PART I

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FREDERICK CHOPIN AS A MAN AND MUSICIAN

By Frederick Niecks

Third Edition (1902)

VOLUME I.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION (1888)

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION (1890)

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION (1902)

PROEM: POLAND AND THE POLES

CHAPTERS I-XIX

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION

While the novelist has absolute freedom to follow his artistic instinct

and intelligence, the biographer is fettered by the subject-matter with

which he proposes to deal. The former may hopefully pursue an ideal, the

latter must rest satisfied with a compromise between the desirable and

the necessary. No doubt, it is possible to thoroughly digest all the

requisite material, and then present it in a perfect, beautiful form.

But this can only be done at a terrible loss, at a sacrifice of truth

and trustworthiness. My guiding principle has been to place before the

reader the facts collected by me as well as the conclusions at which I

arrived. This will enable him to see the subject in all its bearings,

with all its pros and cons, and to draw his own conclusions, should

mine not obtain his approval. Unless an author proceeds in this way,

the reader never knows how far he may trust him, how far the evidence

justifies his judgment. For--not to speak of cheats and fools--the

best informed are apt to make assertions unsupported or insufficiently

supported by facts, and the wisest cannot help seeing things through the

coloured spectacles of their individuality. The foregoing remarks are

intended to explain my method, not to excuse carelessness of literary

workmanship. Whatever the defects of the present volumes may be--and, no

doubt, they are both great and many--I have laboured to the full extent

of my humble abilities to group and present my material perspicuously,

and to avoid diffuseness and rhapsody, those besetting sins of writers

on music.

The first work of some length having Chopin for its subject was Liszt's

"Frederic Chopin," which, after appearing in 1851 in the Paris journal

"La France musicale," came out in book-form, still in French, in 1852

(Leipzig: Breitkopf and Hartel.--Translated into English by M. W. Cook,

and published by William Reeves, London, 1877). George Sand describes

it as "un peu exuberant de style, mais rempli de bonnes choses et de

tres-belles pages." These words, however, do in no way justice to the

book: for, on the one hand, the style is excessively, and not merely

a little, exuberant; and, on the other hand, the "good things" and

"beautiful pages" amount to a psychological study of Chopin, and an

aesthetical study of his works, which it is impossible to over-estimate.

Still, the book is no biography. It records few dates and events, and

these few are for the most part incorrect. When, in 1878, the second

edition of F. Chopin was passing through the press, Liszt remarked to

me:--

"I have been told that there are wrong dates and other mistakes in my

book, and that the dates and facts are correctly given in Karasowski's

biography of Chopin [which had in the meantime been published]. But,

though I often thought of reading it, I have not yet done so. I got my

information from Paris friends on whom I believed I might depend. The

Princess Wittgenstein [who then lived in Rome, but in 1850 at Weimar,

and is said to have had a share in the production of the book] wished me

to make some alterations in the new edition. I tried to please her, but,

when she was still dissatisfied, I told her to add and alter whatever

she liked."

From this statement it is clear that Liszt had not the stuff of a

biographer in him. And, whatever value we may put on the Princess

Wittgenstein's additions and alterations, they did not touch the vital

faults of the work, which, as a French critic remarked, was a symphonie

funebre rather than a biography. The next book we have to notice, M. A.

Szulc's Polish Fryderyk Chopin i Utwory jego Muzyczne (Posen, 1873), is

little more than a chaotic, unsifted collection of notices, criticisms,

anecdotes, &c., from Polish, German, and French books and magazines. In

1877 Moritz Karasowski, a native of Warsaw, and since 1864 a member of

the Dresden orchestra, published his Friedrich Chopin: sein Leben, seine

Werke und seine Briefe (Dresden: F. Ries.--Translated into English by

E. Hill, under the title Frederick Chopin: "His Life, Letters, and Work,"

and published by William Reeves, London, in 1879). This was the first

serious attempt at a biography of Chopin. The author reproduced in

the book what had been brought to light in Polish magazines and other

publications regarding Chopin's life by various countrymen of the

composer, among whom he himself was not the least notable. But the most

valuable ingredients are, no doubt, the Chopin letters which the author

obtained from the composer's relatives, with whom he was acquainted.

While gratefully acknowledging his achievements, I must not omit to

indicate his shortcomings--his unchecked partiality for, and boundless

admiration of his hero; his uncritical acceptance and fanciful

embellishments of anecdotes and hearsays; and the extreme paucity of his

information concerning the period of Chopin's life which begins with

his settlement in Paris. In 1878 appeared a second edition of the work,

distinguished from the first by a few additions and many judicious

omissions, the original two volumes being reduced to one. But of more

importance than the second German edition is the first Polish edition,

"Fryderyk Chopin: Zycie, Listy, Dziela," two volumes (Warsaw: Gebethner

and Wolff, 1882), which contains a series of, till then, unpublished

letters from Chopin to Fontana. Of Madame A. Audley's short and readable

"Frederic Chopin, sa vie et ses oeuvres" (Paris: E. Plon et Cie., 1880),

I need only say that for the most part it follows Karasowski, and where

it does not is not always correct. Count Wodzinski's "Les trois Romans

de Frederic Chopin" (Paris: Calmann Levy, 1886)--according to the title

treating only of the composer's love for Constantia Gladkowska, Maria

Wodzinska, and George Sand, but in reality having a wider scope--cannot

be altogether ignored, though it is more of the nature of a novel than

of a biography. Mr. Joseph Bennett, who based his "Frederic Chopin" (one

of Novello's Primers of Musical Biography) on Liszt's and Karasowski's

works, had in the parts dealing with Great Britain the advantage of

notes by Mr. A.J. Hipkins, who inspired also, to some extent at least,

Mr. Hueffer in his essay Chopin ("Fortnightly Review," September, 1877;

and reprinted in "Musical Studies"--Edinburgh: A. & C. Black, 1880).

This ends the list of biographies with any claims to originality. There

are, however, many interesting contributions to a biography of Chopin

to be found in works of various kinds. These shall be mentioned in

the course of my narrative; here I will point out only the two most

important ones--namely, George Sand's "Histoire de ma Vie," first

published in the Paris newspaper "La Presse" (1854) and subsequently in

book-form; and her six volumes of "Correspondance," 1812-1876 (Paris:

Calmann Levy, 1882-1884).

My researches had for their object the whole life of Chopin, and his

historical, political, artistical, social, and personal surroundings,

but they were chiefly directed to the least known and most interesting

period of his career--his life in France, and his visits to Germany and

Great Britain. My chief sources of information are divisible into two

classes--newspapers, magazines, pamphlets, correspondences, and books;

and conversations I held with, and letters I received from, Chopin's

pupils, friends, and acquaintances. Of his pupils, my warmest thanks are

due to Madame Dubois (nee Camille O'Meara), Madame Rubio (nee Vera de

Kologrivof), Mdlle. Gavard, Madame Streicher (nee Friederike Muller),

Adolph Gutmann, M. Georges Mathias, Brinley Richards, and Lindsay

Sloper; of friends and acquaintances, to Liszt, Ferdinand Hiller,

Franchomme, Charles Valentin Alkan, Stephen Heller, Edouard Wolff, Mr.

