character made him the most delightful of companions imaginable. He had risen from step to step of his career, and was on the point of being despatched on an important diplomatic mission, when he disappeared, in the most incomprehensible fashion, from M----. All search for him was fruitless, and conjecture and enquiry were baffled by a combination of circumstances.

"After a time there appeared amongst the villages, in the depths of the Tyrolese mountains, a man in a brown robe, who preached in these hamlets, and then went away into the wildest parts of the forests, where he lived the life of a hermit. It chanced one day that Count P---- saw this man (who called himself Priest Serapion), and at once recognised him as his unfortunate nephew, who had disappeared from M----. He was taken into custody, became violent, and all the skill of the best doctors in M---- could do nothing to alleviate his terrible condition. He was taken to the lunatic asylum at B----, and there the methodical system, based upon profound psychological knowledge, pursued by the medical man then in charge of that institution, succeeded in bringing about a condition of much less excitement, and greater quietness in the form of his malady. Whether this doctor, true to his theory, gave the patient an opportunity of escaping, or whether he himself found the means of doing so, escape he did, and was lost sight of for a considerable time.

"Serapion appeared, ultimately, in the country some eight miles from B----, where I had seen him; and the doctor declared that if any true compassion was to be shown him, he should not be again driven into a condition of wild excitement; but that, if he was to be at peace, and, after his fashion, happy, he should be left in these woods in perfect freedom, to do just as he liked; in which case he, the said doctor, would be responsible for the consequences. Accordingly, the police authorities were content to leave him to a distant and imperceptible supervision by the officials of the nearest village, and the result bore out what the doctor had said. Serapion built himself a little hut, pretty, and, under the circumstances, comfortable. He made chairs and tables, wove mats of rushes to lie upon, and laid out a garden where he grew flowers and vegetables. In all that did not touch the idea that he was the hermit Serapion who fled into the Theban desert in the days of the Emperor Decius, and suffered martyrdom in Alexandria, his mind was completely unaffected. He could carry on the most intellectual conversation, and often showed traces of the brilliant humour and charming individuality of character for which he had been remarkable in his former life. The aforesaid doctor declared him to be completely incurable, and strongly deprecated all attempts to restore him to the world and to his former pursuits and duties.

"You will readily understand that I could not drive this anchorite of mine out of my thoughts, and that I experienced an irresistible longing to see him again. But just picture to yourselves the excess of my folly! I had no less an undertaking in my mind than that of attacking Serapion's fixed idea at its very roots. I read Pinel, Reil, every conceivable book on insanity which I could lay my hands on. I fondly believed that it might be reserved for me, an amateur psychologist and doctor, to cast some rays of light into Serapion's darkened intelligence. And I did not omit, either, to make myself acquainted with the stories of all the Serapions (there were no fewer than eight of them) treated of in the histories of saints and martyrs.

"Thus equipped, I set out one fine morning in search of my anchorite.

"I found him working in his garden with hoe and spade, singing a devotional song. Wild pigeons, for which he had strewed an abundant supply of food, were fluttering and cooing round him, and a young deer was peeping through the leaves on the trellis. He was evidently living in the closest intimacy with the woodland creatures. Not the faintest trace of insanity was visible in his face; it bore a quiet expression of remarkable serenity and happiness; and all this confirmed what Dr. S---- in B---- had told me. When he heard of my projected visit to the anchorite, he advised me to go some fine, bright pleasant morning, because, he said, his mind would be less troubled then and he would be more inclined to talk to a stranger, whereas at evening he would shun all intercourse with mankind.

"As soon as he saw me he laid down his spade, and came towards me in a kind and friendly manner. I said that, being weary with a longish journey, I should be glad if he would allow me to rest with him for a little while.

"'You are heartily welcome,' he said. 'The little which I can offer you in the shape of refreshment is at your service.'

"And he took me to a seat of moss in front of his hut, brought out a little table, set on bread, magnificent grapes, and a can of wine, and hospitably begged me to eat and drink. He sat down opposite to me, and ate bread with much appetite, washing it down with draughts of water.

"In good sooth I did not see how I was to lead the conversation to my subject--how I was to bring my psychological science to bear upon this peaceful, happy man. At last I pulled myself together and began:

"'You style yourself Serapion, reverend sir?'

"'Yes, certainly,' he answered. 'The Church has given me that name.'

"'Ancient ecclesiastical history,' I continued, 'mentions several celebrated holy men of that name. An abbot Serapion, known for his good works the--learned Bishop Serapion alluded to by Hieronimus in his book "De Viris Illustribus." There was also a monk Serapion, who (as Heraclides relates in his "Paradise") on one occasion, coming from the Theban desert to Rome, ordered a virgin, who had joined him--saying she had renounced the world and its pleasures--to prove this by walking with him naked in the streets of Rome, and repulsed her when she hesitated, saying, "You still live the life of Nature, and are careful for the opinions of mankind. Think not that you are anything great or have overcome the world." If I am not mistaken, reverend sir, this was the "filthy monk" (Heraclid himself so styles him) who suffered a terrible martyrdom under the Emperor Decius--his limbs being torn asunder at the joints, and his body thrown down from a lofty rock.'

"'That was so,' said Serapion, turning pale, and his eyes glowing with a sombre fire. 'But Serapion the martyr, had no connection with that monk, who, in the fury of his asceticism, did battle against human nature. I am Serapion the martyr, to whom you allude.'

"'What?' I cried, with feigned surprise. 'You believe that you are that Serapion who suffered such a hideous martyrdom so many hundred years ago?'

"That,' said Serapion with much calmness, 'may appear incredible to you; and I admit that it must sound very wonderful to many who cannot see further than the points of their own noses. However, it is as I tell you. God's omnipotence permitted me to survive my martyrdom, and to recover from its effects, because it was ordained, in His mysterious providence, that I had still to pass a certain period of my existence, to His praise and glory, here in the Theban desert. There is nothing now to remind me of the tortures which I suffered except sometimes a severe headache, and occasional violent cramps and twitchings in my limbs.'

"Now,' thought I, 'is the time to commence my cure.'

"I made a wide circumbendibus, and talked in an erudite style concerning the malady of 'Fixed Idea,' which attacks people, marring, like one single discord, the otherwise harmonious organisms. I spoke of the scientific man who could not be induced to rise from his chair for fear he would break the windows across the street with his nose. I mentioned the Abbot Molanus, who conversed most rationally upon every subject, but would not leave his room because he thought he was a barleycorn, and the hens would swallow him. I came to the fact that to confound oneself with some historical character was a frequent form of Fixed Idea. 'Nothing more absurd and preposterous,' I said, 'could possibly be imagined than that a little bit of woodland country eight miles from B----, daily frequented by country folk, sportsmen, and people walking for exercise was the Theban desert, and he himself that ascetic who suffered martyrdom many centuries ago.'

"Serapion listened in silence. He seemed to feel what I said, and to be struggling with himself in deep reflection. So that I thought it was time to strike my decisive blow. I stood up, took him by both hands, and cried, loudly and emphatically:

"'Count P----, awake from the pernicious dream which is enthralling you; throw off that abominable dress, and come back to your family, which mourns your loss, and to the world where you have such important duties to discharge.'

"Serapion gazed at me with a sombre, penetrating gaze. Then a sarcastic smile played about his lips and cheeks, and he said, slowly and solemnly:

"'You have spoken, sir, long, and, as you consider, wisely and well. Allow me, in turn, to say a few words in reply. Saint Anthony, and all the men of the Church who have withdrawn from the world into solitude, were often visited by vexing spirits, who, envying the inward peace and contentment of their souls, carried on with them lengthy contests, until they had to lie down conquered in the dust. And such is my fortune also. Every now and then there appear to me emissaries, sent by Satan, who try to persuade me that I am Count P---- of M----, and that I ought to betake myself to the life of Courts, and all sorts of unholiness. Were it not for the efficacy of prayer, I should take these people by the shoulders, turn them out of my little garden, and carefully barricade it against them. But I need not do so in your case; for you are, most unmistakably, the very feeblest of all the adversaries who have ever come to me, and I can vanquish you with your own weapons--those of ratiocination. It is insanity that is in question between us. But if one of us two is suffering from that sad malady, it is evident that you are so in a much greater degree than I. You maintain that it is a case of Fixed Idea that I believe myself to be Serapion the martyr--and I am quite aware that many persons hold the same opinion, or pretend that they do. Now, if I am really insane, none but a lunatic can think that he could argue me out of the Fixed Idea which insanity has engendered in me. Were such a proceeding possible, there would soon be no madmen on the face of the earth, for men would be able to rule, and command, their mental power, which is not their own, but merely lent to them for a time by that Higher Power which disposes of them. But if I am not mad, and if I am really Serapion the martyr, it is insane to set about arguing me out of that, and leading me to adopt the Fixed Idea that I am Count P---- of M----. You say that Serapion the martyr, lived several centuries ago, and that, consequently, I cannot be that martyr, presumably for the reason that human beings cannot remain so long on this earth. Well, as regards this, the notion of time is just as relative a notion as that of number; and I may say to you that, according to the notion of time which I have in me, it is scarcely three hours (or whatever appellation you may choose to give to the divisions of time), since I was put to martyrdom by the Emperor Decius. But, leaving this on one side, can you assert, in opposition to me, that a life of such length as I say I have lived, is unexampled and contrary to human nature? Have you cognizance of the precise length of the life of every human being who has existed in all this wide world, that you can employ the expression 'unexampled' in this pert and decisive manner? Do you compare God's omnipotence to the wretched art of the clockmaker, who can't save his lifeless machinery from destruction? You say this place where we are is not the Theban desert, but a little woodland district eight miles from B----, daily frequented by country folk, sportsmen and others. Prove that to me.'

"Here, I thought I had my man.

"'Come with me,' said I, 'and in a couple of hours we shall be in B----, and what I assert will be proved.'

"'Poor, blinded fool,' said Serapion. 'What a wide distance lies between us and B----! But put the case that I went with you to some town which you call B----; would you be able to convince me that we had been travelling for two hours only, and the place we had arrived at was really B----? If I were to assert that you were insane, and suppose the Theban desert is a little bit of wooded country, and far-away Alexandria the town of B---- in the south of Germany, what would you say in reply? Our old discussion would go on for ever. Then there is another point which you ought seriously to consider. You must, I should suppose, perceive that I, who am talking with you, am leading the peaceful and happy life of a man reconciled with God. It is only after having passed through martyrdom that such a life dawns upon the soul. And if it has pleased the Almighty to cast a veil over what happened before my martyrdom, is it not a terrible, and diabolical action to try to tear that veil away?'

"With all my wisdom, I stood, confounded and silenced in the presence of this insane man! With the very rationality of his irrationality he had beaten me completely out of the field, and I saw the folly of my undertaking in all its fulness. Still more than that, I felt the reproach contained in what he had last said as deeply as I was astounded at the dim remembrance of his previous life which shone through it like some lofty, invulnerable, higher spirit.

"Serapion seemed to be reading my thoughts, and, looking me full in the face with an expression of the greatest kindliness, he said:

"'I never took you for an evil-disposed adversary, and I see I was not mistaken. You may have been instigated by somebody--perhaps by the Evil One himself--to come here to vex and try me, but I am sure it was not a spontaneous act of yours. And perhaps the fact that you found me other than you expected, may have strengthened you in your expression of the doubts which you have suggested. Although I in no sense deviate from the devoutness beseeming him who has given up his life to God and the Church, that cynicism of asceticism into which many of my brethren have fallen--thereby giving proof of the weakness, nay, utter destruction of their mental vigour, instead of its boasted strength--is utterly foreign to me! You expected to find the Monk Serapion pale and haggard, wasted with fast and vigil, all the horror of visions, terrible as those which drove even St. Anthony to despair, in his sombre face, with quivering knees scarce able to support him, in a filthy robe, stained with his blood. You find a placid, cheerful man. But I, too, have passed through those tortures, and have overcome them and survived. And when I awoke with shattered limbs and fractured skull, the spirit dawned, and shone bright within me, restoring my mind and my body to health. May it please Heaven speedily to grant to you also, my brother, even here on earth, a peace and happiness such as those which daily refresh and strengthen me. Have no dread of the terror of the deepest solitude. It is only there that a life like this can dawn upon the pious soul.'

"Serapion, who had spoken with genuine priestly unction, raised, in silence, his eyes to Heaven with an expression of blissful gratitude. How could I feel otherwise than awe-struck! A madman, congratulating himself on his condition, looking upon it as a priceless gift from Heaven, and, from the depths of his heart, wishing me a similar fate!

"I was on the point of leaving him, but he began in an altered tone, saying:

"'You would, probably, scarcely suppose that this wild inhospitable desert is often almost too full of the noise and bustle of life to be suitable for my silent meditations. Every day I receive visits from the most remarkable people of the most diverse kinds. Ariosto was here yesterday, and Dante and Petrarch afterwards. And this evening I expect Evagrus, the celebrated father, with whom I shall discuss the most recent ecclesiastical affairs, as I did poetry yesterday. I often go up to the top of that hill there, whence the towers of Alexandria are to be seen distinctly in clear weather, and the most wonderful and interesting events happen before my eyes. Many people have thought that incredible, too, and considered that I only fancy I see before me, in actual life, what is merely born in my mind and imagination. Now I say that is the most incomprehensible piece of folly that can exist. What is it, except the mind, which takes cognizance of what happens around us in time and space? What is it that hears, and feels, and sees? Is it the lifeless mechanism which we call eyes, ears, hands, etc., and not the mind? Does the mind give form and shape to that peculiar world of its own which has space and time for its conditions of existence, and then hand over the functions of seeing, hearing, etc., to some other principle inherent in us? How illogical! Therefore, if it is the mind only which takes cognizance of events around us, it follows that that which it has taken cognizance of has actually occurred. Last evening only, Ariosto was speaking of the images of his fancy, and saying he had created in his brain forms and events which had never existed in time and space. I at once denied the possibility of this, and he was obliged to allow that it was only from lack of a higher knowledge that a poet would box up within the narrow limits of his brain that which, by virtue of his peculiar seer gift, he was enabled to see in full life before him. But the complete acquirement of this higher knowledge only comes after martyrdom, and is strengthened by the life in profound solitude. You don't appear to agree with me; probably you don't understand me here. Indeed how should a child of this world, however well disposed, understand an anchorite consecrated in all his works and ways to God? Let me tell you what happened before my eyes, as I was standing this morning at sunrise at the top of that hill.'

"He then related a regular romance, with a plot and incidents such as only the most imaginative poet could have constructed. The characters and events stood out with such a vivid, plastic relief, that it was impossible--carried away as one was by the magic spell of them--to help believing, as if in a species of dream, that Serapion had actually witnessed them from the hilltop. This romance was succeeded by another, and that by another, by which time the sun stood high above us in the noon-tide sky. Serapion then rose from his seat, and looking into the distance, said: 'Yonder comes my brother Hilarion, who, in his over strictness, always blames me for being too much given to the society of strangers.'

