When Paganini appeared in England, of course there was a prodigious
curiosity to see and hear the great player. All kinds of rumors were
in the public mouth about him, and many of the lower classes really
believed that he had sold himself to the evil one. The capacious area
of the opera-house was densely packed, and the prices of admission were
doubled on the opening night. The enthusiasm awakened by the performance
can best be indicated by quoting from some of the contemporary accounts.
The concert opened with Beethoven's Second Symphony, performed by
the Philharmonic Society, and it was followed by Lablache, who sang
Rossini's "Largo al factotum." "A breathless silence then ensued,"
writes Mr. Gardiner, an amateur of Leicester, who at the peril of his
ribs had been struggling in the crowd for two hours to get admission,
"and every eye watched the action of this extraordinary violinist as he
glided from the side scenes to the front of the stage. An involuntary
cheering burst from every part of the house, many persons rising from
their seats to view the specter during the thunder of this unprecedented
applause, his gaunt and extraordinary appearance being more like that
of a devotee about to suffer martyrdom than one to delight you with
his art. With the tip of his bow he set off the orchestra in a grand
military movement with a force and vivacity as surprising as it was
new. At the termination of this introduction, he commenced with a soft,
streamy note of celestial quality, and with three or four whips of his
bow elicited points of sound that mounted to the third heaven, and as
bright as stars.... Immediately an execution followed which was equally
indescribable. A scream of astonishment and delight burst from the
audience at the novelty of this effect.... etc." This _naive_ account
may serve to show the impression created on the minds of those not
trained to guard their words with moderation.
"Nothing can be more intense in feeling," said a contemporary critic,
"than his conception and delivery of an adagio passage. His tone is,
perhaps, not quite so full and round as that of a De Bériot or Baillot,
for example; it is delicate rather than strong, but this delicacy was
probably never possessed equally by another player." "There is no trick
in his playing," writes another critic; "it is all fair scientific
execution, opening to us a new order of sounds.... All his passages
seem free and unpremeditated, as if conceived on the instant. One has no
impression of their having cost him either forethought or labor....
The word difficulty has no place in his vocabulary.... etc." Paganini's
lengthened tour through London and the provinces was everywhere attended
with the same success, and brought him in a golden harvest, for his
reputation had now grown so portentous that he could exact the greatest
terms from managers.
Paganini avowed himself as not altogether pleased with England, but,
under the surface of such complaints as the following, one detects the
ring of gratified vanity. He writes in a MS. letter, dated from London
in 1831, of the excessive and noisy admiration to which he was subjected
in the London streets, which left him no peace, and actually blocked his
passage to and from the theatre. "Although the public curiosity to see
me," says he, "is long since satisfied; though I have played in public
at least thirty times, and my likeness has been reproduced in all
possible styles and forms, yet I can never leave my home without being
mobbed by people who are not content with following and jostling me, but
actually get in front of me, and prevent my going either way, address me
in English of which I don't know a word, and even feel me as if to find
out if I am made of flesh and blood. And this is not only among the
common people, but among the upper classes." Paganini repeated his visit
to England during the next season, playing his final farewell concert at
the Victoria Theatre, London, June 17, 1832. The two following years
our artist lived in Paris, and was the great lion of musical and
social circles. People professed to be as much charmed with his lack of
pretension, his _naive_ and simple manners, as with his musical genius.
Yet no man was more exacting of his rights as an artist. One day a court
concert was announced at the Tuilleries, at which Paganini was asked
to play. He consented, and went to examine the room the day before. He
objected to the numerous curtains, so hung as to deaden the sound,
and requested the superintendent to see that they were changed. The
supercilious official ignored the artist's wish, and the offended
Paganini determined not to play. When the hour of the concert arrived,
there was no violinist. The royalties and their attendants were all
seated; murmurs arose, but still no Paganini. At last an official was
sent to the hotel of the artist, only to be informed that _the great
violinist had not gone out, but that he went to bed very early_. It was
during his residence in Paris in the winter of 1834 that he proposed
to Berlioz, for whom he had the most cordial esteem and admiration,
to write a concerto for his Stradiuarius violin, which resulted in the
famous symphony "Harold en Italie." Four years after this he bestowed
the sum of twenty thousand francs on Berlioz, who was then in pressing
need, delicately disguising the donation as a testimonial of his
admiration for the "Symphonie Fantastique." Though the eagerness of
Paganini to make money urged him to labor for years while his health was
exceedingly frail, and though he was justly stigmatized as penurious
in many ways, he was capable of princely generosity on occasions which
appealed strongly to the ardent sympathies which lay at the bottom of
his nature.