Charles Halle, Mr. G. A. Osborne, T. Kwiatkowski, Prof. A. Chodzko, M.

Leonard Niedzwiecki (gallice, Nedvetsky), Madame Jenny Lind-Goldschmidt,

Mr. A. J. Hipkins, and Dr. and Mrs. Lyschinski. I am likewise greatly

indebted to Messrs. Breitkopf and Hartel, Karl Gurckhaus (the late

proprietor of the firm of Friedrich Kistner), Julius Schuberth,

Friedrich Hofmeister, Edwin Ashdown, Richault & Cie, and others, for

information in connection with the publication of Chopin's works. It is

impossible to enumerate all my obligations--many of my informants and

many furtherers of my labours will be mentioned in the body of the book;

many, however, and by no means the least helpful, will remain unnamed.

To all of them I offer the assurance of my deep-felt gratitude. Not a

few of my kind helpers, alas! are no longer among the living; more than

ten years have gone by since I began my researches, and during that time

Death has been reaping a rich harvest.

The Chopin letters will, no doubt, be regarded as a special feature

of the present biography. They may, I think, be called numerous, if we

consider the master's dislike to letter-writing. Ferdinand Hiller--whose

almost unique collection of letters addressed to him by his famous

friends in art and literature is now, and will be for years to come,

under lock and key among the municipal archives at Cologne--allowed

me to copy two letters by Chopin, one of them written conjointly with

Liszt. Franchomme, too, granted me the privilege of copying his friend's

epistolary communications. Besides a number of letters that have here

and there been published, I include, further, a translation of Chopin's

letters to Fontana, which in Karasowski's book (i.e., the Polish

edition) lose much of their value, owing to his inability to assign

approximately correct dates to them.

The space which I give to George Sand is, I think, justified by the part

she plays in the life of Chopin. To meet the objections of those who

may regard my opinion of her as too harsh, I will confess that I

entered upon the study of her character with the impression that she had

suffered much undeserved abuse, and that it would be incumbent upon a

Chopin biographer to defend her against his predecessors and the friends

of the composer. How entirely I changed my mind, the sequel will show.

In conclusion, a few hints as to the pronunciation of Polish words,

which otherwise might puzzle the reader uninitiated in the mysteries

of that rarely-learned language. Aiming more at simplicity than at

accuracy, one may say that the vowels are pronounced somewhat like this:

a as in "arm," aL like the nasal French "on," e as in "tell," e/ with

an approach to the French "e/" (or to the German "u [umlaut]" and "o

[umlaut]"), eL like the nasal French "in," i as in "pick," o as in

"not," o/ with an approach to the French "ou," u like the French ou, and

y with an approach to the German "i" and "u." The following consonants

are pronounced as in English: b, d, f, g (always hard), h, k, I, m, n,

p, s, t, and z. The following single and double consonants differ from

the English pronunciation: c like "ts," c/ softer than c, j like "y,"

l/ like "ll" with the tongue pressed against the upper row of teeth,

n/ like "ny" (i.e., n softened by i), r sharper than in English, w like

"v," z/ softer than z, z. and rz like the French "j," ch like the German

guttural "ch" in "lachen" (similar to "ch" in the Scotch "loch"), cz

like "ch" in "cherry," and sz like "sh" in "sharp." Mr. W. R. Morfill

("A Simplified Grammar of the Polish Language") elucidates the

combination szcz, frequently to be met with, by the English expression

"smasht china," where the italicised letters give the pronunciation.

Lastly, family names terminating in take a instead of i when applied to

women.

April, 1888.

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

The second edition differs from the first by little more than the

correction of some misprints and a few additions. These latter are to

be found among the Appendices. The principal addition consists of

interesting communications from Madame Peruzzi, a friend of Chopin's

still living at Florence. Next in importance come Madame Schumann's

diary notes bearing on Chopin's first visit to Leipzig. The remaining

additions concern early Polish music, the first performances of Chopin's

works at the Leipzig Gewandhaus, his visit to Marienbad (remarks by

Rebecca Dirichlet), the tempo rubato, and his portraits. To the names

of Chopin's friends and acquaintances to whom I am indebted for valuable

assistance, those of Madame Peruzzi and Madame Schumann have, therefore,

to be added. My apologies as well as my thanks are due to Mr. Felix

Moscheles, who kindly permitted a fac-simile to be made from a

manuscript, in his possession, a kindness that ought to have been

acknowledged in the first edition. I am glad that a second edition

affords me an opportunity to repair this much regretted omission. The

manuscript in question is an "Etude" which Chopin wrote for the "Methode

des Methodes de Piano," by F. J. Fetis and I. Moscheles, the father of

Mr. Felix Moscheles. This concludes what I have to say about the second

edition, but I cannot lay down the pen without expressing my gratitude

to critics and public for the exceedingly favourable reception they have

given to my book.

October, 1890.

PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION.

BESIDES minor corrections, the present edition contains the correction

of the day and year of Frederick Francis Chopin's birth, which have been

discovered since the publication of the second edition of this work.

According to the baptismal entry in the register of the Brochow parish

church, he who became the great pianist and immortal composer was born

on February 22, 1810. This date has been generally accepted in

Poland, and is to be found on the medal struck on the occasion of the

semi-centenary celebration of the master's death. Owing to a misreading

of musicus for magnificus in the published copy of the document, its

trustworthiness has been doubted elsewhere, but, I believe, without

sufficient cause. The strongest argument that could be urged against

the acceptance of the date would be the long interval between birth and

baptism, which did not take place till late in April, and the consequent

possibility of an error in the registration. This, however, could only

affect the day, and perhaps the month, not the year. It is certainly

a very curious circumstance that Fontana, a friend of Chopin's in his

youth and manhood, Karasowski, at least an acquaintance, if not an

intimate friend, of the family (from whom he derived much information),

Fetis, a contemporary lexicographer, and apparently Chopin's family, and

even Chopin himself, did not know the date of the latter's birth.

Where the character of persons and works of art are concerned, nothing

is more natural than differences of opinion. Bias and inequality of

knowledge sufficiently account for them. For my reading of the character

of George Sand, I have been held up as a monster of moral depravity; for

my daring to question the exactitude of Liszt's biographical facts, I

have been severely sermonised; for my inability to regard Chopin as one

of the great composers of songs, and continue uninterruptedly in a state

of ecstatic admiration, I have been told that the publication of my

biography of the master is a much to be deplored calamity. Of course,

the moral monster and author of the calamity cannot pretend to be an

unbiassed judge in the case; but it seems to him that there may be some

exaggeration and perhaps even some misconception in these accusations.