"I understood the hint, and took my leave, asking if I should be allowed to pay him another visit. Serapion answered with a gentle smile, 'My friend, I thought you would be eager to get away from this wilderness, so little adapted to your mode of life. But if it is your pleasure to take up your abode for a time in my neighbourhood, you will always be welcome to my cottage and my little garden. Perhaps it may be granted to me to convert him who came to me as an adversary. Farewell, my friend.'

"I am wholly unable to characterize the impression which my visit to him had made upon me. Whilst his condition, his methodical madness in which he found the joy of his life, produced the weirdest effect upon me, his extraordinary poetical genius filled me with amazement, and his kindly, peaceful happiness, instinct with the quietest resignation of the purest mind, touched me unspeakably. I thought of Ophelia's sorrowful words:

"O what a noble mind is here o'erthrown!

The courtier's, soldier's, scholar's, eye, tongue, sword:

The expectancy and rose of this fair state,

The glass of fashion, and the mould of form,

The observ'd of all observers! quite, quite down!

Now see that noble and most sovereign reason,

Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh;

That unmatched form and feature of blown youth,

Blasted with ecstasy."

Yet I could not make plaint against the Omnipotence, which probably had, in this mysterious fashion, steered his bark away from reefs, which might have wrecked it, into this secure haven.

"The oftener I went to see him, the more attached to him I became. I always found him happy, and disposed to converse, and I took great care never again to essay my rôle of the psychological doctor. It was wonderful with what acuteness and penetration he spoke of life in all its aspects, and most remarkable of all, how he deduced historical events from causes wholly remote from all ordinary theories on the subject. When sometimes--notwithstanding the striking acuteness of those divinations of his--I took it upon me to object that no work on history made any mention of the circumstances which he alluded to, he would answer, with his quiet smile, that probably no historian in the world knew as much about them as he did, seeing that he had them from the very lips of the people concerned, when they came to see him.

"I was obliged to leave B---- and it was three years before I could go back there. It was late in Autumn, about the middle of November--the 14th, if I do not mistake--when I set out to pay my anchorite a visit. Whilst I was still at a distance, I heard the sound of the little bell which hung above his hut, and was filled with gloomy forebodings, without apparent cause. At last I reached the cottage and went in.

"Serapion was lying on his mat, with his hands folded on his breast. I thought he was sleeping, and went softly up to him. Then I saw that he was dead."

"And two lions came and helped you to bury him," interrupted Ottmar.

"What do you say?" cried Cyprian astonished.

"Yes," Ottmar went on. "While you were in the forest, before you reached Serapion's hut, you met strange monsters of all kinds, and talked with them; a deer brought you St. Athanasius's mantle, and told you to wrap it about Serapion's body. At any rate, your last visit to your mad anchorite reminds me a good deal of that wonderful one which St. Anthony paid to Paul the Hermit, of which the holy man relates so much fantastic stuff that it's not difficult to see what a big bee was buzzing in his bonnet. I know something of the Legends of the Saints, you see, as well as you. Now I understand why it was that your head was so full of monks and monasteries, saints and hermits a few years ago. I saw that it was so by the letters you sent me, which were so strange and mystic in their tone that they set me supposing all sorts of odd things. And if I am not mistaken, it was about that time that you wrote a curious book, treating of the profounder mysteries of the Catholic Church, but containing madness and diablerie sufficient to give you a very bad name amongst quiet, respectable folks. At that time you were possessed with Serapionism to a very dangerous degree."

"Quite true," said Cyprian, "and although that fanciful book does bear the devil on its forehead, by way of danger-signal--so that those who prefer to give it a wide berth may do so if they choose--I almost wish now I had never brought it into the world. It is quite true that it was suggested to me by my intercourse with the anchorite. I ought to have kept out of his way, perhaps; but you all of you know what a fascination insane people have always had for me. I have always thought that in connection with those abnormal conditions nature vouchsafes us glimpses into her most mysterious depths. In fact, by the very gruesomeness which I have felt in the society of mad people, I have found myself led upon the track of suggestions and ideas which have inspired my mind and fancy to flights of unusual loftiness. Perhaps people who are utterly sane may look upon flights such as these as mere paroxysms of dangerous ill-health. But that is nothing when one knows that one is sound and well."

"There is no doubt, dear Cyprian, that you are as sound and as well as possible," said Theodore, "and in fact all this is a proof of the strength and vigour of your constitution--which I almost could envy you for. You speak of glimpses into Nature's mysterious depths; but people who are not quite sure that they are exempt from anything like giddiness ought to keep away from glimpses of the kind. Of course this could never have applied to your Serapion, as you have described him to us, inasmuch as to associate with him must have been better than companionship with the most brilliant and splendid poet. But you will admit that, chiefly because so many years have passed since you saw him, you have pictured him to tie in all the brilliant colours in which he glows in your memory. Now I consider that, in the society of a man, insane in the particular way in which your Serapion was, I should never have been able to divest myself of an immense uneasiness, nay, I may say terror! Even when you were telling us how he considered his condition to be the happiest conceivable, and wished that it could be yours, I felt my hair beginning to stand on end! What if the notion that this condition was a happy one should take root in one's mind, and eventuate in real madness! Terrible thought! I could never have been much with Serapion, just for that reason. Then, besides the risk to the mind, there was the danger to the body, too. Pinel mentions plenty of cases of people suffering from Fixed Idea who have suddenly become fearfully violent, and murdered everybody whom they came near, like furious wild beasts."

"Theodore is right," said Ottmar. "Cyprian, I blame you for your foolish penchant for folly, your insane interest in insanity. There is a morbidness about it which may give you some trouble one of these days. For my part I shun mad people like the plague; and even people of over-excitable temperaments, which lead them into marked eccentricities of any kind, are repulsive and repugnant to me."

"You go too far," said Theodore, "in your distaste for every expression of feeling which takes any rather peculiar or unusual form. The incongruity which excitable people, as they are called, perceive between their inner selves and the world without them makes them grimace, in a manner which quiet folks, over whom pain has as little power as pleasure, can't understand, and are only annoyed with. Yet you yourself, Ottmar, with all your sensitiveness to this kind of behaviour in others, often lay yourself open to be accused of very distinct eccentricity.

"I happen to remember a man whose eccentricities were so extreme that half his fellow-citizens considered him a lunatic, although no one really less deserved to be so characterized. The way in which I made his acquaintance was as quaintly comic as the circumstances in, which I met with him at a later period were tragic and terrible. I should like to tell you all this story, as a sort of transition from pure insanity, viâ eccentricity, to the realms of every-day rationality. Only I am afraid that, as I should have to say a good deal about music, I should be open to the objection which I made to Cyprian's story--that of giving my own particular hobby undue prominence, and introducing too much of my own personality into my tale. In the meantime, I see that Lothair is casting longing looks at that vase which Cyprian calls 'mysterious,' so we may as well break the spell which binds it."

"Now," said Lothair, when glasses of a fluid which would have merited the encomiums of the fraternity of the "Clucking Hen" had been passed round, "tell us about your eccentric friend--be entertaining, be affecting, be merry, or sad; but get us away from the atmosphere of that abominable mad anchorite, and out of the bedlam where Cyprian has been keeping us immured."

"[The man,]" said Theodore, "whom I am going to tell you about was Krespel, a Member of Council in the town of H----. This Krespel was the most extraordinary character that I have ever, in my lifetime, come across. When I first arrived in H---- the whole town was talking of him, because one of his most extraordinary pranks chanced to be in its fullest swing. He was a very clever lawyer and diplomate, and a certain German prince---not a person of great importance--had employed him to draw up a memorial, concerning claims of his on the Imperial Chancery, which had been eminently successful. As Krespel had often said he never could meet with a house quite to his mind, this prince, as recompense for his services, undertook to pay for the building of a house, to be planned by Krespel according to the dictates of his fancy. He also offered to buy a site for it; but Krespel determined to build it in a delightful piece of garden ground of his own, just outside the town-gate. So he got together all the necessary building materials, and had them laid down in this piece of ground. After which, he was to be seen all day long, in his usual extraordinary costume--which he always made with his own hands, on peculiar principles of his own--slaking the lime, sifting the gravel, arranging the stones in heaps, etc., etc. He had not gone to any architect for a plan. But one fine day he walked in upon the principal builder, and told him to come next morning, to his garden, with the necessary workmen--stonemasons, hodmen, and so forth--and build him a house. The builder, of course, asked to see the plan, and was not a little astonished when Krespel said there was no plan and no occasion for one; every thing would go on all right without one.

"The builder arrived next morning with his men, and found a great rectangular trench, carefully dug in the ground; and Krespel said 'this is the foundation; so set to work, and go on building the walls till I tell you to stop.'

"'But what about the doors and windows,' said the builder; 'are there to be no partition walls?'

"'Just you do as I tell you, my good man,' said Krespel, as calmly as possible; 'everything will come quite right in its own good time.'

"Nothing but the prospect of liberal payment induced the man to have anything to do with a job so preposterous--but never was there a piece of work carried through so merrily; for it was amid the never-ceasing jokes and laughter of the workmen--who never left the ground, where abundance of victuals and drink were always at hand--that the four walls rose with incredible celerity, till one day Krespel cried, 'Stop!'

"Mallets and chisels paused. The men came down from their scaffolds, and formed a circle about Krespel, each grinning countenance seeming to say--'What's going to happen now?'

"'Out of the way! 'cried Krespel, who hastened to one end of the garden, and then paced slowly towards his rectangle of stone walls. On reaching the side of it which was nearest--the one, that is, towards which he had been marching--he shook his head dissatisfied, went to the other end of the garden, then paced up to the wall as before, shaking his head, dissatisfied, once more. This process he repeated two or three times; but at last, going straight up to the wall till he touched it with the point of his nose, he cried out, loud--

"Come here, you fellows, come here! Knock me in the door! Knock me in a door here!' He gave the size it was to be, accurately in feet and inches; and what he told them to do they did. When the door was knocked out, he walked into the house, and smiled pleasantly at the builder's remark that the walls were just the proper height for a nice two-storied house. He walked meditatively up and down inside, the masons following him with their tools, and whenever he cried 'here a window six feet by four; a little one yonder three feet by two,' out flew the stones as directed.

"It was during these operations that I arrived in H----, and it was entertaining in the extreme to see some hundreds of people collected outside the garden, all hurrahing whenever the stones flew out, and a window appeared where none had been expected. The house was all finished in the same fashion, everything being done according to Krespel's directions as given on the spot. The quaintness of the proceeding, the feeling--not to be resisted--that it was all going to turn out so marvellously better than was to have been expected; but, particularly, Krespel's liberality, which, by the way, cost him nothing, kept everybody in the best of humour. So the difficulties attending this remarkable style of house-building were got over, and in a very brief time there stood a fully-finished house, which had the maddest appearance, certainly, from the outside, no two windows being alike, and so forth, but was a marvel of comfort and convenience within. Everybody said so who entered it, and I was of the same opinion, when Krespel admitted me to it after I made his acquaintance.

"It was some time, however, ere I did so. He had been so engrossed by his building operations that he had never gone, as he did at other times, to lunch at Professor M----'s on Thursdays, saying he should not cross his threshold till after his house-warming. His friends were expecting a grand entertainment on that occasion. However, he invited nobody but the workmen who built the house. Them he entertained with the most recherché dishes. Journeymen masons feasted on venison pasties, carpenters' apprentices and hungry hodmen, for once in their lives stayed their appetites with roast pheasant and paté de foie gras. In the evening their wives and daughters came, and there was a fine ball. Krespel just waltzed a little with the foremen's wives, and then sat down with the town-band, took a fiddle, and led the dance-music till daylight.

"On the Thursday after this house-warming, which had established Krespel in the position of a popular character--'a friend to the working classes'--I at last met him at Professor M----'s, to my no small gratification. The most extravagant imagination could not invent anything more extraordinary than Krespel's style of behaviour. His movements were awkward, abrupt, constrained, so that you expected him to bump against the furniture and knock things down, or do some mischief or other every moment. But he never did; and you soon noticed that the lady of the house never changed colour ever so little, although he went floundering heavily and uncertainly about, close to tables covered with valuable china, or manœuvring in dangerous proximity to a great mirror reaching from floor to ceiling; even when he took up a valuable china jar, painted with flowers, and whirled it about near the window to admire the play of the light on its colours. In fact, whilst we were waiting for luncheon, he inspected and scrutinised everything in the room with the utmost minuteness, even getting up upon a cushioned arm-chair to take a picture down from the wall and hang it up again. All this time he talked a great deal; often (and this was more observable while we were at luncheon) darting rapidly from one subject to another, and at other times--unable to get away from some particular idea--he would keep beginning at it again and again, and get into labyrinths of confusion over it, till something else came into his head. Sometimes the tone of his voice was harsh and screaming, at other times it would be soft, sustained, and singing; but it was always completely inappropriate to what he happened to be talking about. For instance, we were discussing music, and some one was praising a new composer: Krespel smiled, and said in his gentle cantabile tone, 'I wish to heaven the devil would hurl the wretched music-perverter ten thousand millions of fathoms deep into the abysses of hell!' and then he screamed out violently and wildly, 'She's an angel of heaven, all compounded of the purest, divinest music:' and the tears came to his eyes. It was some time ere we remembered that, about an hour before, we had been talking of a particular prima donna. There was a hare at table, and I noticed that he carefully polished the bones on his plate, and made particular enquiries for the feet, which were brought to him, with many smiles, by the professor's little daughter of fifteen. All the time of luncheon the children had been fixing their eyes upon him as on a favourite, and now they came up to him, though they kept a respectful distance of two or three paces.' 'What's going to happen,' thought I. The dessert came, and Krespel took a small box from his pocket, out of which he brought a miniature turning-lathe, made of steel, which he screwed on to the table, and proceeded to turn, from the bones, with wonderful skill and rapidity, all sorts of charming little boxes, balls, etc., which the children took possession of with cries of delight.

"As we rose from table, the professor's niece said--

"'And how is our dear Antonia, Mr. Krespel?'

"'Our--OUR dear Antonia!' he answered, in his sustained singing tone most unpleasant to hear. At first he made the sort of face which a person makes who bites into a bitter orange, and wants to look as if it were a sweet one; but soon this face changed to a perfectly terrible-looking mask, out of which grinned a bitter, fierce--nay, as it seemed to me, altogether diabolical, sneer of angry scorn.

"The professor hastened up to him. In the look of angry reproach which he cast at his niece I read that she had touched some string which jarred most discordantly within Krespel.

"'How get on the violins?' said the professor, taking Krespel by both hands.

"The cloud cleared away from his face, and he answered in his harsh rugged tone, 'Splendidly, Professor. You remember my telling you about a magnificent Amati, which I got hold of by a lucky accident a short time ago? I cut it open this very morning, and expect that Antonia has finished taking it to pieces by this time.'

"'Antonia is a dear, good child,' said the Professor.

"'Ay! that she is--that she is!' screamed Krespel, and seizing his hat and stick, was off out of the house like a flash of lightning.

"As soon as he was gone, I eagerly begged the Professor to tell me all about those violins, and more especially about Antonia.

