DEAR A.,--I have not written since we left the kind V. Rensselaers in
Dresden. Mama must have given you all the details of our life there.... I
hope, now that I have studied French, German, and Italian like a good
little girl for six months and not "sung a single note," that I may
venture to present myself before the great Garcia again.
I can't imagine that I am the same person who has (it seems to me years
ago) sung before large, distinguished, and enthusiastic audiences, has
been a little belle, in a way, in Cambridge, has had serenades from the
Harvard Glee Club (poor aunty! routed out of your sleep in the middle of
the night to listen to them), inspired poetry, and danced on "the Green"
on Class Day. I felt as if I ought to put on pantalettes and wear my hair
down my back. I look now upon myself as a real _Backfisch_, as the Germans
call very young girls, and that is simply what I am; and I feel that I
ought never to have been allowed to sport about in those fascinating clear
waters which reflected no shadows, now that I must go back to the millpond
and learn to swim.
I have been already three weeks studying hard with Garcia, who is not only
a wonderful teacher, but is a wonderful personality. I simply worship him,
though he is very severe and pulls me up directly I "slipshod," as he
calls it; and so far I have literally sung nothing but scales. He says
that a scale must be like a beautiful row of pearls: each note like a
pearl, perfect in roundness and color.
This is so easy to say, but very difficult to accomplish. Stone-breaking
on the highroad is nothing to it. I come home tired out from my lessons,
only to begin singing scales again. I tell mama I feel like a fish with
the scales being taken off him.
Four hours by myself and two lessons a week will soon reduce your poor
niece to _a scaleton_. Ah! please forgive this....
No question of a song yet. "Qui la voce" seems way back in the Middle
Ages. Garcia says, "If, when your voice is well oiled [that is what he
calls the scaling process], you are not intelligent enough to sing a song
by yourself, then you had better knit stockings for the poor."
"Then," I answered, "I had better begin at once to learn to knit
stockings."
"Not quite yet!" he laughed. "Wait till I have finished with you." More
than once he has said, "Your voice reminds me of my sister Marie's
[meaning Malibran]; but she had no brains to speak of, whereas you have,
and you ought to be thankful for it."
I murmured that I was glad he thought so, and, if I really had some
brains, I should be thankful; but I was not quite sure that I had. "Trust
me to tell you if you have not," said he.
I trusted him, indeed, for I knew very well that he would not let the
occasion slip had he anything of that sort to say.