As to George Sand, I have not merely made assertions, but have earnestly

laboured to prove the conclusions at which I reluctantly arrived. Are

George Sand's pretentions to self-sacrificing saintliness, and to purely

maternal feelings for Musset, Chopin, and others to be accepted in spite

of the fairy-tale nature of her "Histoire," and the misrepresentations

of her "Lettres d'un Voyageur" and her novels "Elle et lui" and

"Lucrezia Floriani"; in spite of the adverse indirect testimony of

some of her other novels, and the adverse direct testimony of her

"Correspondance"; and in spite of the experiences and firm beliefs of

her friends, Liszt included? Let us not overlook that charitableness

towards George Sand implies uncharitableness towards Chopin, place. Need

I say anything on the extraordinary charge made against me--namely, that

in some cases I have preferred the testimony of less famous men to

that of Liszt? Are genius, greatness, and fame the measures of

trustworthiness?

As to Chopin, the composer of songs, the case is very simple. His

pianoforte pieces are original tone-poems of exquisite beauty; his

songs, though always acceptable, and sometimes charming, are not. We

should know nothing of them and the composer, if of his works they alone

had been published. In not publishing them himself, Chopin gave us his

own opinion, an opinion confirmed by the singers in rarely performing

them and by the public in little caring for them. In short, Chopin's

songs add nothing to his fame. To mention them in one breath with those

of Schubert and Schumann, or even with those of Robert Franz and

Adolf Jensen, is the act of an hero-worshipping enthusiast, not of a

discriminating critic.

On two points, often commented upon by critics, I feel regret, although

not repentance--namely, on any "anecdotic iconoclasm" where fact

refuted fancy, and on my abstention from pronouncing judgments where the

evidence was inconclusive. But how can a conscientious biographer help

this ungraciousness and inaccommodativeness? Is it not his duty to tell

the truth, and nothing but the truth, in order that his subject may

stand out unobstructed and shine forth unclouded?

In conclusion, two instances of careless reading. One critic, after

attributing a remark of Chopin's to me, exclaims: "The author is fond

of such violent jumps to conclusions." And an author, most benevolently

inclined towards me, enjoyed the humour of my first "literally ratting"

George Sand, and then saying that I "abstained from pronouncing judgment

because the complete evidence did not warrant my doing so." The former

(in vol. i.) had to do with George Sand's character; the latter (in vol.

ii.) with the moral aspect of her connection with Chopin.

An enumeration of the more notable books dealing with Chopin, published

after the issue of the earlier editions of the present book will form an

appropriate coda to this preface--"Frederic Francois Chopin," by Charles

Willeby; "Chopin, and Other Musical Essays," by Henry T. Finck; "Studies

in Modern Music" (containing an essay on Chopin), by W. H. Hadow;

"Chopin's Greater Works," by Jean Kleczynski, translated by Natalie

Janotha; and "Chopin: the Man and his Music," by James Huneker.

Edinburgh, February, 1902.

PROEM.

POLAND AND THE POLES.

THE works of no composer of equal importance bear so striking a national

impress as those of Chopin. It would, however, be an error to attribute

this simply and solely to the superior force of the Polish musician's

patriotism. The same force of patriotism in an Italian, Frenchman,

German, or Englishman would not have produced a similar result.

Characteristics such as distinguish Chopin's music presuppose a nation

as peculiarly endowed, constituted, situated, and conditioned, as the

Polish--a nation with a history as brilliant and dark, as fair and

hideous, as romantic and tragic. The peculiarities of the peoples

of western Europe have been considerably modified, if not entirely

levelled, by centuries of international intercourse; the peoples of the

eastern part of the Continent, on the other hand, have, until recent

times, kept theirs almost intact, foreign influences penetrating to no

depth, affecting indeed no more than the aristocratic few, and them only

superficially. At any rate, the Slavonic races have not been moulded by

the Germanic and Romanic races as these latter have moulded each other:

east and west remain still apart--strangers, if not enemies. Seeing how

deeply rooted Chopin's music is in the national soil, and considering

how little is generally known about Poland and the Poles, the necessity

of paying in this case more attention to the land of the artist's birth

and the people to which he belongs than is usually done in biographies

of artists, will be admitted by all who wish to understand fully and

appreciate rightly the poet-musician and his works. But while taking

note of what is of national origin in Chopin's music, we must be careful

not to ascribe to this origin too much. Indeed, the fact that the

personal individuality of Chopin is as markedly differentiated, as

exclusively self-contained, as the national individuality of Poland,

is oftener overlooked than the master's national descent and its

significance with regard to his artistic production. And now, having

made the reader acquainted with the raison d'etre of this proem, I shall

plunge without further preliminaries in medias res.

The palmy days of Poland came to an end soon after the extinction of

the dynasty of the Jagellons in 1572. So early as 1661 King John Casimir

warned the nobles, whose insubordination and want of solidity, whose

love of outside glitter and tumult, he deplored, that, unless they

remedied the existing evils, reformed their pretended free elections,

and renounced their personal privileges, the noble kingdom would become

the prey of other nations. Nor was this the first warning. The Jesuit

Peter Skarga (1536--1612), an indefatigable denunciator of the vices of

the ruling classes, told them in 1605 that their dissensions would bring

them under the yoke of those who hated them, deprive them of king and

country, drive them into exile, and make them despised by those

who formerly feared and respected them. But these warnings remained

unheeded, and the prophecies were fulfilled to the letter. Elective

kingship, pacta conventa, [Footnote: Terms which a candidate for the

throne had to subscribe on his election. They were of course dictated by

the electors--i.e., by the selfish interest of one class, the szlachta

(nobility), or rather the most powerful of them.] liberum veto,

[Footnote: The right of any member to stop the proceedings of the Diet

by pronouncing the words "Nie pozwalam" (I do not permit), or others of

the same import.] degradation of the burgher class, enslavement of

the peasantry, and other devices of an ever-encroaching nobility,

transformed the once powerful and flourishing commonwealth into one

"lying as if broken-backed on the public highway; a nation anarchic

every fibre of it, and under the feet and hoofs of travelling

neighbours." [Footnote: Thomas Carlyle, Frederick the Great, vol.

viii., p. 105.] In the rottenness of the social organism, venality,

unprincipled ambition, and religious intolerance found a congenial soil;

and favoured by and favouring foreign intrigues and interferences, they

bore deadly fruit--confederations, civil wars, Russian occupation of the

country and dominion over king, council, and diet, and the beginning of

the end, the first partition (1772) by which Poland lost a third of her

territory with five millions of inhabitants. Even worse, however, was

to come. For the partitioning powers--Russia, Prussia, and Austria--knew

how by bribes and threats to induce the Diet not only to sanction the

spoliation, but also so to alter the constitution as to enable them to

have a permanent influence over the internal affairs of the Republic.

The Pole Francis Grzymala remarks truly that if instead of some thousand

individuals swaying the destinies of Poland, the whole nation had

enjoyed equal rights, and, instead of being plunged in darkness and

ignorance, the people had been free and consequently capable of feeling

and thinking, the national cause, imperilled by the indolence and

perversity of one part of the citizens, would have been saved by those

who now looked on without giving a sign of life. The "some thousands"

here spoken of are of course the nobles, who had grasped all the

political power and almost all the wealth of the nation, and, imitating

the proud language of Louis XIV, could, without exaggeration, have said:

"L'etat c'est nous." As for the king and the commonalty, the one had

been deprived of almost all his prerogatives, and the other had become

a rightless rabble of wretched peasants, impoverished burghers, and

chaffering Jews. Rousseau, in his Considerations sur le gouvernement

de Pologne, says pithily that the three orders of which the Republic

of Poland was composed were not, as had been so often and illogically

stated, the equestrian order, the senate, and the king, but the nobles

who were everything, the burghers who were nothing, and the peasants

who were less than nothing. The nobility of Poland differed from that of

Other countries not only in its supreme political and social position,

but also in its numerousness, character, and internal constitution.