"'Ah,' said the Professor, 'Krespel is an extraordinary man; he studies fiddle-making in a peculiar fashion of his own.'

"'Fiddle-making?' cried I in amazement.

"'Yes,' said the Professor; 'connoisseurs consider that Krespel's violin-making is unapproachable at the present day. Formerly, when he turned out any special chef d'œuvre, he would allow other people to play upon it; but now he lets no one touch them but himself. When he has finished a fiddle, he plays upon it for an hour or two (he plays magnificently, with a power and an amount of feeling and expression which the greatest professional violinists rarely equal, let alone surpass), then he hangs it up on the wall beside the others, and never touches it again, nor lets anyone else lay hands upon it.'

"'And Antonia?' I eagerly asked.

"'Well, that,' said the Professor, 'is an affair which would make me have a very shady opinion of Krespel, if I didn't know what a thoroughly good fellow he is; so that I feel convinced there is some mystery about it which we don't at present fathom. When he first came here some years ago, he lived like a hermit, with an old housekeeper, in a gloomy house in ----Street. His eccentricities soon attracted people's attention, and, when he saw this, he soon sought and made acquaintances. Just as was the case in my house, people got so accustomed to him that they couldn't get on without him. In spite of his rough exterior even the children got fond of him, though they were never troublesome to him, but always looked upon him with a certain amount of awe which prevented over-familiarity. You have seen how he attracts children by all sorts of ingenious tricks. Everybody looked upon him as a regular old bachelor and woman-hater, and he gave no sign to the contrary; but after he had been here some time, he went off on some excursion or other, no one knew where, and it was some months before he came back. The second evening after his return, his windows were lighted up in an unusual way--and that was enough to attract the neighbours' attention. Presently, a most extraordinarily beautiful female voice was heard singing to a pianoforte accompaniment. Soon the tones of a violin were heard joining in, responding to the voice in brilliant, fiery emulation. It was easy to distinguish that it was Krespel who was playing. I joined the little crowd assembled outside the house myself, to listen to the wonderful concert, and I can assure you that the greatest prima-donnas I have ever heard were poor every-day performers compared to the lady we heard that night. I never heard any one sing with such marvellously touching expression, and such absolute finish of execution; never had had any idea of such long-sustained notes, such nightingale roulades, such crescendoes and diminuendoes, such swellings to an organ-like forte, such dyings down to the most imperceptible whisper. There was not a soul in all the crowd able to resist the magic spell of this wonderful singing; and when she stopped, you heard nothing but sighs breaking the silence. It was probably about midnight, when, all at once we heard Krespel talking loudly and excitedly; another male voice, to judge by the tone of it, bitterly reproaching him about something, and a woman intervening as best she could tearfully, in broken phrases. Krespel screamed louder and louder, till at last he broke into that horrible singing tone which you know. A loud shriek from the lady interrupted him: then all was as still as death; and suddenly steps came rapidly down the stairs, and a young man came out, sobbing, and, jumping into a carriage which was standing near, drove rapidly away.

"'The next day Krespel appeared quite in his ordinary condition, as if nothing had happened, and no one had the courage to allude to the events of the previous night; but the housekeeper said Krespel had brought home a most beautiful lady, quite young; that he called her Antonia, and that it was she who sung so splendidly; and that a young gentleman had also come, who seemed to be deeply attached to Antonia, and, as she supposed, was engaged to her; but that he had had to go away, because Krespel had insisted on it. What Antonia's precise position with respect to Krespel is, remains a mystery; at all events he treats her in the most tyrannical style. He watches her as a cat does a mouse, or as Dr. Bartolo, in Il Barbiere, does his niece. She scarcely dares to look out of the window. On the rare occasions when he can be prevailed upon to take her into society, he watches her with Argus-eyes, and won't suffer a note of music to be heard, far less that she shall sing; neither will he now allow her to sing in his own house; so that, since that celebrated night, Antonia's singing has become, for the people of the town, a sort of romantic legend, as of some splendid miracle, and even those who never heard her often say, when some celebrated prima-donna comes to sing at a concert, 'Good gracious! what a wretched caterwauling all this is, nobody can sing but Antonia!'

"You know how anything of this sort always fascinates me, and you can imagine how essential it became to me that I should make Antonia's acquaintance. I had heard those sayings of the public about Antonia's singing often, but I had had no idea that this glorious creature was there, on the spot, held in thraldom by this crack-brained Krespel, as by some tyrant enchanter. Naturally, that night, in my dreams I heard Antonia singing in the most magnificent style; and as she was imploring me, in the most moving manner, to set her free, in a gloriously lovely adagio--absurdly enough, it seemed as if I had composed it myself--I at once made up my mind that, by some means or other, I would make my way into Krespel's house, and, like another Astolfo, set this Queen of Song free from her shameful bonds.

"Things came about, however, quite differently to what I had anticipated; for after I had once or twice met Krespel and had a talk with him about fiddle-making, he asked me to go and see him. I went, and he showed me his violin treasures: there ere some thirty of them hanging in a cabinet; and there was one, remarkable above the rest, with all the marks of the highest antiquity (a carved lion's head at the end of the tail-piece, etc.), which was hung higher than the others, with a wreath of flowers on it, and seemed to reign over the rest as queen.

"'This violin,' said Krespel, when I questioned him about it, 'is a very remarkable and unparalleled work, by some ancient master, most probably about the time of Tartini. I am quite convinced there is something most peculiar about its interior construction, and that, if I were to take it to pieces, I should discover a certain secret which 1 have long been in search of. But--you may laugh at me if you like--this lifeless thing, which I myself inspire with life and language, often speaks out of itself, to me in an extraordinary manner; and when I first played upon it, I felt as if I were merely the magnetiser--the mesmerist--who acts upon his subject in such sort that she relates in words what she is seeing with her inward vision. No doubt you think me an ass to have any faith in nonsense of this sort; still, it is the fact that I have never been able to prevail upon myself to take that lifeless thing there to pieces. I am glad I never did, for since Antonia has been here, I now and then play to her on that fiddle; she is fond of hearing it--very fond.'

"He exhibited so much emotion as he said this, that I was emboldened to say 'Ah! dear Mr. Krespel, won't you be so kind as to let me hear you play on it?' But he made one of his bitter-sweet faces, and answered in his cantabile sostenuto:

"'Nay, my dear master student, that would ruin everything;' and I had to go and admire a number of curiosities, principally childish trash, till at length he dived into a chest and brought out a folded paper, which he put into my hand with much solemnity, saying: 'There! you are very fond of music: accept this as a present from me, and always prize it beyond everything. It is a souvenir of great value.' With which he took me by the shoulders and gently shoved me out of the door, with an embrace on the threshold--in short, he symbolically kicked me out of his house.

"When I opened the paper which he had given me, I found a small piece of the first string of a violin, about the eighth of an inch in length, and on the paper was written--

"'Portion of the first string which was on Stamitz's violin when he played his last Concerto.'

"The calmly insulting style in which I had been shown to the door the moment I had said a word about Antonia, seemed to indicate that I should probably never be allowed to see her; however, the second time I went to Krespel's I found Antonia in his room, helping him to put a fiddle together. Her exterior did not strike me much at first, but after a short time one could not resist the charm of her lovely blue eyes, rosy lips, and exquisitely expressive, tender face. She was very pale; but when anyone said anything interesting, a bright colour and a very sweet smile appeared in her face, but the colour quickly died down to a pale-rose tint. She and I talked quite unconstrainedly and pleasantly together, and I saw none of those Argus-glances which the Professor had spoken about. Krespel went on quite in his ordinary, beaten track, and seemed rather to approve of my being friendly with Antonia than otherwise. Thus it came about that I went pretty often there, and our little circle of three got so accustomed to each other's society that we much enjoyed ourselves in our quiet way. Krespel was always entertaining with his strange eccentricities; but it was really Antonia who drew me to the house, and made me put up with a great deal which, impatient as I was in those days, I should never have endured but for her. In Krespel's quirks and cranks there was often a good deal which was tedious, and not in the best of taste. What most annoyed me was that, whenever I led the conversation to music--particularly to vocal music--he would burst in, in that horrible singing voice of his, and smiling like a demon, with something wholly irrelevant and generally disgustingly unimportant at the same time. From Antonia's looks of annoyance on those occasions, it was clear that he did this to prevent me from asking her to sing. However, I wasn't going to give in: the more he objected, the more determined was I to carry my point. I felt that I must hear her, or die of my dreams of it.

"There came an evening when Krespel was in particularly good humour. He had taken an old Cremona violin to pieces, and found that the sound-post of it was about half a line more perpendicular than usual. Important circumstance!--of priceless practical value! I was fortunate enough to start him off on the true style of violin playing. The style of the great old masters--copied by them from that of the really grand singers--of which he spoke, led to the observation that now the direct converse held good, and that singers copied the scale, and skipping 'passages' of the instrumentalists. 'What,' said I, hastening to the piano and sitting down at it, 'can be more preposterous than those disgusting mannerisms, more like the noise of peas rattling on the floor of a barn than music?' I went on to sing a number of those modern cadenza-passages, which go yooping up and down the scale, more like a child's humming-top than anything else, and I struck a feeble chord or two by way of accompaniment. Krespel laughed immoderately, and cried 'Ha! ha! ha! I could fancy I was listening to some of our German Italians, or our Italian Germans, pumping out some aria of Pucitt or Portugallo, or some other such maestro di capella, or rather schiavo d' un prime uomo.'

"'Now,' thought I, 'is my chance at last.--I am sure Antonia,' I said, turning to her, 'knows nothing of all that quavering stuff,' and I commenced to roll out a glorious soulful aria of old Leonardo Leo's. Antonia's cheeks glowed; a heavenly radiance beamed from her beautiful eyes; she sprang to the piano; she opened her lips--but Krespel instantly made a rush at her; shoved her out of the room, and, seizing me by the shoulders, shrieked--'Little son, little son, little son.' He continued, in a soft and gentle singing voice, while he took me by the hand, bending his head with much courtesy, 'No doubt, my dear young Master Student, it would be a breach of all courtesy and politeness if I were to proceed to express, in plain and unmistakable words, and with all the energy at my command, my desire that the damnable, hellish devil might clutch hold of that throat of yours, here on the spot, with his red-hot talons; leaving that on one side for the moment, however, you will admit, my very dear young friend, that it's getting pretty late in the evening, and will soon be dark; and as there are no lamps lighted, even if I were not to pitch you down stairs, you might run a certain risk of damaging your precious members. Go away home, like a nice young gentleman, and don't forget your good friend Krespel, if you should never--never, you understand--find him at home again when you happen to call.' With which he took me in his arms, and slowly worked his way with me to the door in such fashion that I could not manage to set eyes on Antonia again for a moment.

"You will admit that, situated as I was, it was impossible for me to give him a good hiding, as, probably, I ought to have done by rights. The Professor laughed tremendously, and declared that I had seen the last of Krespel for good and all; and Antonia was too precious, I might say too sacred, in my sight, that I should go playing the languishing amoroso under her window. I left her, broken-hearted; but, as is the case with matters of the kind, the bright tints of the picture in my fancy gradually faded, and toned down with the lapse of time; and Antonia, ay, even Antonia's singing, which I had never heard, came to shine upon my memory only like some beautiful, far-away vision, bathed in rosy radiance.

"Two years afterwards, when I was settled in B----, I had occasion to make a journey into the South of Germany. One evening I saw the familiar towers of H---- rising into sight against the dewy, roseate evening sky; and as I came nearer, a strange, indescribable feeling of painful, anxious uneasiness and alarm took possession of me, and lay on my heart like a weight of lead. I could scarcely breathe. I got out of the carriage into the open air. The oppression amounted to actual physical pain. Presently I thought I could hear the notes of a solemn hymn floating on the air; it grew more distinct, and I made out male voices singing a choral. 'What's this, what's this,' I cried, as it pierced through my heart like a dagger stab. 'Don't you see, sir?' said the postillion, walking beside me, 'it's a funeral going on in the churchyard.' We were, in fact, close to the cemetery, and I saw a circle of people in black assembled by a grave, which was bring filled in. The tears came to my eyes. I frit as if somehow all the happiness and joy of my life bring buried in that grave. I had been descending the hill pretty quickly, so that I could not now see into the cemetery. The choral ceased, and I saw, near the gate, black-dressed men coming away from the funeral. The Professor with his niece on his arm, both in deep mourning, passed close to me without noticing me. The niece had her handkerchief at her eyes' and was sobbing bitterly. I felt I could not go into the town; I sent my servant with the carriage to the usual hotel, and walked into the well-known country to try if I could shake off the strange condition I was in, which I ascribed to physical causes, being overheated and tired with my journey, etc. When I reached the alley which leads to the public gardens, I saw a most extraordinary sight--Krespel, led along by two men in deep mourning, whom he seemed to be trying to escape from by all sorts of extraordinary leaps and bounds. He was dressed, as usual, in his wonderful grey coat of his own making; but from his little three-cornered hat, which he had cocked over one ear in a martial manner, hung a very long, narrow streamer of black crape, which fluttered playfully in the breeze. Round his waist he had buckled a black sword-belt, but instead of a sword he had stuck into it a long fiddle bow.

"The blood ran cold in my veins. 'He has gone quite mad,' I said as I followed them slowly.

"They took him to his own door, where he embraced them, laughing loud. They left him, and then he noticed me. He stared at me in silence for a considerable time; then he said, in a mournful, hollow voice:

"'Glad to see you, Master Student, you know all about it.' He seized me by the arm, dragged me into the house, and upstairs to the room where the violins hung. They were all covered with crape, but the masterpiece by the unknown maker was not in its place, a wreath of cypress bung in its stead.

"I knew then what had happened. 'Antonia, alas! Antonia,' I cried in uncontrollable anguish.

"Krespel was standing in front of me with his arms folded, like a man turned to stone.

"'When she died,' he said, very solemnly, 'the sound-post of that fiddle shivered to pieces with a grinding crash. The faithful thing could only live with her and in her; it is lying with her in her grave.' I sank into a chair overpowered; but Krespel began singing a merry ditty, in a hoarse voice; and it was a truly awful sight to see him dancing, as he sang it, upon one foot, while the crape on his hat kept flapping about the fiddles on the wall; and I could not help giving a scream of horror as this crape streamer, during one of his rapid gyrations, came wafting over my face, for I felt as if the touch of it must infallibly infect me, and drag me, too, down into the black, terrible abyss of madness. But when I gave the scream, Krespel stopped dancing, and said, in his singing voice:

"'What are you shrieking out like that for, little son? Did you see the death angel, think you? people always do before the funeral.' Then, walking into the middle of the floor, he drew the bow out of his belt, and, raising it with both hands above his head, he broke it into splinters. Then he laughed long and loud, and cried, 'The staff's broken over me now, you think, little son, don't you?[²] nothing of the kind, nothing of the kind!'

"'I'm free now--I'm free! I'm free!

And fiddles I'll make no more, boys!

And fiddles I'll make no more!

Hurray! hurray! hip-hip hurray!

Oh! fiddles I'll make no more.'"