Paganini made a great fortune by the exercise of his art, and in 1834
purchased, among other property in his native country, a charming
country seat called Villa Gajona, near Parma. Here he spent two years
in comparative quiet, though still continuing to give concerts. At this
period and for some time previous many music-sellers had striven to buy
the copyright of his works. But Paganini put a price on it which
was prescriptive, the probability being that he did not wish his
compositions to pass out of his hands till he had given up his career on
the concert stage. He was willing that they should be arranged for the
piano, but not published as violin music.
After his return to Italy Paganini gave several most successful
concerts, among others, one for the poor at Placentia, on the 14th of
November, 1834, and another at the court of the Duchess of Parma, in the
December following. But his health was already giving way most visibly.
Phthisis of the larynx, which rendered him a mere shadow of his former
self, and sometimes almost deprived him of speech, had been gaining
ground since his return to his native climate. In 1836, however, he was
better, and some unscrupulous Parisian speculators induced him to lend
his name to a joint-stock undertaking, a sort of gambling-room and
concert-hall, which they called the Casino Paganini. This was duly
opened in a fashionable part of Paris in 1837; but, as the Government
would not allow the establishment to be used as a gambling-house, and
the concerts did not pay the expenses, it became a great failure, and
the illustrious artist actually suffered loss by it to the extent of
forty thousand francs.
One of his last, if not his very last, concert was given with the
guitar-player, Signor Legnani, at Turin, on the 9th of June, 1837,
for the benefit of the poor. He was then on his way to fulfill his
engagements at the fatal Parisian casino, which opened with much
splendor in the November following. But his health had again broken
down, and the fatigue of the journey had told upon him so much that he
was unable to appear at the casino. When the enterprise was found to
be a failure, a pettifogging lawsuit was carried on against him, and,
according to Fetis, who is very explicit on this subject, the French
judges condemned him to pay the aforesaid forty thousand francs, and to
be deprived of his liberty until that amount was paid--all this without
hearing his defense!
The career of Paganini was at this critical period fast drawing to a
close. His medical advisers recommended him to return at once to the
South, fearing that the winter would kill him in Paris. He died at Nice
on May 27, 1840, aged fifty-six years. He left to his legitimized son
Achille, the offspring of his _liaison_ with the singer Antonia Bianchi,
a fortune of eighty thousand pounds, and the title of baron, of which he
had received the patent in Germany. His beautiful Guarnerius violin, the
vehicle of so many splendid artistic triumphs, he bequeathed to the town
of Genoa, where he was born. Though Paganini was superstitious, and died
a son of Holy Church, he did not leave any money in religious bequests,
nor did he even receive the last sacraments. The authorities of Rome
raised many difficulties about the funeral, and it was only after an
enormous amount of trouble and expense that Achille was able to have a
solemn service to the memory of his father performed at Parma. It was
five years after Paganini's death that this occurred, and permission
was obtained to have the body removed to holy ground in the village
churchyard near the Villa Gajona. During this long period the dishonored
remains of the illustrious musician were at the hospital of Nice, where
the body had been embalmed, and afterward at a country place near Genoa,
belonging to the family. The superstitious peasantry believed that
strange noises were heard about the grave at night--the wailings of
the unsatisfied spirit of Paganini over the unsanctified burial of its
earthly shell. It was to end these painful stories that the young
baron made a final determined effort to placate the ecclesiastical
authorities.