[Footnote: The statistics concerning old Poland are provokingly

contradictory. One authority calculates that the nobility comprised

120,000 families, or one fourteenth of the population (which, before

the first partition, is variously estimated at from fifteen to twenty

millions); another counts only 100,000 families; and a third states

that between 1788 and 1792 (i.e., after the first partition) there were

38,314 families of nobles.]

All nobles were equal in rank, and as every French soldier was said to

carry a marshal's staff in his knapsack, so every Polish noble was born

a candidate for the throne. This equality, however, was rather de jure

than de facto; legal decrees could not fill the chasm which separated

families distinguished by wealth and fame--such as the Sapiehas,

Radziwills, Czartoryskis, Zamoyskis, Potockis, and Branickis--from

obscure noblemen whose possessions amount to no more than "a few acres

of land, a sword, and a pair of moustaches that extend from one ear to

the other," or perhaps amounted only to the last two items. With some

insignificant exceptions, the land not belonging to the state or the

church was in the hands of the nobles, a few of whom had estates of

the extent of principalities. Many of the poorer amongst the nobility

attached themselves to their better-situated brethren, becoming their

dependents and willing tools. The relation of the nobility to the

peasantry is well characterised in a passage of Mickiewicz's epic poem

Pan Tadeusz, where a peasant, on humbly suggesting that the nobility

suffered less from the measures of their foreign rulers than his own

class, is told by one of his betters that this is a silly remark, seeing

that peasants, like eels, are accustomed to being skinned, whereas the

well-born are accustomed to live in liberty.

Nothing illustrates so well the condition of a people as the way in

which justice is administered. In Poland a nobleman was on his

estate prosecutor as well as judge, and could be arrested only after

conviction, or, in the case of high-treason, murder, and robbery, if

taken in the act. And whilst the nobleman enjoyed these high privileges,

the peasant had, as the law terms it, no facultatem standi in judicio,

and his testimony went for nothing in the courts of justice. More than

a hundred laws in the statutes of Poland are said to have been

unfavourable to these poor wretches. In short, the peasant was quite

at the mercy of the privileged class, and his master could do with him

pretty much as he liked, whipping and selling not excepted, nor did

killing cost more than a fine of a few shillings. The peasants on the

state domains and of the clergy were, however, somewhat better off; and

the burghers, too, enjoyed some shreds of their old privileges with more

or less security. If we look for a true and striking description of

the comparative position of the principal classes of the population of

Poland, we find it in these words of a writer of the eighteenth century:

"Polonia coelum nobilium, paradisus clericorum, infernus rusticorum."

The vast plain of Poland, although in many places boggy and sandy, is on

the whole fertile, especially in the flat river valleys, and in the east

at the sources of the Dnieper; indeed, it is so much so that it has been

called the granary of Europe. But as the pleasure-loving gentlemen had

nobler pursuits to attend to, and the miserable peasants, with whom it

was a saying that only what they spent in drink was their own, were not

very anxious to work more and better than they could help, agriculture

was in a very neglected condition. With manufacture and commerce it

stood not a whit better. What little there was, was in the hands of the

Jews and foreigners, the nobles not being allowed to meddle with such

base matters, and the degraded descendants of the industrious and

enterprising ancient burghers having neither the means nor the spirit to

undertake anything of the sort. Hence the strong contrast of wealth and

poverty, luxury and distress, that in every part of Poland, in town and

country, struck so forcibly and painfully all foreign travellers. Of the

Polish provinces that in 1773 came under Prussian rule we read that--

the country people hardly knew such a thing as bread, many

had never in their life tasted such a delicacy; few villages

had an oven. A weaving-loom was rare; the spinning-wheel

unknown. The main article of furniture, in this bare scene of

squalor, was the crucifix and vessel of holy-water under

it....It was a desolate land without discipline, without law,

without a master. On 9,000 English square miles lived 500,000

souls: not 55 to the square mile. [Footnote: Carlyle.

Frederick the Great, vol. x., p. 40.]

And this poverty and squalor were not to be found only in one part of

Poland, they seem to have been general. Abbe de Mably when seeing, in

1771, the misery of the country (campagne) and the bad condition of the

roads, imagined himself in Tartary. William Coxe, the English historian

and writer of travels, who visited Poland after the first partition,

relates, in speaking of the district called Podlachia, that he visited

between Bjelsk and Woyszki villages in which there was nothing but the

bare walls, and he was told at the table of the ------ that knives,

forks, and spoons were conveniences unknown to the peasants. He says he

never saw--

a road so barren of interesting scenes as that from Cracow to

Warsaw--for the most part level, with little variation of

surface; chiefly overspread with tracts of thick forest;

where open, the distant horizon was always skirted with wood

(chiefly pines and firs, intermixed with beech, birch, and

small oaks). The occasional breaks presented some pasture-

ground, with here and there a few meagre crops of corn. The

natives were poorer, humbler, and more miserable than any

people we had yet observed in the course of our travels:

whenever we stopped they flocked around us in crowds; and,

asking for charity, used the most abject gestures....The

Polish peasants are cringing and servile in their expressions

of respect; they bowed down to the ground; took off their

hats or caps and held them in their hands till we were out of

sight; stopped their carts on the first glimpse of our

carriage; in short, their whole behaviour gave evident

symptoms of the abject servitude under which they groaned.

[FOOTNOTE: William Coxe, Travels in Poland, Russia, Sweden,

and Denmark (1784--90).]

The Jews, to whom I have already more than once alluded, are too

important an element in the population of Poland not to be particularly

noticed. They are a people within a people, differing in dress as well

as in language, which is a jargon of German-Hebrew. Their number before

the first partition has been variously estimated at from less than

two millions to fully two millions and a half in a population of from

fifteen to twenty millions, and in 1860 there were in Russian Poland

612,098 Jews in a population of 4,867,124.

[FOOTNOTE: According to Charles Forster (in Pologne, a volume of the

historical series entitled L'univers pittoresque, published by Firmin

Didot freres of Paris), who follows Stanislas Plater, the population of

Poland within the boundaries of 1772 amounted to 20,220,000 inhabitants,

and was composed of 6,770,000 Poles, 7,520,000 Russians (i.e., White and

Red Russians), 2,110,000 Jews, 1,900,000 Lithuanians, 1,640,000 Germans,

180,000 Muscovites (i.e., Great Russians), and 100,000 Wallachians.]

They monopolise [says Mr. Coxe] the commerce and trade of the

country, keep inns and taverns, are stewards to the nobility,

and seem to have so much influence that nothing can be bought

or sold without the intervention of a Jew.