"This he sang to a terribly merry tune, dancing about on one foot again as he did so. Full of horror I was making for the door; but he held me back, saying, quite quietly and soberly this time:

"'Don't go away, Master Student. Don't think that those outbreaks of my pain, which is so terrible that I can scarcely bear it longer, mean that I am mad. No, no, I am as sane as you are, and as calmly in my senses. The only thing is, a little while ago I made myself a nightshirt, and thought when I had it on I should be like Destiny, or God.' He went on talking the wildest incoherence for a time, till he sank down, completely exhausted. The old housekeeper came at my summons, and I was thankful when I found myself outside in the open air.

"I never doubted for an instant that Krespel had gone completely mad; but the Professor maintained the contrary. 'There are people,' he said, 'in whose cases Nature, or some destiny or other, has deprived them of the cover--the exterior envelope--under which we others carry on our madnesses unseen. They are like certain insects who have transparent integuments, which (as we see the play of their muscular movements) give the effect of a malformation, although everything is perfectly normal. What never passes beyond the sphere of thought in us becomes action in Krespel. The bitter scorn and rage which the soul, imprisoned as it is in earthly conditions of being and action, often vividly feels, Krespel carries out, or expresses, into external life, by extraordinarily frantic gesticulations and hare jumps. But those are his lightning conductors. What comes out of the earth he delivers back to the earth again; the heavenly he retains, and consequently apprehends it quite clearly and distinctly with his inner consciousness, notwithstanding all the crackiness which we sparking out of him. No doubt Antonia's unexpected loss touches him very keenly, but I should bet that he'll be going on in his usual jog trot to-morrow as if nothing had happened.'

"And it turned out very much as the Professor had expected: Krespel appeared next morning very much as if nothing had happened. Only he announced that he had given up fiddle-making, and would never play on one again. And it afterwards appeared that he kept his word.

"All that I had heard from the Professor strengthened my conviction that the relation in which Antonia had stood to Krespel--so very intimate, and so carefully kept unexplained--as also the fact that she was dead--very probably involved him in a very serious responsibility, which he might find it by no means easy to clear himself from. I made up my mind that I would not leave H---- until I had given him the full benefit of my ideas on this subject. My notion was to thoroughly alarm him, to appeal to his conscience, and, if I could, constrain him to a full confession of his crime. The more I considered the matter the clearer it seemed that he must be a terrible villain; and all the more eloquent and impressive grew the allocution which I mentally got ready to deliver to him, and which gradually took the form of a regular masterpiece of rhetoric.

"Thus prepared for my attack, T betook myself to him in a condition of much virtuous indignation one morning.

"I found him making children's toys at his turning lathe, with a tranquil smile on his face.

"'How,' said I, 'is it possible that your conscience can allow you to be at peace for an instant, when the thought of the horrible crime you have been guilty of must perpetually sting you like a serpent's tooth?'

"He laid down his tools, and stared at me in astonishment.

"'What do you mean, my good sir?' he said. 'Sit down on that chair there.'

"But I went on, with much warmth, and distinctly accused him of having caused Antonia's death, threatening him with the vengeance of Heaven. Nay more, being full of juridical zeal--as I had just been inducted into a judicial appointment--I went on to assure him that I should consider it my duty to leave no stone unturned to bring the affair thoroughly to light, so as to deliver him into the hands of earthly justice. I was a little put out, I admit, when, on the conclusion of my rather pompous harangue, Krespel, without a word in reply, merely looked at me as if waiting for what I had to say next: and I tried to find something further to add: but everything that occurred to me seemed so silly and feeble that I held my peace. He seemed rather to enjoy this breakdown in my eloquence, and a bitter smile passed over his face, but then he became very grave, and said in a solemn tone:

"'My good young sir! Very likely you think me a fool--or a madman. I forgive you. We are both in the same madhouse, and you object to my thinking myself God the Father, because you think you are God the Son. How do you suppose you can enter into another person's life, utterly unknown to you in all its complicated turnings and windings, and pick up and follow all its deeply hidden threads? She is gone, and the riddle is solved!'

"He stopped, rose, and walked two or three times up and down the room. I ventured to ask for some explanation. He looked at me fixedly, took me by the hand, and led me to the window, opening both the outside jalousies. He leaned upon the sill with both his arms, and, so looking out into the garden, he told me the story of his life.

"When he had ended, I left him deeply affected, and bitterly ashamed.

"To make a long tale short, matters as concerned Antonia stood as follows:

"Some twenty years previously, his fancy of making a collection of the finest violins of the great old makers had taken him to Italy. At that time he had not begun to make violins himself, neither, consequently, to take them to pieces. At Venice he heard the renowned prima donna, Angela, at that time shining in the leading rôles at the Teatro di San Benedetto. She was as supereminent in beauty as she was in art: and well became, and deserved, her name of Angela. He sought her acquaintance, and, in spite of all his rugged uncouthness, his most remarkable violin playing, with its combination of great originality, force and tenderness, speedily won her artist's heart. A close intimacy led, in a few weeks, to a marriage--which not made public--because Angela would neither leave the stage, give up her well-known name, nor tack on to it strangely-sounding 'Krespel.' He described, with the bitterest irony, the quite peculiar ingenuity with which Signora Angela commenced, as soon as she was his wife, to torment and torture him. All the selfishness, caprice, and obstinacy of all the prima donnas on earth rolled into one, were, as Krespel considered, incorporated in Angela's little body. Whenever he tried to assert his true position in the smallest degree, she would launch a swarm of abbates, maestros, and academicos about his ears, who, not knowing his real relations with her, would snub him, and set him down as a wretched unendurable ass of an amateur inamorato, incapable of adapting himself to the Signora's charming and interesting humours. After one of those stormy scenes, Krespel had flown off to Angela's country house, and phantasizing on his Cremona, was forgetting the sorrows of the day. This had not lasted long, however, when the Signora, who had followed him, came into the room. She happened to be in a tender mood: she embraced Krespel with sweet, languishing glances, she laid her little head upon his shoulder. But Krespel, lost in the world of his harmonies, went on fiddling, so that the walls reechoed; and it so chanced that he touched the Signora, a trifle ungently, with his bow-arm. She blazed up like a fury, screamed out, 'Bestia tedesca,' snatched the violin out of his hand, and dashed it to pieces on a marble table. Krespel stood before her for a moment, a statue of amazement, and then, as if awaking from a dream, he grasped the Signora as with the fists of a giant, shied her out of the window of her own palazzo, and set off--without concerning himself further about the matter--to Venice, and thence to Germany. It was some little time before he quite realized what he had done. Though he knew the window was only some five feet from the ground, and the necessity of throwing the Signora out of it under the circumstances was quite indisputable, still he felt very anxious as to the results, inasmuch as she had given him to understand that he was 'about to be a father.' He was almost afraid to make any inquiries, and was not a little surprised, some eight months afterwards, to receive an affectionate letter from his beloved wife, in which she did not say a syllable about the little circumstance which had occurred at the country palazzo, but announced that she was the happy mother of a charming little daughter, and prayed the 'marito amato e padre felicissimo' to come as quickly as he could to Venice. However, Krespel didn't go, but made inquiries through a trusted friend as to what had happened. He was told that the Signora had dropped down on to the grass as lightly as a bird, and the only results of her fall were mental ones. The Signora had been like a new creature after Krespel's heroic achievement. All her wilfulness and charming caprices had disappeared completely; and the maestro who wrote the music for the next Carnival considered himself the luckiest man under the sun; inasmuch as the Signora sang all his arias without one of the thousand alterations which, in ordinary circumstances, she would have insisted on his making in them. Krespel's friend added that it was most desirable to give no publicity to what had occurred, because, otherwise, prima donnas would be getting pitched out of window every day.

"Krespel was in great excitement. He ordered horses. He got in to the post-chaise.

"'Stop a moment, though,' he said. 'Isn't it a positive certainty that, as soon as I make my appearance, the evil spirit will take possession of Angela again? I've thrown her out of window once already. What should I do a second time? I don't see what I could do.'

"He got out of the carriage, wrote an affectionate letter to his wife, and--remained in Germany. They carried on a warm correspondence. Assurances of affection, fond imaginings, regrets for the absence of the beloved, etc., etc., flew backwards and forwards between H---- and Venice. Angela came to Germany, as we know, and shone as prima donna on the boards at F----. Though she was no longer young, she carried everything before her by the irresistible charm of her singing. Her voice had lost nothing at that time. Meanwhile Antonia had grown up; and her mother could scarce find words in which to describe, to Krespel, how, in Antonia, a Cantatrice of the first rank was blossoming out. Krespel's friends in F----, too, kept on telling him of this; begging him to go there and hear these two remarkable singers. Of course they had no idea of the relationship in which Krespel stood to them. He would fain have gone and seen his daughter, who lived in the depths of his heart, and whom he often saw in dreams. But the thought of what his wife was restrained him: and he stayed at home, amongst his dismembered fiddles.

"I daresay you remember a very promising young composer in F---- of the name of B----, who suddenly ceased to be heard of--no one knew why: perhaps you may have known him. Well, he fell deeply in love with Antonia; she returned his affection, and he urged her mother to consent to a union consecrated by art. Angela was quite willing, and Krespel gave his consent all the more readily that this young maestro's writings had found favour before his critical tribunal. Krespel was expecting to hear of the marriage every day, when there came a letter with a black seal, addressed in a stranger's hand. A certain Dr. M---- wrote to say that Angela had been taken seriously ill, in consequence of a chill caught at the theatre, and had passed away on the very night before the day fixed for Antonia's marriage. He added that Angela had told him she was Krespel's wife, and Antonia his daughter; so that he ought to come and take charge of her. Deeply as he was shocked by Angela's death, he could not but feel that a certain disturbing element was removed from his life, and that he could breathe freely, for the first time for many a long day. You cannot imagine how affectingly he described the moment when he saw Antonia for the first time. In the very oddness of his description of it lay a wonderful power of expression which I am unable to give any idea of. Antonia had all the charm and attractiveness of Angela, with none of her nasty reverse side. There was no cloven foot peeping out anywhere. B----, her husband that was to have been, came. Antonia comprehending her quaint father, with delicate tact, and seeing into his inner depths, sang one of those motetts of old Padre Martini which she knew Angela used to sing to him during the fullest blossom-time of their days of love. He shed rivers of tears. Never had he heard even Angela sing so splendidly. The tone of Antonia's voice was quite sui generis--at times it was like the Æolian harp, at others like the trilling roulades of the nightingale. It seemed as though there could not be space for those tones in a human breast. Antonia, glowing with love and happiness, sang all her best solos, and B---- played between whiles as only ecstatic inspiration can play. At first, Krespel floated in ecstasy. Then he grew thoughtful and silent, at last he sprung up, pressed Antonia to his heart, and said, gently and imploringly, 'Don't sing any more, if you love me. It breaks my heart. The fear of it--the fear of it! Don't sing any more.'

"'No,' said Krespel next morning to Dr. M----, 'when, during her singing, her colour contracted to two dark red spots on her white cheeks, it was no longer a mere everyday family likeness--it was what I had been dreading.' The doctor, whose face at the beginning of the conversation had expressed deep anxiety, said, 'Perhaps it may be that she has exerted herself too much in singing when over-young, or her inherited temperament may be the cause. But Antonia has organic disease of the chest. It is that which gives her voice its extraordinary power, and its most remarkable timbre, which is almost beyond the scope of the ordinary human voice. At the same time it implies her early death. If she goes on singing, six months is the utmost I can promise her.' This pierced Krespel's heart like a thousand daggers. It was as if some beautiful tree had suddenly come into his life, all covered with beautiful blossoms, and it was sawn across at the root. His decision was made at once. He told Antonia all. He left it to her to decide whether she would follow her lover, and yield to his and the world's claims on her, and die young, or bestow upon her father, in his declining years, a peace and happiness such as he had never known, and live many a year in so doing.

"She fell sobbing into her father's arms. It was beyond his power to think at such a moment. He felt too keenly all the anguish involved in either alternative. He discussed the matter with B----; but although he asseverated that Antonia should never sing a single note, Krespel knew too well that he never would be able to resist the temptation to hear her sing compositions of his own at all events. Then the world--the musical public--though it knew the true state of the case, would never give up its claims upon her. The musical public is a cruel race; where its own enjoyment is in question, and terrible.

"Krespel disappeared with Antonia from F----, and came to H----. B---- heard with despair of their departure, followed on their track, and arrived at H---- at the same time that they did.

"'Only let me see him once, and then die!' Antonia implored.

"'Die--die!' cried Krespel in the wildest fury. His daughter, the only creature in the wide world who could fire him with a bliss he had never otherwise felt, the only being who had ever made life endurable to him, was tearing herself violently away from him. So the worst might happen, and he would give no sign.

"B---- sat down to the piano, Antonia sang, and Krespel played the violin, till suddenly the dark red spots came to Antonia's cheeks. Then Krespel ordered a halt, but when B---- took his farewell she fell down insensible in a swoon.

"'I thought she was dead,' Krespel said, 'for I quite expected it would kill her; and as I had wound myself up to expect the worst, I kept quite calm and self-possessed. I took hold of B---- by the shoulders (in his frightful consternation he was staring before him like a sheep), and said (here he fell into his singing voice), "My dear Mr. Pianoforte-teacher, now that you have killed the woman you were going to marry by your own deliberate act, perhaps you will be so kind as to take yourself off out of this with as little trouble as you can, unless you choose to stay till I run this little hunting-knife through you, so that my daughter, who, as you see, is looking rather white, may derive a shade or two of colour from that precious blood of yours. Even though you run pretty quick, I could throw a fair sized knife after you." I suppose I must have looked rather terrible as I said this, for B---- dashed away with a scream of terror downstairs, and out of the door.'

"When, after B----'s departure, Krespel went to raise Antonia, who was lying senseless on the floor, she opened her eyes with a profound sigh, but seemed to close them again, as if in death. Krespel then broke out into loud, inconsolable lamentations. The doctor, fetched by the old housekeeper, said that Antonia was suffering from a violent shock, but that there was no danger, and this proved to be the case, and she recovered even more speedily than was to be expected. She now clung to her father with the most devoted filial affection, and entered warmly into all his favourite hobbies, however absurd. She helped him to take old fiddles to pieces, and to put new ones together. 'I won't sing any more. I want to live for you,' she would often say to her father with a gentle smile, when people asked her to sing, and she was obliged to refuse. Krespel endeavoured to spare her those trials, and this was why he avoided taking her into society, and tried to taboo all music. He knew, of course, what a pain it was to her to renounce the art which she had cultivated to such perfection. When he bought the remarkable violin already spoken of--the one which was buried with her--and was going to take it to pieces, Antonia looked at him very sorrowfully, and said, gently imploring him, 'This one, too?' Some indescribable impulse constrained him to leave it untouched, and to play on it. Scarcely had he brought out a few notes from it when Antonia cried, loudly and joyfully, 'Ah! that is I--that is I singing again.' And of a verity its silver bell-like tones had something quite extraordinarily wonderful about them. They sounded as if they came out of a human heart. Krespel was deeply affected. He played more gloriously than ever he had done before. And when, with his fullest power, he would go storming over the strings, in brilliant, sparkling scales and arpeggios, Antonia would clap her hands and cry, delighted, 'Ah! I did that well. I did that splendidly!' Often she would say to him, 'I should like to sing something, father'; and then he would take the fiddle from the wall, and play all her favourite solos, those which she used to sing of old,--and then she was quite happy.