Our never-failing informant was particularly struck with the number and

usefulness of the Jews in Lithuania when he visited that part of the

Polish Republic in 1781--

If you ask for an interpreter, they bring you a Jew; if you

want post-horses, a Jew procures them and a Jew drives them;

if you wish to purchase, a Jew is your agent; and this

perhaps is the only country in Europe where Jews cultivate

the ground; in passing through Lithuania, we frequently saw

them engaged in sowing, reaping, mowing, and other works of

husbandry.

Having considered the condition of the lower classes, we will now turn

our attention to that of the nobility. The very unequal distribution of

wealth among them has already been mentioned. Some idea of their mode of

life may be formed from the account of the Starost Krasinski's court in

the diary (year 1759) of his daughter, Frances Krasinska. [FOOTNOTE: A

starost (starosta) is the possessor of a starosty (starostwo)--i.e., a

castle and domains conferred on a nobleman for life by the crown.] Her

description of the household seems to justify her belief that there

were not many houses in Poland that surpassed theirs in magnificence.

In introducing to the reader the various ornaments and appendages of the

magnate's court, I shall mention first, giving precedence to the fair

sex, that there lived under the supervision of a French governess six

young ladies of noble families. The noblemen attached to the lord of the

castle were divided into three classes. In the first class were to be

found sons of wealthy, or, at least, well-to-do families who served

for honour, and came to the court to acquire good manners and as an

introduction to a civil or military career. The starost provided the

keep of their horses, and also paid weekly wages of two florins to their

grooms. Each of these noble-men had besides a groom another servant who

waited on his master at table, standing behind his chair and dining on

what he left on his plate. Those of the second class were paid for their

services and had fixed duties to perform. Their pay amounted to from

300 to 1,000 florins (a florin being about the value of sixpence), in

addition to which gratuities and presents were often given. Excepting

the chaplain, doctor, and secretary, they did not, like the preceding

class, have the honour of sitting with their master at table. With

regard to this privilege it is, however, worth noticing that those

courtiers who enjoyed it derived materially hardly any advantage from

it, for on week-days wine was served only to the family and their

guests, and the dishes of roast meat were arranged pyramidally, so

that fowl and venison went to those at the head of the table, and those

sitting farther down had to content themselves with the coarser kinds of

meat--with beef, pork, &c. The duties of the third class of followers,

a dozen young men from fifteen to twenty years of age, consisted

in accompanying the family on foot or on horseback, and doing their

messages, such as carrying presents and letters of invitation.

The second and third classes were under the jurisdiction of the

house-steward, who, in the case of the young gentlemen, was not sparing

in the application of the cat. A strict injunction was laid on all to

appear in good clothes. As to the other servants of the castle, the

authoress thought she would find it difficult to specify them; indeed,

did not know even the number of their musicians, cooks, Heyducs,

Cossacks, and serving maids and men. She knew, however, that every day

five tables were served, and that from morning to night two persons

were occupied in distributing the things necessary for the kitchen.

More impressive even than a circumstantial account like this are

briefly-stated facts such as the following: that the Palatine Stanislas

Jablonowski kept a retinue of 2,300 soldiers and 4,000 courtiers,

valets, armed attendants, huntsmen, falconers, fishers, musicians, and

actors; and that Janusz, Prince of Ostrog, left at his death a majorat

of eighty towns and boroughs, and 2,760 villages, without counting the

towns and villages of his starosties. The magnates who distinguished

themselves during the reign of Stanislas Augustus (1764--1795) by the

brilliance and magnificence of their courts were the Princes Czartoryski

and Radziwill, Count Potocki, and Bishop Soltyk of Cracovia. Our

often-quoted English traveller informs us that the revenue of Prince

Czartoryski amounted to nearly 100,000 pounds per annum, and that his

style of living corresponded with this income. The Prince kept an open

table at which there rarely sat down less than from twenty to thirty

persons. [FOOTNOTE: Another authority informs us that on great occasions

the Czartoryskis received at their table more than twenty thousand

persons.] The same informant has much to say about the elegance and

luxury of the Polish nobility in their houses and villas, in the

decoration and furniture of which he found the French and English styles

happily blended. He gives a glowing account of the fetes at which he

was present, and says that they were exquisitely refined and got up

regardless of expense.

Whatever changes the national character of the Poles has undergone in

the course of time, certain traits of it have remained unaltered, and

among these stands forth predominantly their chivalry. Polish bravery is

so universally recognised and admired that it is unnecessary to enlarge

upon it. For who has not heard at least of the victorious battle of

Czotzim, of the delivery of Vienna, of the no less glorious defeats of

Maciejowice and Ostrolenka, and of the brilliant deeds of Napoleon's

Polish Legion? And are not the names of Poland's most popular heroes,

Sobieski and Kosciuszko, household words all the world over? Moreover,

the Poles have proved their chivalry not only by their valour on the

battle-field, but also by their devotion to the fair sex. At banquets

in the good olden time it was no uncommon occurrence to see a Pole kneel

down before his lady, take off one of her shoes, and drink out of it.

But the women of Poland seem to be endowed with a peculiar power. Their

beauty, grace, and bewitching manner inflame the heart and imagination

of all that set their eyes on them. How often have they not conquered

the conquerors of their country? [FOOTNOTE: The Emperor Nicholas is

credited with the saying: "Je pourrais en finir des Polonais si je

venais a bout des Polonaises."] They remind Heine of the tenderest and

loveliest flowers that grow on the banks of the Ganges, and he calls for

the brush of Raphael, the melodies of Mozart, the language of Calderon,

so that he may conjure up before his readers an Aphrodite of the

Vistula. Liszt, bolder than Heine, makes the attempt to portray them,

and writes like an inspired poet. No Pole can speak on this subject

without being transported into a transcendental rapture that illumines

his countenance with a blissful radiance, and inspires him with a

glowing eloquence which, he thinks, is nevertheless beggared by the

matchless reality.

The French of the North--for thus the Poles have been called--are of a

very excitable nature; easily moved to anger, and easily appeased; soon

warmed into boundless enthusiasm, and soon also manifesting lack of

perseverance. They feel happiest in the turmoil of life and in the

bustle of society. Retirement and the study of books are little to

their taste. Yet, knowing how to make the most of their limited stock

of knowledge, they acquit themselves well in conversation. Indeed, they

have a natural aptitude for the social arts which insures their success

in society, where they move with ease and elegance. Their oriental

mellifluousness, hyperbolism, and obsequious politeness of speech have,

as well as the Asiatic appearance of their features and dress, been

noticed by all travellers in Poland. Love of show is another very

striking trait in the character of the Poles. It struggles to manifest

itself among the poor, causes the curious mixture of splendour and

shabbiness among the better-situated people, and gives rise to the

greatest extravagances among the wealthy. If we may believe the

chroniclers and poets, the entertainments of the Polish magnates must

have often vied with the marvellous feasts of imperial Rome. Of the

vastness of the households with which these grands seigneurs surrounded

themselves, enough has already been said. Perhaps the chief channel

through which this love of show vented itself was the decoration of man

and horse. The entrance of Polish ambassadors with their numerous

suites has more than once astonished the Parisians, who were certainly

accustomed to exhibitions of this kind. The mere description of some of

them is enough to dazzle one--the superb horses with their bridles and

stirrups of massive silver, and their caparisons and saddles embroidered

with golden flowers; and the not less superb men with their rich

garments of satin or gold cloth, adorned with rare furs, their bonnets

surmounted by bright plumes, and their weapons of artistic workmanship,

the silver scabbards inlaid with rubies. We hear also of ambassadors

riding through towns on horses loosely shod with gold or silver, so that

the horse-shoes lost on their passage might testify to their wealth

and grandeur. I shall quote some lines from a Polish poem in which the

author describes in detail the costume of an eminent nobleman in the

early part of this century:--

He was clad in the uniform of the palatinate: a doublet

embroidered with gold, an overcoat of Tours silk ornamented

with fringes, a belt of brocade from which hung a sword with

a hilt of morocco. At his neck glittered a clasp with

diamonds. His square white cap was surmounted by a

magnificent plume, composed of tufts of herons' feathers. It

is only on festive occasions that such a rich bouquet, of

which each feather costs a ducat, is put on.

The belt above mentioned was one of the most essential parts and the

chief ornament of the old Polish national dress, and those manufactured

at Sluck had especially a high reputation. A description of a belt of

Sluck, "with thick fringes like tufts," glows on another page of the

poem from which I took my last quotation:--

On one side it is of gold with purple flowers; on the other

it is of black silk with silver checks. Such a belt can be

worn on either side: the part woven with gold for festive

days; the reverse for days of mourning.

A vivid picture of the Polish character is to be found in Mickiewicz's

epic poem, Pan Tadeusz, from which the above quotations are taken.

[FOOTNOTE: I may mention here another interesting book illustrative

of Polish character and life, especially in the second half of the

eighteenth century, which has been of much use to me--namely, Count

Henry Rzewuski's Memoirs of Pan Severin Soplica, translated into German,

and furnished with an instructive preface by Philipp Lubenstein.]

He handles his pencil lovingly; proclaiming with just pride the virtues

of his countrymen, and revealing with a kindly smile their weaknesses.

In this truest, perhaps, of all the portraits that have ever been drawn

of the Poles, we see the gallantry and devotion, the generosity and

hospitality, the grace and liveliness in social intercourse, but also

the excitability and changefulness, the quickly inflamed enthusiasm and

sudden depression, the restlessness and turbulence, the love of outward

show and of the pleasures of society, the pompous pride, boastfulness,

and other little vanities, in short, all the qualities, good and

bad, that distinguish his countrymen. Heinrich Heine, not always a

trustworthy witness, but in this case so unusually serious that we

will take advantage of his acuteness and conciseness, characterises

the Polish nobleman by the following precious mosaic of adjectives:

"hospitable, proud, courageous, supple, false (this little yellow

stone must not be lacking), irritable, enthusiastic, given to gambling,

pleasure-loving, generous, and overbearing." Whether Heine was not

mistaken as to the presence of the little yellow stone is a question

that may have to be discussed in another part of this work. The observer

who, in enumerating the most striking qualities of the Polish character,

added "MISTRUSTFULNESS and SUSPICIOUSNESS engendered by many misfortunes

and often-disappointed hopes," came probably nearer the truth. And this

reminds me of a point which ought never to be left out of sight when

contemplating any one of these portraits--namely, the time at which it

was taken. This, of course, is always an important consideration; but it

is so in a higher degree in the case of a nation whose character, like

the Polish, has at different epochs of its existence assumed such varied

aspects. The first great change came over the national character on

the introduction of elective kingship: it was, at least so far as

the nobility was concerned, a change for the worse--from simplicity,

frugality, and patriotism, to pride, luxury, and selfishness; the second

great change was owing to the disasters that befell the nation in the

latter half of the last century: it was on the whole a change for the

better, purifying and ennobling, calling forth qualities that till then

had lain dormant. At the time the events I have to relate take us to

Poland, the nation is just at this last turning-point, but it has not

yet rounded it. To what an extent the bad qualities had overgrown

the good ones, corrupting and deadening them, may be gathered from

contemporary witnesses. George Forster, who was appointed professor

of natural history at Wilna in 1784, and remained in that position for

several years, says that he found in Poland "a medley of fanatical

and almost New Zealand barbarity and French super-refinement; a people

wholly ignorant and without taste, and nevertheless given to luxury,

gambling, fashion, and outward glitter."

Frederick II describes the Poles in language still more harsh; in his

opinion they are vain in fortune, cringing in misfortune, capable

of anything for the sake of money, spendthrifts, frivolous, without

judgment, always ready to join or abandon a party without cause. No

doubt there is much exaggeration in these statements; but that there

is also much truth in them, is proved by the accounts of many writers,

native and foreign, who cannot be accused of being prejudiced against

Poland. Rulhiere, and other more or less voluminous authorities, might

be quoted; but, not to try the patience of the reader too much, I shall

confine myself to transcribing a clenching remark of a Polish nobleman,

who told our old friend, the English traveller, that although the name

of Poland still remained, the nation no longer existed. "An universal

corruption and venality pervades all ranks of the people. Many of the

first nobility do not blush to receive pensions from foreign courts: one

professes himself publicly an Austrian, a second a Prussian, a third a

Frenchman, and a fourth a Russian."

CHAPTER I.

FREDERICK CHOPIN'S ANCESTORS.--HIS FATHER NICHOLAS CHOPIN'S BIRTH,

YOUTH, ARRIVAL AND EARLY VICISSITUDES IN POLAND, AND MARRIAGE.--BIRTH

AND EARLY INFANCY OF FREDERICK CHOPIN.--HIS PARENTS AND SISTERS.

GOETHE playfully describes himself as indebted to his father for

his frame and steady guidance of life, to his mother for his happy

disposition and love of story-telling, to his grandfather for his

devotion to the fair sex, to his grandmother for his love of finery.

Schopenhauer reduces the law of heredity to the simple formula that man

has his moral nature, his character, his inclinations, and his heart

from his father, and the quality and tendency of his intellect from his

mother. Buckle, on the other hand, questions hereditary transmission of

mental qualities altogether. Though little disposed to doubt with the

English historian, yet we may hesitate to assent to the proposition of

the German philosopher; the adoption of a more scientific doctrine,

one that recognises a process of compensation, neutralisation, and

accentuation, would probably bring us nearer the truth. But whatever the

complicated working of the law of heredity may be, there can be no doubt

that the tracing of a remarkable man's pedigree is always an interesting

and rarely an entirely idle occupation. Pursuing such an inquiry with

regard to Frederick Chopin, we find ourselves, however, soon at the end

of our tether. This is the more annoying, as there are circumstances

that particularly incite our curiosity. The "Journal de Rouen" of

December 1, 1849, contains an article, probably by Amedee de Mereaux, in

which it is stated that Frederick Chopin was descended from the French

family Chopin d'Arnouville, of which one member, a victim of the

revocation of the Edict of Nantes, had taken refuge in Poland.