"A short time before I came back, Krespel one night thought he heard some one playing on the piano in the next room, and presently he recognized that it was B----, preluding in his accustomed rather peculiar fashion. He tried to rise from his bed, but some strange heavy weight seemed to lie upon him, fettering him there, so that he could not move. Presently he heard Antonia singing to the piano, in soft whispering tones, which gradually swelled, and swelled to the most pealing fortissimo. Then those marvellous tones took the form of a beautiful, glorious aria which B---- had once written for Antonia, in the religious style of the old masters. Krespel said the state in which he found himself was indescribable, for terrible alarm was in it, and also a bliss such as he had never before known. Suddenly he found himself in the middle of a flood of the most brilliant and dazzling light, and in this light he saw B---- and Antonia holding each other closely embraced, and looking at each other in a rapture of bliss. The tones of the singing and of the accompanying piano went on, although Antonia was not seen to be singing, and B---- was not touching the piano. Here Krespel fell into a species of profound unconsciousness, in which the vision and the music faded and were lost. When he recovered, all that remained was a sense of anxiety and alarm. He hastened into Antonia's room.

"She was lying on the couch, with her eyes, closed, and a heavenly smile on her face, as if she were dreaming of the most exquisite happiness and bliss. But she was dead!"

Whilst Theodore had been telling this tale, Ottmar had been manifesting his impatience nay, his lively repugnance in various ways. Sometimes he would get up and walk about the room, then he would sit down again, and drink glass after glass of the contents of the vase; then he sat down at Theodore's table, and pulled the papers about, till he found an almanac, of which he eagerly turned over the leaves for a time, till at length he laid it down before him, open on the table, with the air of having discovered something in it of the deepest interest and importance.

"Well!" cried Lothair, when Theodore had ended his story; "this is almost too much. You can't bear the idea of the kindly visionary whom Cyprian told us about; you tell us it is dangerous to peep down into those mysterious abysses of nature; you will neither talk about things of the sort, nor hear them talked about, yet you come in upon us with a story which, frightful as it is in its crackiness, is infinitely beyond, at all events, my powers of endurance. What was the gentle, happy, contented Serapion in comparison with this splenetic Krespel--absolutely terrific in his spleneticism? You said we were to be led, gently, from insanity, viâ eccentricity, to ordinary, everyday rationality; and you go on to show us pictures which, if we look at them with any closeness, are enough to drive us clean out of our senses. Cyprian's story was largely tinctured by his own individuality, but yours was so by yours in a far higher degree, for I know that the moment music is in question, you get into a sort of magnetized condition, and see the strangest visions. As is usual with you, you have given your story a strong dash of mystery which, of course, excites and enthrals a listener, as anything out of the common groove will do, be it never so morbid. But there are limits to all things; and it is not right to drive people to the verge of insanity in this gratuitous sort of way. Antonia's story and circumstances, and the mysterious sympathy between her and that ancient violin are very touching, but in a way which makes one's blood curdle, and the finale of the tale produces an inconsolable misery which I cannot but call excessively painful--in fact, I consider it 'abominable.' It is a strong expression; but I really don't see that I can well retract it."

"Are you accusing me," asked Theodore with a smile, "of having harrowed your feelings with a more or less elaborately constructed fiction? I was merely telling you about a strange character, of whom I was reminded by the story of Serapion. I merely related circumstances which actually occurred; and if you think any of them improbable, remember, my dear sir, that it is nearly always the most improbable things that really come to pass."

"Very likely," said Lothair. "Still, that is small excuse for you. You should cither have told us nothing about this horrible Krespel, or (admirable colourist as you are) you should have shown him in more agreeable tints. However, we have had more than enough of that distressful architect, diplomate, and fiddle maker. May he sink Into oblivion? But now, Cyprian, I bend my knee to you. I shall never call you a fanciful spirit-seer again. You have given us a strange proof that reminiscences are very remarkable and mysterious things. All this day you have not been able to get poor Serapion out of your mind, and I see quite clearly that you have been much relieved, and happier, since you told us his story. Now just come and look at this book here, this excellent specimen of the ordinary household almanac, for it contains a key to the whole mystery. This, you see, is the 14th of November. It was on the 14th of November that you found your hermit lying dead in his hut, and though you were not vouchsafed the assistance of a couple of lions to bury him--as Ottmar suggested--and met with no particularly wonderful adventures in the forest, of course you were deeply affected at the sight of your friend, who had passed to his rest so gently. The impression was ineradicable; and it may well be supposed that the spirit within you brought the image of your friend more vividly before you than usual on the anniversary of his death, by some process of which you were unconscious. Do me the kindness, Cyprian, to add a miraculous circumstance or two to your account of Serapion's death, just to enrich the conclusion of it a little."

"When I was leaving the hut," said Cyprian, "the tame deer, which I told you about, came up to me with great tears in its eyes, and the wild doves hovered about me with anxious cries; and as I was approaching the village, to give information of his death, I met some peasants coming with a bier, all ready, who said that when they had heard the hermit's bell tolling at an unusual time they had known that the holy man had laid himself down to die, or was dead already. That is all, dear Lothair, that I have to serve up by way of a subject for your banter."

"Banter, do you say?" cried Lothair, rising. "What do you take me for, O my Cyprianus? Am I not, like Brutus, an honourable man; just and upright; a lover of the truth? Don't I enthusi-ize with the enthusiasts, and phantazize with the phantazizers? Do I not rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with those that weep? Just look here, my Cyprianus! Look once again at this book, this literary production here, crammed with incontrovertible facts, this most excellent specimen of the common, every-day household almanac. At the date '14th November' you find, it is true, the commonplace, every-day name 'Levin.' But cast your eyes upon this 'catholic' column here. There stands, in red letters,

"'SERAPION, MARTYR.'

"Consequently, your Serapion died on the very name-day of the Saint whom he took himself to be! Come; I drink this cup to the memory of Serapion, saint and martyr, and do you all do likewise!"

"'With all my heart!' said Cyprian, and the glasses clinked.

"Looking at the subject all round," said Lothair, "and especially now that Theodore has so thoroughly stirred my bile with that horrible Krespel of his, I am quite reconciled to Cyprian's Serapion. More than that, I honour and reverence his insanity; for none but a grand and genuine poet could have been attacked by a madness of that particular form. I needn't advert to the circumstance--it's an old, well-worn story--that, originally, the same word was used to denote the poet and the seer; but it is certain that we might often doubt just as much of the existence of real poets as of that of genuine seers, recounting in their extasis the wonders of a higher realm; or else why is it that so much poetry, by no means to be termed 'bad' (so far as its form and workmanship are concerned), affects us no more than some pale, faded picture, so that we are not carried away by it at all, and the gorgeousness of its diction only serves to increase the frost which it permeates us with? Why is this, but because the poet has never really seen what he is telling us about: the events and incidents have never appeared to his mental vision, in all their joy, terror, splendour, majesty, gloom, and sadness, inspiring him, and setting him aglow, so that his inward fire blazes forth in words of lightning? It is useless for a poet to set to work to make us believe in a thing which he does not believe in himself, cannot believe in, because he has never really seen it. What can the characters of a poet of this sort--who (according to the old expression) is not at the same time a genuine seer--be but deceptive puppets, glued together out of heterogeneous stuff? Your hermit, dear Cyprian, was a true poet. He had actually seen what he described; and that was why he affected people's hearts and souls. Poor Serapion! Wherein did your madness consist? except that some hostile star had taken away your faculty of discerning that duplexity which is, really, the essential condition of our earthly existence. There is an inner world; and a spiritual faculty of discerning it with absolute clearness, nay, with the most minute and brilliant distinctness. But it is part of our earthly lot that it is the outer world, in which we are encased, which is the lever that brings that spiritual faculty into play. The things of the inner world appear to us only inside the circle which is formed round us by the objects of the outer world, beyond which circle our spirits cannot soar, except in dim mysterious bodings--never; becoming distinct images--that such things exist. But you, happy hermit, lost sight of the outer world, and did not perceive the lever which set your inward faculty in motion; and when, with that gruesome acumen of yours, you declared that it is only the mind which sees, hears, and takes cognizance of events and incidents, and that, as a consequence, whatever the mind takes cognizance of has actually happened, you forgot that it is the outer world which causes the spirit to exercise those functions which, take cognizance. Your life was a constant dream, from which your awaking in another world was assuredly not a painful one. I consecrate this glass to your memory."

"Don't you notice," said Ottmar, "that Lothair is looking quite a different person--thanks to Theodore's admirably compounded beverage, which has driven the evil spirit out of him?"

"Don't ascribe my better mood to the influence of the bowl," said Lothair. "You all know that, till the evil mood has left me, I never can touch wine. The truth is that I have only just begun to feel at ease, and at home, amongst you. The restless, excited state in which I was at first has gone; and as I not only forgive Cyprian for telling us about Serapion, but feel a real affection for him, why, Theodore's horrible 'Krespel' may pass muster as well. But there are a good many things I should like to say to you. We seem to be all agreed that we are a set of rather uncommonly superior people, and we have made up our minds to reconstitute our old alliance; whilst the bustle of this great town, our distance from each other, and the diversity of our occupations tend to keep us apart. Let us determine, then, this evening, the times and places of our weekly meetings. More than that, it cannot but be that, as of old, we shall wish to read to each other such little stories, and so forth, as we may have been writing from time to time. Let us remember Serapion the Hermit in connection with this. Let each of us try, and examine himself well, as to whether he has really seen what he is going to describe before he sets to work to put it in words. At all events, let each of us strive, very strenuously, to get a clear grasp, in his mind, of the picture he is going to produce,--in every one of its forms, colours, lights and shadows, and then, when he feels himself thoroughly permeated and kindled by it, bring it out into outer life. Thus shall our society be established on solid foundations, and be a source of comfort and gratification to us all. Let Serapion the Hermit be our patron saint: may his seer-gift inspire us. His rule we will follow, as true Serapion Brethren."

"Now," said Cyprian, "is not our Lothair the most extraordinary of all extraordinary fellows? At first he was the one who flamed furiously up in opposition to Ottmar's very sensible suggestion that we should meet every week on a certain evening, and dragged in the subject of clubs, without rhyme or reason. And now he is the very one to prove to us that our meetings are a necessity, as well as a pleasure, and to set to work to determine their character, and lay down the rules which are to govern them."

"I certainly did, at first, feel opposed to the idea of there being anything in the shape of formal conditions attached to our meetings," said Lothair, "but I was in a peculiar mood then, which has passed away now. There is no danger of our drifting into Philistinism. Everybody has more on less of a tendency towards it, however sublimely he may strive against it; and perhaps a certain spice of it may not always be an unmitigated evil. However, we needn't bother ourselves about whatever little clouds, of any sort, may rise on our horizon from time to time. The devil is sure to bring some over us, as opportunities offer. Let us discuss the Serapiontic principle. What are your views about it?"

Theodore, Ottmar and Cyprian all thought that their union would have been sure to assume a literary character, of itself, though nothing had been expressly stipulated to that affect,--and at once took the vow of obedience to the rule of Serapion the Hermit, so clearly formulated by Lothair; which, as Theodore pointed out, amounted to this--that they should never vex each other's souls by the production of scamped work.

So they clinked their glasses joyously, and gave each other the fraternal embrace of the true Serapion Brother.

"Midnight," said Ottmar, "is still a long way off, and I think it would be very nice if one of us were to relate something more pleasant and amusing, by way of throwing the melancholy, nay terrible, events we have been dealing with into the background a little. I think it rests properly with Theodore to operate his promised 'Transition to Ordinary Rationality.'"

"If you like," said Theodore, "I will read you a little story which I wrote some time ago, which was suggested to me by a picture. When I saw this picture, I discovered a meaning in it which the painter of it had certainly never dreamt of--could not have dreamt of in fact--because it referred to circumstances in my own early life, which the picture brought strangely back to my memory."

"I sincerely trust there are no mad people in it," said Lothair; "for I have had more than my fill of them already: and I hope it conforms to the rule of our patron saint."

"There are no mad people in it," said Theodore, "but, as to its conformity with Serapiontic rule, I must leave that to the verdict of my worthy brethren, begging them at the same time not to judge me too severely, seeing that my little story was suggested by a light, airy picture, and makes no pretence but to cause a passing moment's entertainment."

With which Theodore produced his manuscript, and began as follows:

"[AN INTERRUPTED CADENCE.]

"In the Berlin autumn Exhibition of 1814, there was a charming picture of Hummel's, called 'A Scene in an Italian Locanda,' which attracted much attention. It was both light and vigorous, and had all the effect of representing a real occurrence. The scene was a garden-arbour, thick with the luxuriant leafage of the South. Two Italian ladies, seated opposite to one another, at a table, with wine and fruit--one of them singing, the other accompanying her on a guitar. Between them, and behind the table, an abbate, standing beating the time, as music-director; his hand was raised, as a conductor's is when a singer is executing a cadenza, watching carefully and anxiously for the precise instant when the singer--evidently warbling out her cadence, with eyes upraised to the sky--should come in with her trillo--her long shake; at the precise termination of which it would be his duty to make his down-beat, on which signal the guitarist should strike in with her chord of the dominant. The abbate, all admiration and intense enjoyment, was watching for the proper instant to made his down-beat as a cat watches a mouse. Not if his life depended on it would he depass that precise instant by a hair's-breadth. Fain would he muzzle every fly, every mosquito, humming about under the leaves. Most distressful to him the approach of the landlord, who had selected that particular moment to come in with more wine. Beyond the arbour, in the middle distance, a shaded alley, with streams of bright sunlight breaking athwart it through the branches; and a man on horseback, drinking a cool draught, served to him by a girl from the locanda.

"Edward and Theodore were standing studying this picture; and Edward said:

"'The more I look at this picture; at that lady singing--not quite so young as she has been, but inspired by genuine artistic enthusiasm--at the pure, intellectual Roman profile, and the magnificent figure of the lady accompanying on the guitar, and at the delicious little abbate beating the time, the more convinced I am that they are portraits of real, living persons. I feel as if I should like to step into that arbour and open one of those delightful wicker-covered flasks that are smiling at me on that table there. I can almost fancy I scent the aroma of the noble wine. And that latter idea must be realised, and not allowed to evaporate in this chill atmosphere. I propose that we go and drink a bottle of real Italian wine, in honour of this charming picture, and of the happy land of Italy, the only country where life is worth living.'

"As Edward so spoke, Theodore was standing silent, sunk in deep reflection.

"'Very well--yes--we may as well,' he answered, like a man waking from a dream. Yet he seemed loth to tear himself away from the picture, and still kept casting longing glances at it when he had mechanically followed his friend to the door.

"It was an easy matter to put Edward's idea into practice. They had only to cross the street to find themselves in the little blue room in the Sala Tarone, with a wicker-covered flask, like those in the picture, on the table before them.

"'You seem, somehow,' said Edward, when they had swallowed two or three glasses of the Italian wine, and Theodore was still sitting silent and thoughtful,--'you seem, somehow, as if that picture had produced a different impression, and a far less pleasant one, on you than on me.'

"'I delight in that picture as much as anybody,' answered Theodore. 'But the extraordinary thing about it is, that it chances to represent a scene in my early life, with the utmost exactness, so that the very characters in it are absolute portraits of the real actors in that scene. You will admit that even pleasant reminiscences affect us strangely when they come bursting in upon us in this utterly unexpected sort of manner, as if evoked by the wand of an enchanter.'

"'What a very extraordinary affair,' said Edward. 'You say this picture represents an incident, in your own life? It seems probable enough that the two ladies and the abbate are likenesses of real people: but that they should ever have had anything to do with you is certainly amazing enough. Do tell me all about it. We are not pressed for time, and nobody is likely to come in and disturb us at this hour of the day.'

"'I should rather like to tell you about it,' said Theodore, 'only I shall have to go a longish way back, to the time when I was a mere boy.'

"Please go on, then, and tell me about it,' said Edward. 'I don't know much about your early life; and if it does take some time in telling we shall only have to send for another bottle of this Italian wine; nobody will be the worse for that, neither we nor Signor Tarone.'

"'Nobody who knows me,' said Theodore, 'need feel any surprise at my having thrown everything else overboard, and devoted myself, body and soul, to the glorious art, music. Even when I was a mere child, music was the only thing I really cared about. I would hammer all day, and all night, too, if people would have allowed me, upon my uncle's old rattle-trap of a piano. Music was at an extremely low ebb in the little place where we lived; there was nobody to give me any instruction but an old, conceited, self-opinionated organist. His music was of the lifeless, mathematical order. He wearied my soul with a lot of ugly gloomy toccatas and fugues. However, I did not let this discourage me, but laboured faithfully on. The old fellow would often gird at me in bitter and unsparing terms; but he had only to sit down and play me something in his severely accurate manner, to reconcile me to life and art in a moment. Often the most wonderful ideas would come into my head on such occasions; many of Sebastian Bach's works, for instance, and they above all others, would fill me with a weird awe, as if they were legends about spirits and enchanters. But a perfect paradise opened upon me when, as happened in winter, the town band gave a concert, assisted by a few local amateurs, and I was allowed to play the kettledrums in the symphony, a favour granted to me on account of the accuracy of my time. It was many a day before I knew what wretched and ludicrous affairs those concerts were. My master, the organist, generally played a couple of pianoforte concertos of Wolff or Emanuel Bach; one of the bandsmen tortured himself--and his hearers--with some violin solo of Stamitz, and the excise officer blew terrifically on a flute, and wasted so much breath in the process, that he kept blowing out the candles on his desk, so that they had to be constantly lighted up again. Nothing in the shape of singing could be accomplished, and this was a source of deep regret to my uncle, a "great" amateur musician. He remembered the days when the choir-masters of the four churches used to sing "Lottchen am Hofe" at the concerts, and he used to refer, with high approbation, to the fine spirit of religious tolerance which actuated those musicians, who laid aside their religious differences, and united in these performances, coming together, irrespective of creed, on a common basis of art. For, besides the Catholic and the Evangelical communities, the Protestants themselves were divided into French and German churches. The French choir-master used to take the part of "Charlotte," and my uncle used to say he sang it--spectacles on nose--in the loveliest falsetto that ever issued from a human throat.

"'There dwelt amongst us, at this period, a certain "court-singer," retired on pension, whose name was Mademoiselle Meibel. She was a demoiselle of some five-and-fifty summers, but my uncle thought it would be only a proper thing if she could be induced to emerge occasionally from her pensioned retirement, so far as to sing a solo now and then at our concerts. After giving herself the proper amount of airs, and saying "no" a sufficient number of times, she graciously yielded, so that we got the length of including an occasional "Aria di Bravura" in our programmes. She was an extraordinary-looking creature, Mademoiselle Meibel. I can see her little wizened figure at this moment as if she were here before my eyes. She used to come forward on to the platform, very grave and dignified, her music in her hand, dressed in nearly all the colours of the rainbow, and make a ceremonious dip of the upper part of her body to the audience. She used to have on a miraculous sort of head-gear, with Italian porcelain flowers stuck on the front of it; and, as she sung, these flowers used to nod and quiver in the oddest fashion. When she ended her solo--received always by the audience with boundless applause--she would hand her music, with a glance of pride, to my master, who was accorded the privilege of dipping his forefinger and thumb into the little box, in the shape of a pug dog, which she at such times produced, and took snuff from with a courtly air. She had a most disagreeable, quavering voice, and introduced all kinds of horrible, vulgar grace-notes and flourishes; and you can imagine the ludicrous effect which this, in combination with her external appearance, produced on me. My uncle was loud in encomiums, but this was incomprehensible to me, and I sided all the more with my organist, who despised all vocal music, and used to mimic old Mademoiselle Meibel in the most entertaining style.

"'The more I coincided with my master in considering all singing to be an inferior province of the musical art, the higher waxed his estimate of my musical endowments. He taught me counterpoint with untiring, indefatigable pains and zeal, and ere long I was able to write the correctest of fugues and toccatas.

"'On my nineteenth birthday, I was playing one of those compositions of mine to my uncle, when the waiter of our principal hotel came in, and announced that two foreign ladies, who had just arrived in the town, were coming to see us.

"Before my uncle had time to throw off his large-flowered dressing-gown and dress himself, the ladies were in upon us.

"You know the electrical effect which any unusual apparition of this sort has upon people who live in small provincial places, but the one which now appeared to me was really such as to produce on me the effect of the wave of some enchanter's wand.

"'Picture to yourself two tall, handsome Italian girls, dressed in the latest fashions, walking up to my uncle, with a combination of artistic ease and charming courtesy of manner, and talking away to him in voices which were extremely loud, and yet remarkably beautiful in tone. What was the curious language they were speaking? Now and then but only now and then it sounded something like German.

"'My uncle didn't understand a word of it. He stepped back, completely nonplussed, and pointed in silence to the sofa; they sat down there and talked to each other. That was real music. Ultimately they managed to explain to my uncle that they were singers on a tour, intended giving some concerts, and had been recommended to apply to him as a person who could assist them in the necessary arrangements. While they had been talking to each other I had gathered their names; Lauretta, who seemed to be the elder of the two, kept talking away to my bewildered uncle, with immense energy and eager gesticulation, glancing about her with beaming eyes the while. Without being to be called "stout," she was luxuriant of figure to a degree which was at that time something wholly novel to my inexperienced--and admiring--eyes. Teresina, taller and slighter, with a long earnest face, spoke, in the intervals, very little, but much more comprehensibly. Every now and then she would smile, in a curious way, as if a good deal amused at the aspect of my poor uncle, who kept shrinking into his flowered dressing-gown as a snail does into its shell, vainly trying to stick away a certain string belonging to his nether garments, which would keep fluttering out every now and then, to the length of an ell or so.

"'At last they rose to go. My uncle had promised to arrange a concert for the next day but one, and he and I (whom he had presented to them as a young virtuoso) were invited to go and take chocolate with the sisters that evening.

"'When the time came, we walked slowly and solemnly up the stairs accordingly. We both felt very queer: somewhat as if we were going forward to undertake some rather perilous adventure, for which we were by no means adequately prepared.

"After my uncle, who had carefully prepared himself beforehand, had spoken much and learnedly about music--(nobody understood a word he said, neither he himself, nor we others)--after I had burnt my tongue, three times, terribly with the scalding chocolate smiling at my tortures with the stoicism of a Scaevola--Lauretta said she would sing something. Teresina took the guitar tuned it, and struck two or three handfuls of chords. I had never heard the instrument before, and was much impressed by the strange, mysterious effect of its hollow vibrations.

"'Lauretta commenced a note, very piano, swelled it out to a ringing fortissimo, and then broke out into a bold warbling cadenza, extending over an octave and a half. I remember the words of the beginning of her aria:--

"Sento l'amica speme."

"'My blood seemed to pause in my veins! I never had had an idea that there could be anything like this, and as Lauretta soared on her bright pinions of song, higher and higher, and as the beams of those beautiful tones shone brighter and brighter upon me, all the music within me--dead and dormant hitherto--caught fire, and blazed on high in glorious and mighty flames.

"'Ah! that was the first time in my life that I ever heard music! Next the sisters sang together, some of those earnest, quiet, deep-drawn duets of Abbate Steffani'e. Teresina's rich, exquisitely beautiful contralto stirred the depths of my soul. I could not keep back my tears, they rolled down my cheeks. My uncle blew his nose a great deal, and cast reproachful looks at me. It was no use; I couldn't control myself. This seemed to please the sisters; they asked about my musical studies. I felt utterly disgusted with all I had done, and declared, in my enthusiasm, that I had never heard music before.

"'"Il buon fanciullo!" said Lauretta, very sweetly and tenderly.

"'When I got home I felt almost out of my mind. I seized all the toccatas and fugues which I had so laboriously carpentered together (as well as forty-five Variations on a Thema in Canon, which the organist had composed for me, and presented to me in a beautifully written MS.), and shied the whole boiling of them into the fire. I laughed sardonically as this mass of double counterpoint crackled and blazed, and went sparkling out into ashes. Then I sat down to the instrument, and tried, first to imitate the guitar, and then to play, and next to sing, the melodies which I had heard the sisters execute. At last, about midnight, my uncle came out of his bedroom crying, "For the love of heaven stop that caterwauling, be off to your bed, and let's try to get some sleep," with which he blew out the lights and left me in the dark. I had nothing for it but obey; but in my dreams I thought I had solved the secret of song, and was singing the "Sento l'Amica Speme" in the most exquisite style myself.

"'Next morning my uncle had got together everybody who could play on string or wind instruments, to a rehearsal in the concert-room, and a proud man he felt himself to be able to turn out such a fine show of performers. The rehearsal was anything but a success, however. Lauretta essayed a grand scena, but we had not got many bars into the recitative when everything was at sixes and sevens; none of the players had the slightest idea of accompanying. Lauretta screamed, stormed, wept, with rage and disgust. The organist was at the piano, and him she attacked with her bitterest objurgations. He rose from his seat, and walked slowly, and with much composure, out at the door. The band-master, at whom she had hurled an "asino tedesco" put his violin under his arm, and cocked his cap martially over one ear; he, too, was making for the door, his men, unscrewing their mouthpieces, and sticking their bows in among their strings, preparing to follow him. Only the amateurs were left, looking at each other, almost with tears in their eyes, the exciseman saying, "Oh, dear me! how very much I do feel a thing of this sort!"

"'But all my natural bashfulness had abandoned me. I stopped the band-master; I entreated and implored him; in the anguish of the moment I promised I would write him six minuets, with double trios each, for the county-ball. I succeeded in pacifying him. He went back to his music-stand; the bandsmen followed his example, and the orchestra was ready to commence operations once more. All except the organist; his place at the piano was vacant. I found him strolling--a calm, contemplative man--up and down in the market-place, by no process whatever to be prevailed upon to cross the threshold of the concert-room any more.

"'Teresina had been looking on at all this, biting her lips to keep back her laughter. Lauretta was now just as conciliatory as she had previously been the contrary. She thanked me most warmly for all I had done. She asked if I could play the piano, and, ere I knew where I was, I found myself occupying the organist's vacant place, with the score before me. Up to this time I had never accompanied a singer, or directed an orchestra. Teresina sat down beside me, and indicated the various tempi to me. Lauretta gave me an encouraging "bravo!" now and then; the orchestra began to understand, and things went better. At the second rehearsal all was clear, and the sensation the sisters produced at the concert was indescribable.

"'There were going to be great doings at the Residenz, on the occasion of the prince's return from abroad, and the sisters were engaged to sing there; in the meantime they decided on remaining in our little town, and giving one or two more concerts. The admiration of the towns-folk for them amounted to a species of insanity. Only old Mdlle. Meibel would take a reflective pinch out of her pug-dog snuff-box, and remark that screeching of that sort was not singing. My organist was no more to be seen, and I by no means regretted his absence. I was the happiest creature on earth. I sat with the sisters all day long, playing their accompaniments, and writing out the parts from the scores for the concerts at the Residenz. Lauretta was my ideal; all her naughty tempers, her artistic outbreaks of fury, impatience with her accompanyist, and so forth, I bore like a lamb. I began to learn Italian, and wrote a canzonetta or two. How I rose to the empyrean when Lauretta sang my compositions, and even praised them! I often felt as if I had never thought and written those things, but as if the ideas streamed out for the first time when she sang them. With Teresina I did not get on so well. She sang very seldom; didn't seem to take much interest in me or my doings, and sometimes gave me the impression of laughing at me behind my back.

"'The time arrived at last when they had to leave us: then it was that I fully realized what Lauretta had become to me, and how impossible it was for me to be parted from her. After she had been unusually smorfiosa with me, she would be kind and caressing, but always in such a fashion that, although my blood would seethe, the coldness which I could feel that she brought to bear upon me was sufficient to prevent me from throwing myself at her feet with passionate avowals of love.

"'I had a pretty fair tenor voice then: it had never had any cultivation, but it was beginning to improve, and I used to sing, with Lauretta, numbers of those tender Italian duets whose name is legion. We were singing one of those duets one day; the time of her departure was at hand--

"Senza di te, ben mio!

Vivere non poss' io."

"'Who could have resisted this? I threw myself at Lauretta's feet, wild with despair.

"'She helped me to rise. "Why should we part, dear friend?" she said. I listened in delighted amazement. She said I had much better go with her and Teresina to the Residenz. If I meant to devote myself to music altogether, I should have to quit my little native town some day or other.

"'Picture to yourself a person who has bidden good-bye to life and hope, and is falling down some black, fathomless abyss; but, at the very instant when he expects the crash which is to dash him in pieces, lo and behold! he is in a beautiful bower of roses, with hundreds of little many-tinted lights dancing round him, and saying, "Darling! you're still alive, you see!" These were my sensations at that moment. To go with them to the Residenz was the one prominent, tangible idea of my life.

"'I shan't weary you by describing how I set about proving to my uncle the absolute necessity of my going to the Residenz--no such very great distance, when all was said. He agreed at last, and said he would go with me! Here was an unexpected baulk to my little plans. I dared not tell him I was going with the ladies; but luckily one of his attacks of bronchitis came to my rescue.

"'I started off in the stage-coach, but got out at the first change of horses, and waited there for the coming of my goddesses. I had plenty of money in my pocket, so that I was able to make all my arrangements. My idea was to escort the ladies on horseback, like a paladin of Romance; so I managed to hire a steed--not particularly grand to look at, but, as his owner assured me, a good serviceable animal,--and at the appointed time I mounted him, and rode out to meet the two cantatrices. Ere long, their little double-seated phæton was seen coming quietly along. The two sisters were on the front seat, and behind sat their maid, little fat Gianna, a brown Neapolitan. The carriage was crammed with all sorts of boxes, band-boxes, portmanteaus, and so forth, and two pug-dogs, on Gianna's lap, yapped at me as I rode up.