[Footnote: In scanning the Moniteur of 1835, I came across several

prefects and sous-prefects of the name of Choppin d'Arnouville. (There

are two communes of the name of Arnouville, both are in the departement

of the Seine et Oise--the one in the arrondissement Mantes,

the other in the arrondissement Pontoise. This latter is called

Arnouville-les-Gonesse.) I noticed also a number of intimations

concerning plain Chopins and Choppins who served their country as maires

and army officers. Indeed, the name of Chopin is by no means uncommon in

France, and more than one individual of that name has illustrated it

by his achievements--to wit: The jurist Rene Chopin or Choppin

(1537--1606), the litterateur Chopin (born about 1800), and the poet

Charles-Auguste Chopin (1811--1844).] Although this confidently-advanced

statement is supported by the inscription on the composer's tombstone in

Pere Lachaise, which describes his father as a French refugee, both the

Catholicism of the latter and contradictory accounts of his extraction

caution us not to put too much faith in its authenticity. M. A. Szulc,

the author of a Polish book on Chopin and his works, has been told

that Nicholas Chopin, the father of Frederick, was the natural son of

a Polish nobleman, who, having come with King Stanislas Leszczynski to

Lorraine, adopted there the name of Chopin. From Karasowski we learn

nothing of Nicholas Chopin's parentage. But as he was a friend of the

Chopin family, and from them got much of his information, this silence

might with equal force be adduced for and against the correctness of

Szulc's story, which in itself is nowise improbable. The only point that

could strike one as strange is the change of name. But would not the

death of the Polish ruler and the consequent lapse of Lorraine to France

afford some inducement for the discarding of an unpronounceable foreign

name? It must, however, not be overlooked that this story is but a

hearsay, relegated to a modest foot-note, and put forward without

mention of the source whence it is derived. [FOOTNOTE: Count Wodzinski,

who leaves Nicholas Chopin's descent an open question, mentions a

variant of Szulc's story, saying that some biographers pretended that

Nicholas Chopin was descended from one of the name of Szop, a soldier,

valet, or heyduc (reitre, valet, ou heiduque) in the service of

Stanislas Leszczinski, whom he followed to Lorraine.] Indeed, until we

get possession of indisputable proofs, it will be advisable to disregard

these more or less fabulous reports altogether, and begin with the first

well-ascertained fact--namely, Nicholas Chopin's birth, which took place

at Nancy, in Lorraine, on the 17th of August, 1770. Of his youth nothing

is known except that, like other young men of his country, he conceived

a desire to visit Poland. Polish descent would furnish a satisfactory

explanation of Nicholas' sentiments in regard to Poland at this time

and subsequently, but an equally satisfactory explanation can be found

without having recourse to such a hazardous assumption.

In 1735 Stanislas Leszczynski, who had been King of Poland from 1704 to

1709, became Duke of Lorraine and Bar, and reigned over the Duchies till

1766, when an accident--some part of his dress taking fire--put an end

to his existence. As Stanislas was a wise, kind-hearted, and benevolent

prince, his subjects not only loved him as long as he lived, but also

cherished his memory after his death, when their country had been united

to France. The young, we may be sure, would often hear their elders

speak of the good times of Duke Stanislas, of the Duke (the philosophe

bienfaisant) himself, and of the strange land and people he came from.

But Stanislas, besides being an excellent prince, was also an amiable,

generous gentleman, who, whilst paying due attention to the well-being

of his new subjects, remained to the end of his days a true Pole. From

this circumstance it may be easily inferred that the Court of Stanislas

proved a great attraction to his countrymen, and that Nancy became a

chief halting-place of Polish travellers on their way to and from Paris.

Of course, not all the Poles that had settled in the Duchies during the

Duke's reign left the country after his demise, nor did their friends

from the fatherland altogether cease to visit them in their new home.

Thus a connection between the two countries was kept up, and the

interest taken by the people of the west in the fortunes of the people

in the east was not allowed to die. Moreover, were not the Academie de

Stanislas founded by the Duke, the monument erected to his memory, and

the square named after him, perpetual reminders to the inhabitants of

Nancy and the visitors to that town?

Nicholas Chopin came to Warsaw in or about the year 1787. Karasowski

relates in the first and the second German edition of his biography of

Frederick Chopin that the Staroscina [FOOTNOTE: The wife of a starosta

(vide p. 7.)] Laczynska made the acquaintance of the latter's father,

and engaged him as tutor to her children; but in the later Polish

edition he abandons this account in favour of one given by Count

Frederick Skarbek in his Pamietniki (Memoirs). According to this most

trustworthy of procurable witnesses (why he is the most trustworthy will

be seen presently), Nicholas Chopin's migration to Poland came about

in this way. A Frenchman had established in Warsaw a manufactory of

tobacco, which, as the taking of snuff was then becoming more and more

the fashion, began to flourish in so high a degree that he felt the

need of assistance. He proposed, therefore, to his countryman, Nicholas

Chopin, to come to him and take in hand the book-keeping, a proposal

which was readily accepted.

The first impression of the young Lorrainer on entering the land of

his dreams cannot have been altogether of a pleasant nature. For in the

summer of 1812, when, we are told, the condition of the people had been

infinitely ameliorated by the Prussian and Russian governments, M.

de Pradt, Napoleon's ambassador, found the nation in a state of

semi-barbarity, agriculture in its infancy, the soil parched like a

desert, the animals stunted, the people, although of good stature, in

a state of extreme poverty, the towns built of wood, the houses filled

with vermin, and the food revolting. This picture will not escape

the suspicion of being overdrawn. But J.G. Seume, who was by no means

over-squeamish, and whom experience had taught the meaning of "to rough

it," asserts, in speaking of Poland in 1805, that, Warsaw and a few

other places excepted, the dunghill was in most houses literally and

without exaggeration the cleanest spot, and the only one where one could

stand without loathing. But if the general aspect of things left much

to be desired from a utilitarian point of view, its strangeness and

picturesqueness would not fail to compensate an imaginative youth

for the want of order and comfort. The strong contrast of wealth and

poverty, of luxury and distress, that gave to the whole country so

melancholy an appearance, was, as it were, focussed in its capital.

Mr. Coxe, who visited Warsaw not long before Nicholas Chopin's arrival

there, says:--

The streets are spacious, but ill-paved; the churches and

public buildings large and magnificent, the palaces of the

nobility are numerous and splendid; but the greatest part of

the houses, especially the suburbs, are mean and ill-

constructed wooden hovels.

What, however, struck a stranger most, was the throngs of humanity that

enlivened the streets and squares of Warsaw, the capital of a nation

composed of a medley of Poles, Lithuanians, Red and White Russians,

Germans, Muscovites, Jews, and Wallachians, and the residence of a

numerous temporary and permanent foreign population. How our friend from

quiet Nancy--which long ago had been deserted by royalty and its train,

and where literary luminaries, such as Voltaire, Madame du Chatelet,

Saint Lambert, &c., had ceased to make their fitful appearances--must

have opened his eyes when this varied spectacle unfolded itself before

him.