"Everything went swimmingly till we got to the last stage from the Residenz, but there my horse was seized with the remarkable idea that he ought to go home to his stable. A conviction that severe measures are seldom effectual in such conjunctures induced me to try every description of mild persuasion that I could think of. The perverse animal was proof against all my gentle remonstrances. I wanted to go forward; he wanted to go back. All that I could accomplish in the circumstances was that, instead of retrograding, he kept describing circles. Teresina leant out of the carriage, laughing most heartily; whilst Lauretta put her hands before her eyes and screamed, as if I were in the utmost danger. I jammed my spurs into the brute's sides, and, ere I could say Jack Robinson, found myself on the broad of my back on the turnpike road, with the horse standing over me, his long neck stretched out, surveying me with an expression of calm derision.

"'I could not get up till the driver got off and helped me. Lauretta, too, got out, and was weeping and screaming. I had twisted one of my feet, and couldn't ride any further. What was to be done? The horse was made fast to the back of the carriage, and I had to squeeze myself inside, as best I could. Just picture to yourself two well-grown young women, a fat maid, a couple of dogs, a dozen or so of baskets, band-boxes, etc., and me in addition, squeezed up in a little two-seated phaeton! Think of Lauretta's lamentations about the want of room; the dogs' yapping; the Neapolitan's chattering, and the horrible pain of my foot, and you will have some idea what a charming position I was in. Teresina declared she could bear it no longer; the driver pulled up, and with one bound she was out of the carriage. She loosed my horse, got on his back, and trotted and curvetted down the road before us. She certainly looked splendid; the grace and distinction which she possessed in an eminent degree were more especially conspicuous on horseback. She made us hand her out her guitar, and, slinging her bridle over her left arm, she sang Spanish ballads as she rode along, striking handfuls of chords in accompaniment. Her silk dress fluttered in shimmering folds, and the white plumes in her hat nodded and quivered, like airy sprites, in time to the music. Her whole effect was romantic beyond expression, and I could not take my eyes away from her; although Lauretta called her absurd, and said she was a silly, forward girl, and had better take care she didn't meet with an accident. However, the horse seemed to have altered his tactics--or perhaps he preferred the lady-singer to the Paladin; at all events, it was not till we were close to the gates of the Residenz that Teresina clambered back into the carriage again.

"'Imagine me now deliciously up to my eyes in concerts, operas, and music of every description, passing my days and hours at the piano, whilst arias, duets, and I don't know all what, are being studied and rehearsed. From the total change in my outward man you gather that I am permeated and inspired by a spirit of might. All the provincial bashfulness is gone. I sit at the piano, a maestro, with the score before me, conducting my donna's scenas. My whole soul and existence is centred in melody. With the utmost contempt for counterpoint, I write quantities of canzonettas and arias, which Lauretta sings--only in private, however. Why won't she ever sing anything of mine at a concert? I can't make this out. Teresina sometimes dawns on my memory, curvetting with her lyre on her charger, like some incarnation of music; and, spite of myself, I write loftier and more serious strains when I think of this. Lauretta, no doubt, sports and plays with the notes like some fairy-queen. What does she ever attempt in which she does not succeed? Teresina never attempts a roulade; a simple appoggiatura or so, in the antique style, is the utmost that she ventures upon; but those long, sustained notes of hers shine through the dim background, and wonderful spirits arise, and gaze, with their earnest eyes, deep into the breast. I don't know why mine was so long before it opened to them.

"'The sisters' benefit-concert came off at length. Lauretta was singing a great scena of Anfossi's. I was, of course, at the piano as usual. We had arrived at her final "pause," where her grand cadenza ad libitum had to come in. It was a question of showing what she really could do. Nightingale trills went warbling up and down; then came long holding-notes; then all kinds of florid passages--a regular solfeggio; even I thought the affair was being kept up too long. Suddenly I felt a breath. Teresina was standing close behind me; Lauretta was just pulling herself together to begin her long, swelling harmonica shake, which was to lead back to the a-tempo. Some demon took possession of me. I crashed down the chord of the dominant with both hands; the orchestra followed me; and there was an end of Lauretta's trillo, just at the supreme moment when it ought to have set the audience in furore.

"'Lauretta, with a glare of fury at me, which went through me like a two-edged sword, tore her music in pieces, and sent it flying about my ears; then rushed away like a mad creature, through the orchestra, into the ante-room. As soon as the tutti was finished, I hastened after her. She was sobbing and raving. "Don't come near me, you malignant fiend!" she screamed: "you have blasted my career for ever; how can I ever look an audience in the face again? You have robbed me of my name, and fame, and, oh, of my trillo! Out of my sight;" she made a rush at me, but I slipped deftly out of the door. During the concerto--which somebody or other played--Teresina and the Kapellmeister succeeded in so far pacifying her as to induce her to appear again--but not with me at the piano--and in the concluding duet, which the sisters sung, Lauretta did actually introduce the harmonica shake, was tremendously applauded, and got into the most delightful temper imaginable.

"'I, however, couldn't get over the style in which I had been treated before so many strangers; and I had quite made up my mind to be off back to my native town again the following morning. In fact I was packing up, when Teresina came into my room. When she saw what was going on, she was thunderstruck. "You going to leave us?" she cried. I said that after the way in which Lauretta had behaved to me, I could not possibly stay.

"'"Then the hasty, petulant outburst of a foolish girl, which she is heartily ashamed of and sorry for, is going to drive you away; where else could you carry on your artistic life so happily? It rests entirely with you to cure Lauretta of those tempers of hers. You are too good to her, and let her have her own way far too much. You have too high an opinion of her altogether. She has a very fair voice, and an enormous compass, no doubt. But all those fioriture, those everlasting scales and passages, and nightingale trills of hers, what are they but dazzling tricks, more like what an acrobat does on the tight-rope than anything else? Can such things possibly touch the heart? The harmonica shake, which you wouldn't let her bring in, is a thing which I detest! it makes me feel quite ill. Then all that clambering up among the ledger-line notes, isn't it a mere, unnatural forcing of the proper voice--the real voice--the only voice that touches the listener? What I admire are the middle and lower registers. A tone which goes to the heart, a genuine portamento di voce, I prefer to everything else. None of those meaningless embellimenti--a firm, steady, full utterance of the note--something like decision and accuracy of intonation; that is real singing, and that is how I sing myself. If you can't bear Lauretta longer, don't forget that there is Teresina, who is your devoted friend: and you can be my maestro and composer quite in your own special style. Don't be vexed with me, but all your florid canzonettas and arias are nothing in comparison with the one."

"'Teresina sang, in her rich pathetic tones, a simple canzone in church style which I had written a few days before. Never could I have imagined that it could ever possibly have sounded like that. Tears of rapture rolled down my cheeks: I seized her hand, and pressed it to my lips a thousand times: I vowed that nothing on earth should ever part us.

"'Lauretta looked upon my alliance with Teresina with angry jealousy, which she concealed as best she could. I was indispensable to her at the time; because, clever as her singing was, she couldn't learn anything new without assistance. She was a wretched hand at reading, and extremely shaky over her time. Teresina could read everything at sight, and the accuracy of her time was incomparable. Lauretta's tempers and caprices never came out in such full force as when she was being accompanied. The accompaniment never pleased her. She looked upon it in the light of a necessary evil, she wanted the piano to be barely audible, always pianissimo. She was always dragging and altering the time, every bar different, just as she happened to take it in her head at the moment. I set to work to resist this firmly. I combatted those evil habits of hers; I showed her that there must be a certain energy about an accompaniment, that breadth of phrasing was one thing, and meaningless dragging quite another. Teresina backed me up staunchly. I gave up writing everything but the church style, and gave all the solos to the contralto voice. Teresina dragooned me pretty smartly, too; but I didn't mind that. She knew more than Lauretta, and I thought she had more feeling for German music.

"'When we were in a certain little town in the south of Germany, we met with an Italian tenor on his way from Milan to Vienna. My ladies were charmed to meet with a fellow-countryman. He was continually with them. Teresina was the one whom he chiefly devoted himself to, and, to my no small disgust, I found myself quite playing second fiddle. One morning, as I was just going into their room, with a score under my arm, I heard an animated conversation going on between my ladies and the tenor. My own name struck my ear, and I listened with might and main. I knew enough Italian to catch every word that was said. Lauretta was relating the terrible story of the concert when I cut her out of her shake by striking my chord too soon.

"'"Asino tedesco!" cried the tenor. I felt inclined to go and chuck the vapouring stage-hero out of the window; but I restrained myself. Lauretta went on to say that she would have got rid of me on the spot, but that I had implored her to let me stay, and she had done so, out of compassion, as I was going to take singing-lessons from her. Teresina confirmed this, to my no small amazement. "He is a nice boy, enough," she added. "He is in love with me just now, and writes all his solos for the contralto. There is a certain amount of talent in him, if he could get rid of the stiffness and awkwardness which all Germans have. I am in hopes I may make a composer of him who may write some good things for the contralto: there is so little written for it that is worth very much. He is dreadfully wearisome with his everlasting sighings and devotion, and torments me fearfully with his compositions, which are poor enough as yet."

"'"Thank goodness, I am quit of him," cried Lauretta, "You know, Teresina, how he used to torture me with his arias and duettos," and she began a duet of mine, which she had highly praised formerly. Teresina took the second voice, and they both caricatured me most unmercifully. The tenor laughed till the room re-echoed. I felt a stream of icy water running down my back, my mind was thoroughly made up. I slipped back to my own room as quietly as I could. Its windows looked out into the side-street--the post-office was just over the way, and the Bamberg coach was drawing up to take in the mail-bags. The passengers were collecting at the gate, but I had still the best part of an hour before me. I got my things together as quickly as I could--magnanimously paid the whole of the hotel bill, and was off to the coach. As I went along the High Street, I saw my ladies looking out at the window, with the tenor, at the sound of the horn. But I kept well out of sight in the background, and pictured to myself, with deep delight, the crushing effect of the scathing letter which I had left for them.

"'Here Theodore slowly savoured, with intense gusto, the last drops of the glowing Eleatic which Edward had poured out for him.

"'"I shouldn't have expected Teresina to have behaved as she did," said Edward, opening a fresh bottle, and shaking away the drop or two of oil on the surface like one accustomed to that operation. "I can't forget the pretty picture of her caracoling along on horseback, singing Spanish songs."

"'That was her culminating point,' said Theodore. 'I remember as distinctly as possible the impression that made upon me. I forgot the pain of my foot. She looked like some creature of a higher sphere. A moment of that sort makes a tremendous impression upon one sometimes. Things sometimes put on a form, in an instant, which no lapse of time can change. If ever, since then, I have been unusually happy in the subject of some bold, spirited romanza, you may be sure I had that scene, and Teresina, vividly before my mind.'

"'"We mustn't forget the clever Lauretta, either," said Edward. "I vote that we let bygones be bygones, and drink to both the sisters." Which they did.

"'Ah!' said Theodore, 'how the perfumes of exquisite Italy breathe upon one out of this wine. One's blood seems to course through one's veins with threefold vigour. Oh, why had I to leave that glorious country so soon!'

"'"So far, though," said Edward, "I see no connection between what you have been telling me and the picture; so I suppose there is more about the sisters yet to come. Of course I see that the ladies in the picture are no other than Lauretta and Teresina."

"'Yes,' said Theodore. 'And my longing sighs for Italy form a good-enough introduction to what there remains for me to say. A short time before I had to leave Rome, the year before last, I went for a little excursion into the country, on horseback. I came to a locanda, where I saw a nice-looking girl, and I thought it would be a good thing to get her to bring me a flagon of good wine. I drew up at the door in the shaded alley, the bright sunlight breaking athwart it through the branches. I heard singing, and a guitar, somewhere near. I listened attentively, for the voices of the singers affected me strangely; dim reminiscences stirred within me, but were slow to take definite form. I got off my horse, and slowly drew nearer to the vine-covered arbour where the music was going on. The second voice had stopped; the first was singing a canzonetta alone; the singer was in the middle of an elaborate cadenza, it went warbling up and down, till at last she began a long holding-note, and then, all at once, a woman's voice broke out in a fury, with curses, execrations and reproaches. A man was heard protesting, another man laughing, whilst a second woman's voice joined in the mêlée. Wilder and wilder raged the storm, with true Italian rabbia. At last, just as I came up to the arbour, out flew an abbate, nearly knocking me down. He looked up at me, and I saw that he was none other than my good friend Signor Ludovico, my regular news-purveyor, from Rome. "What, in the name of Heaven----" I cried. "Ah, Signor Maestro! Signor Maestro!" he cried, "save me! rescue me! protect me from this mad creature--this crocodile, this tiger, this hyena--this devil of a girl! It is true I was beating the time to that canzonetta of Anfossi's, and I came in too soon with my down-beat, right in the middle of her pause-note, and cut her out of her trillo. Why did I look at her eyes, goddess of the infernal regions that she is? The devil take all pause-notes!"

"'In most unusual excitement I hastened into the arbour, and at the first glance, recognised Lauretta and Teresina. Lauretta was still screaming and raging, Teresina talking violently into her face; the landlord was looking on with a face of amusement, whilst a girl was putting fresh flasks of wine on the table.

"'The moment that the singers set eyes on me they threw themselves about my neck and overwhelmed me with the affectionateness of their reception. "Ah, Signor Teodoro, Signor Teodoro," all our little differences were forgotten. "This," said Lauretta to the Abbate, "is a composer who has all the grace and melody of the Italians combined with the science of the Germans." And both the sisters, taking the words out of each other's mouths, told him all about the happy days we had spent together, my profound musical knowledge, even as a boy, our practisings, and the excellence of my compositions. Never had they really cared to sing anything but works of mine. Presently Teresina told me she had got an engagement at an important theatre for the next Carnival, but meant to make it a condition that I should be commissioned to write at least one tragic opera; since, of course, opera seria was my real line, etc., etc. Lauretta, again, said it would be too bad if I didn't follow my special bent for the florid and sparkling style--for opera buffa, in fact: that she had got an engagement as prima donna in that line, and that, as a matter of course, nobody but I should write the operas in which she should appear. You can imagine how strange it felt to be with them again; and you see, now, that the scene and all the circumstances are exactly those of Hummel's picture.

"'"But didn't they say anything about the circumstances of your parting, or that scathing letter of yours?" asked Edward.

"Not a syllable,' said Theodore. 'Neither did I. I had long forgotten my annoyance, and remembered my affair with the sisters as a mere piece of fun nothing more. The only thing I did was to tell the Abbate how, many years ago, a similar misadventure had befallen me, and that in an aria of Anfossi's too. I incorporated in my story an account of all that had happened during the time that the sisters and I had spent together, delivering a swashing side-blow, now and then, just to show the considerable increment of "calibre" which a few years of artistic experience had endowed me with. "And," said I in conclusion, "it was a very lucky thing that I did come in too soon with that down-beat of mine. No doubt it was fore-ordained from all eternity; and I have little doubt that, if I hadn't interrupted Lauretta as I did then, I should have been sitting playing pianoforte accompaniments to this hour."

"'"But, Signer," said the Abbate, "what maestro can lay down laws to a prima donna? And then, your crime was far more heinous than mine. You were in a concert-room. I was only in this arbour here, merely playing the maestro. What did it matter about my down-beat? If those beautiful eyes of hers hadn't bewitched me, I shouldn't have made an ass of myself as I did." The Abbate's last words worked like magic. Lauretta's eyes, which had begun to dart angry lightnings, beamed softly again.

"'We spent that evening together. It was fourteen years since we had met, and fourteen years cause many changes. Lauretta was by no means as young as she had been, but she had not lost all her attractiveness. Teresina had worn better, and still retained her beautiful figure. They dressed in much the same style as of old, and had all their former ways: that's to say, their dress and manners were fourteen years younger than themselves. At my request, Teresina sang some of those earnest, serious arias which had impressed me so much in early days, but they did not seem to be quite what my memory had represented them. And it was the same with Lauretta's singing: though her voice had fallen off little, either in power or in compass, still it was different from the singing which lived in my memory as hers; and this attempt to compare a mental idea with the not altogether satisfactory reality, untuned me even more than the sisters' behaviour--their pretended ecstasy, their coarse admiration (which at the same time took the form of a generous patronage) had done at the beginning. But the droll little Abbate--who was playing the amoroso to both the sisters at once, in the most sugary manner--and the good wine (of which we had a fair share) gave me my good humour back at length, so that we all enjoyed our evening. The sisters invited me, in the most pressing manner, to go and see them, so that we might talk over the parts I was to compose for them; however I left Rome without ever seeing them again.

"'"Still," said Edward, "you have to thank them for awaking the music within you."

"'Undoubtedly,' answered Theodore, 'and for a quantity of good melodies into the bargain; but that is exactly the reason why I never should have seen them again. No doubt every composer can remember some particular occasion when some powerful impression was made on him, which time never effaces. The spirit which dwells in music spoke, and the spirit en rapport with it within the composer awoke at that creative fiat; it flamed up with might, and could never be extinguished again. It is certain that all the melodies which we produce under an impulse of this sort seem to belong only to the singer who cast the first spark into us. We hear her, and merely write down what she has sung; but it is the lot of us feeble earthly creatures, clamped to the dust as we are, to long and strive to bring down whatever we can of the super-earthly into the wretched little bit of earthly life in which we are cribbed up. And thus the singer becomes our beloved--perhaps our wife! The spell is broken; our inward melody, with its message, or gospel of glory, turns to a squabble about a broken soup-plate, or a row about an ink-mark on one's new shirt. That composer is a happy man who never again, in this earthly life, sees Her who, with mystic power, kindled the music within him. He may rage, and mourn, poor boy! when his beautiful enchantress has left him; but she has been transformed to everlasting Music, glorious and divine, which lives on in eternal beauty and youth; and out of it are born the melodies which are Her only, and Her again and again. What is she but his highest ideal, reflected from him on to herself?

"'"Curious, but pretty plausible," said Edward, as the friends, arm-in-arm, walked out of the Sala Tarone into the street.'"

It was admitted that, if Theodore's story might not satisfy all the necessary conditions, it came near enough to be passed as "Serapiontic." Ottmar said, "Your story, dear Theodore, has this effect, that it brings vividly to mind all your devoted labours at music. Each of us wished to draw you into a different province of it. While Lothair thought your instrumental writings your best, I thought your forte was comic opera. Cyprian wanted you to do 'things unattempted yet,' by putting music to (what he will now admit were) poems completely beyond all recognised forms and rules; and you yourself cared only for the serious ecclesiastical style. Well, as things stand at present, the opera tragica may probably be considered, the highest goal at which a composer can aim, and I can't understand why you haven't set to work at one long ago; you would surely have turned out something very superior in that line."

"And whose fault is it that I have not?" said Theodore, "but your own, and Cyprian's, and Lothair's? Could I ever succeed in inducing either of you to write me a libretto, with all my entreaties?"

"Marvellous fellow!" said Cyprian, "haven't I argued for hours and days with you about opera-texts? Haven't you rejected the finest ideas, on the ground that they were not adapted for music? Didn't you insist, at last, like an extraordinary fellow as you are, that I should regularly set to work to study music, so as to be able to understand, and comply with your requirements? So that I should have had to say good-bye to all idea of writing poetry, seeing that, like all professional writers, Kapellmeisters, and music-directors, you cleave to the established musical forms, and won't abandon them by so much as a hair's breadth."

"What I can't understand," said Lothair, "is, why Theodore, with his command of language and poetical expression, doesn't write librettos for himself? Why should we have to learn to be musicians, and expend our poetical powers, merely to produce a sort of block, or lay figure, for him to give life and motion to? Is it not principally because composers are usually one-sided people, without enough general education, that they require other folks to help them to do their own work? Are perfect unity of text and music conceivable, except when poet and composer are one and the same person?"

"All that sounds astonishingly plausible," said Theodore, "and yet it is utterly and completely untrue. I maintain that it is wholly impossible that any one person can write a work, the words and the music of which shall both be excellent."

"You composers," said Lothair, "get that idea into your heads either because you are absurdly unenergetic, or constitutionally indolent. The notion of having to go through the labour of writing the words before you can set to work at the music is so disagreeable to you that you can't bring yourselves to face it; but my belief is that, to a really inspired composer, the words and the music would occur simultaneously."

"You are rather driving me into a corner," said Theodore, "so instead of carrying on this argument, I shall ask you to let me read you a dialogue about the necessary conditions, or essentials of opera, which I wrote several years ago that eventful period which we have passed through was then only beginning. I thought my artistic existence seriously menaced, and I fell into a state of despondency, which was probably partly the result of bad health. At this time I made a Serapiontic friend, who had abandoned the pen for the sword. He cheered me in my despondency, and forced me to throw myself into the full current of the events of that stirring time." Without further introduction, Theodore at once began:--

"[THE POET AND THE COMPOSER.]

"The enemy was before the gates. Heavy guns were thundering in every direction, and shells were hurtling through the air; the people of the town were running, with white faces, into their houses, and the empty streets rang to the tramp of the cavalry patrols that were cantering along through them, and driving, with threats and curses, such of the soldiers as were loitering, or had fallen out of the ranks from any cause, forward into the trenches. But Ludwig sat on, in his back room, sunk and lost in the lovely, glorious vision-world which had opened upon him at his piano. For he had just completed a symphony, in which he had tried to write down, in notes to be seen and read, what he had heard and seen within him; a work which, like Beethoven's colossal ones in that kind, should tell, in heavenly language, of the glorious wonders of that far-off, romantic realm where life is all unspeakable, blissful, longing. Like his marvellous creations, it was to come from that far-off realm, into this little, arid, thirsty world of ours, and, with beautiful, syren-accents, lure away from it those who should list, and give ear to its charming. But the landlady came in and rated him for sitting at his piano in that time of danger and distress; asking him if he meant to stay in his garret and be shot. At first he didn't understand what the woman was talking about, till a fragment of a shell knocked a piece of the roof off, and the broken panes of the window went clattering down upon the floor. Then the landlady ran down-stairs weeping and screaming; and Ludwig, taking his most precious possession, the score of his symphony, under his arm, hastened after her to the cellar. The inhabitants of the house were all assembled there. In an access of liberality very unusual with him, the wine-shop keeper, who occupied the lower story, had 'stood' a dozen or so of his best wine; whilst the women, in fear and trembling, brought numerous tit-bits in their work-baskets. People ate and drank, and quickly passed from their condition of exaltation and excitement to that confidential frame of mind in which neighbour, drawing close to neighbour, seeks, and thinks he finds security; and, so to say, all the petty, artificial pas which we have been taught by conventionality are whelmed and merged in the great colossal waltz-whirl, to which the iron hand of destiny beats the resistless measure. The trouble and danger--the risk to life and limb--were forgotten; cheerful conversation was the order of the day; animated lips uttered brilliant speeches, and fellow-lodgers, who barely touched a hat to each other at ordinary times as they met on the stairs, were seated side by side, confiding to each other their most confidential affairs.

"The firing began to slacken a good deal, and there was talk of going up-stairs again, as the streets seemed to be getting pretty safe. An ex-Militaire, who was present, went further; and, after a few instructive observations concerning the system of fortification practised by the Romans, and the effect of the catapult (with a passing allusion or two to Vauban, and more modern times), was just proving to us that we had no cause for the slightest uneasiness, because the house was completely out of the line of fire, when a shot sent the bricks of the cellar-ventilator rattling down about our ears. No one was hurt, however; and, as the Militaire jumped, with a brimming bumper in his hand, on to the table (which the falling bricks had cleared of the bottles), and defied any other shot to trouble us, we were all quite reassured at once; and this proved to be our last scare. The night passed away quietly, and, in the morning, we found that the troops had moved off to occupy another position, abandoning the town to the enemy. On leaving the cellar, we found the enemy's cavalry scouring the streets, and a placard posted up guaranteeing that the townsfolk and their property should not be molested.

"Ludwig joined the throng, eager to see the new spectacle, which was watching the arrival of the enemy's commander-in-chief, who was coming in at the gate, with a pompous fanfare of trumpets, surrounded by a brilliant escort. Scarcely could he believe his eyes when he saw his old college-friend Ferdinand among the staff, in a quiet-looking uniform, with his left arm in a sling, curvetting close past him on a beautiful sorrel charger. 'It was he--it was really and truly himself and no other!' Ludwig cried involuntarily. He couldn't overtake him, his horse was going too fast, and Ludwig hastened, full of thought, back to his room. But he couldn't get on with any work; he could think of nothing but his old friend, whom he had not seen for years; and the happy days of youth which they had spent together rose to his memory bright and clear. At that time Ferdinand had never shown any turn for soldiering: he was devoted to the Muses, and had evinced his poetic vocation in many a striking poem; so that this transformation was all the more incomprehensible; and Ludwig burned with anxiety to speak with him, though he had no notion where or how he should find him. The bustle and movement in the streets increased; a considerable portion of the enemy's forces, with the Allied Princes at their head, passed through the town, as a halt was to be made in the neighbourhood for a day or two; and the greater the crowd about headquarters the less chance there seemed of encountering Ferdinand. But suddenly, in an out-of-the-way café, where Ludwig was in the habit of going for his frugal dinner, Ferdinand came up to him with a cry of delight.

"Ludwig was silent, for a certain feeling of discomfort embittered, for him, this longed-for meeting. It was, as it often is in dreams, when, just as we are going to put our arms about people whom we love, they suddenly change into something else, and the whole thing becomes a mockery, Here was the gentle son of the Muses, the writer of many a romantic lay which Ludwig had clothed in music, in a nodding plume, with a clanking sword at his side, and even his voice transformed to a harsh, rough tone of command. Ludwig's gloomy glance rested on the wounded arm, and upon the decoration, the cross of honour, on his breast. But Ferdinand put his arm round him and pressed him to his side.

"'I know what you are thinking,' he said; 'I understand what you feel at this meeting of ours. But the Fatherland called me; I could not hesitate to obey. My hand, which had only wielded the pen, took up the sword, with the joy, with the enthusiasm, which the holy cause has kindled in every breast which is not stamped with the seal of cowardice. I have given some of my blood already; and the mere accident that this happened under the Prince's eyes has gained me this cross. But, believe me, Ludwig, the strings which vibrated in me of old, and whose tones have so often spoken to you, are all whole and uninjured still; and many a night, when, after some fierce engagement, the troopers have been sleeping round the fire of the bivouac on some lonely picquet, I have written poems which have elevated me and inspired me in my glorious duty of fighting for Honour and Freedom.'

"Ludwig's heart opened at these words; and when Ferdinand went with him into a small private room, and took off his sword and helmet, he felt as if his friend had only been dressed to act a part, and had taken off his stage-costume.

"As they dined and talked over the old days they began to feel as if they had only parted yesterday. Ferdinand asked what Ludwig had been composing lately, and was much astonished to learn that he had never written an opera, because he never had been able to meet with a libretto to his satisfaction--one that could inspire him with music.

"'I can't understand,' said Ferdinand, 'why you haven't written a Libretto long ago yourself. You have a very vivid imagination, and a fine command of language.'

"Ludwig. 'Yes, I have imagination enough to invent plenty of good plots. Indeed, often, when at night a slight headache keeps me in that dreamy condition which is like a struggle between sleeping and waking, I not only think of splendid subjects for operas, but see and hear them being performed, to my own music. But, so far as the faculty of retaining them and writing them down is concerned, my belief is that I am wholly without it. And in fact it is scarcely to be expected of us composers that we should acquire that technical, mechanical skill (which is necessary to success in every art, and only comes by constant perseverance and long practice) which would enable us to write our own librettos. But even if I had the skill to write out a plot, properly arranged in lines, scenes, etc., I scarcely think I should set to work to do it for myself.'

"Ferdinand. 'But then nobody could so thoroughly understand your special musical tendencies as yourself.'

"Ludwig. 'That, I daresay, may be true enough. Still, I can't help thinking that a composer who should sit down to put the idea of a plot, which had occurred to him, into the words would be something like a painter who should be called upon to make a minute etching, or a line-engraving, of his picture before setting to work to draw it and colour it.'

"Ferdinand. 'You mean that the necessary fire would smoulder out during the process of versifying?'

"Ludwig. 'I think it would. My poetry would seem trashy, to myself; something like the cases of rockets which had fallen down, charred and empty, after rushing all resplendent up to the skies. To me it appears that in no art so much as in music is it so essential that the entirety of the subject involved, with all its parts, down to the minutest detail, should be grasped by the mind at first, in its earliest, glowing outburst; because in no other is subsequent polishing and altering so hurtful. I am convinced, by my own experience, that the melody which comes to you, as at the wave of an enchanter's wand, the first time you read the words of a poem, is always the best--nay, probably the only really right one (for that particular composer at all events), to put to it. It would be impossible for a composer not to think of the music called for by the situation, while he was writing down the words. Indeed he would be thinking so much of it that he could not give the necessary attention to the words, and if he forced himself to do so the river of the music would soon dry up, as if sucked in by thirsty sands. Nay, to express my meaning more clearly, I will say that, at the moment of his musical inspiration, all words, all verbal expressions, would appear insufficient to him, nay flat, and miserably inadequate; and it would be necessary for him to come down to a lower level, to go, like a beggar asking for alms, in quest of those words, necessities of the lower requirements of his existence. Would not his wings soon be paralysed, like a caged eagle's, so that he would try to soar sunwards in vain?'

"Ferdinand. 'One listens to all this, of course; but do you know, my dear friend, that what you say does not so much convince me as it seems to indicate your own personal repugnance to working your way, laboriously, through all the necessary scenas, arias, duettos, etc., till you get to the point of composing the music.'

"Ludwig. 'Perhaps; but I renew an old reproach. Why, in the days when you and I were living in such constant intimacy, would you never write me a libretto, eagerly as I begged you to do so?'