The streets of stately breadth, formed of palaces in the

finest Italian taste and wooden huts which at every moment

threatened to tumble down on the heads of the inmates; in

these buildings Asiatic pomp and Greenland dirtin strange

union, an ever-bustling population, forming, like a

masked procession, the most striking contrasts. Long-bearded

Jews, and monks in all kinds of habits; nuns of the strictest

discipline, entirely veiled and wrapped in meditation; and in

the large squares troops of young Polesses in light-coloured

silk mantles engaged in conversation; venerable old Polish

gentlemen with moustaches, caftan, girdle, sword, and yellow

and red boots; and the new generation in the most incroyable

Parisian fashion. Turks, Greeks, Russians, Italians, and

French in an ever-changing throng; moreover, an exceedingly

tolerant police that interfered nowise with the popular

amusements, so that in squares and streets there moved about

incessantly Pulchinella theatres, dancing bears, camels, and

monkeys, before which the most elegant carriages as well as

porters stopped and stood gaping.

Thus pictures J. E. Hitzig, the biographer of E. Th. A. Hoffmann, and

himself a sojourner in Warsaw, the life of the Polish capital in 1807.

When Nicholas Chopin saw it first the spectacle in the streets was even

more stirring, varied, and brilliant; for then Warsaw was still the

capital of an independent state, and the pending and impending political

affairs brought to it magnates from all the principal courts of Europe,

who vied with each other in the splendour of their carriages and horses,

and in the number and equipment of their attendants.

In the introductory part of this work I have spoken of the misfortunes

that befel Poland and culminated in the first partition. But the

buoyancy of the Polish character helped the nation to recover sooner

from this severe blow than could have been expected. Before long

patriots began to hope that the national disaster might be turned into

a blessing. Many circumstances favoured the realisation of these hopes.

Prussia, on discovering that her interests no longer coincided with

those of her partners of 1772, changed sides, and by-and-by even went

the length of concluding a defensive and offensive alliance with the

Polish Republic. She, with England and other governments, backed Poland

against Russia and Austria. Russia, moreover, had to turn her attention

elsewhere. At the time of Nicholas Chopin's arrival, Poland was dreaming

of a renascence of her former greatness, and everyone was looking

forward with impatience to the assembly of the Diet which was to meet

the following year. Predisposed by sympathy, he was soon drawn into

the current of excitement and enthusiasm that was surging around him.

Indeed, what young soul possessed of any nobleness could look with

indifference on a nation struggling for liberty and independence. As he

took a great interest in the debates and transactions of the Diet, he

became more and more acquainted with the history, character, condition,

and needs of the country, and this stimulated him to apply himself

assiduously to the study of the national language, in order to increase,

by means of this faithful mirror and interpreter of a people's heart and

mind, his knowledge of these things. And now I must ask the reader to

bear patiently the infliction of a brief historical summary, which

I would most willingly spare him, were I not prevented by two strong

reasons. In the first place, the vicissitudes of Nicholas Chopin's

early life in Poland are so closely bound up with, or rather so much

influenced by, the political events, that an intelligible account of

the former cannot be given without referring to the latter; and in the

second place, those same political events are such important factors in

the moulding of the national character, that, if we wish to understand

it, they ought not to be overlooked.

The Diet which assembled at the end of 1788, in order to prevent the

use or rather abuse of the liberum veto, soon formed itself into a

confederation, abolished in 1789 the obnoxious Permanent Council,

and decreed in 1791, after much patriotic oratory and unpatriotic

obstruction, the famous constitution of the 3rd of May, regarded by the

Poles up to this day with loving pride, and admired and praised at the

time by sovereigns and statesmen, Fox and Burke among them. Although

confirming most of the privileges of the nobles, the constitution

nevertheless bore in it seeds of good promise. Thus, for instance, the

crown was to pass after the death of the reigning king to the Elector

of Saxony, and become thenceforth hereditary; greater power was given

to the king and ministers, confederations and the liberum veto were

declared illegal, the administration of justice was ameliorated, and

some attention was paid to the rights and wrongs of the third estate and

peasantry. But the patriots who already rejoiced in the prospect of a

renewal of Polish greatness and prosperity had counted without the proud

selfish aristocrats, without Russia, always ready to sow and nurture

discord. Hence new troubles--the confederation of Targowica, Russian

demands for the repeal of the constitution and unconditional submission

to the Empress Catharine II, betrayal by Prussia, invasion, war,

desertion of the national cause by their own king and his joining the

conspirators of Targowica, and then the second partition of Poland

(October 14, 1793), implying a further loss of territory and population.

Now, indeed, the events were hastening towards the end of the sad drama,

the finis poloniae. After much hypocritical verbiage and cruel coercion

and oppression by Russia and Prussia, more especially by the former,

outraged Poland rose to free itself from the galling yoke, and fought

under the noble Kosciuszko and other gallant generals with a bravery

that will for ever live in the memory of men. But however glorious the

attempt, it was vain. Having three such powers as Russia, Prussia,

and Austria against her, Poland, unsupported by allies and otherwise

hampered, was too weak to hold her own. Without inquiring into the

causes and the faults committed by her commanders, without dwelling on

or even enumerating the vicissitudes of the struggle, I shall pass on

to the terrible closing scene of the drama--the siege and fall of Praga,

the suburb of Warsaw, and the subsequent massacre. The third partition

(October 24, 1795), in which each of the three powers took her share,

followed as a natural consequence, and Poland ceased to exist as an

independent state. Not, however, for ever; for when in 1807 Napoleon,

after crushing Prussia and defeating Russia, recast at Tilsit to a great

extent the political conformation of Europe, bullying King Frederick

William III and flattering the Emperor Alexander, he created the Grand

Duchy of Warsaw, over which he placed as ruler the then King of Saxony.

Now let us see how Nicholas Chopin fared while these whirlwinds passed

over Poland. The threatening political situation and the consequent

general insecurity made themselves at once felt in trade, indeed soon

paralysed it. What more particularly told on the business in which the

young Lorrainer was engaged was the King's desertion of the national

cause, which induced the great and wealthy to leave Warsaw and betake

themselves for shelter to more retired and safer places. Indeed, so

disastrous was the effect of these occurrences on the Frenchman's

tobacco manufactory that it had to be closed. In these circumstances

Nicholas Chopin naturally thought of returning home, but sickness

detained him. When he had recovered his health, Poland was rising under

Kosciuszko. He then joined the national guard, in which he was before

long promoted to the rank of captain. On the 5th of November, 1794, he

was on duty at Praga, and had not his company been relieved a few hours

before the fall of the suburb, he would certainly have met there his

death. Seeing that all was lost he again turned his thoughts homewards,

when once more sickness prevented him from executing his intention.

For a time he tried to make a living by teaching French, but ere long

accepted an engagement as tutor in the family--then living in the

country--of the Staroscina Laczynska, who meeting him by chance had been

favourably impressed by his manners and accomplishments. In passing we

may note that among his four pupils (two girls and two boys) was one,

Mary, who afterwards became notorious by her connection with Napoleon

I., and by the son that sprang from this connection, Count Walewski,

the minister of Napoleon III. At the beginning of this century we find

Nicholas Chopin at Zelazowa Wola, near Sochaczew, in the house of the

Countess Skarbek, as tutor to her son Frederick. It was there that he

made the acquaintance of Justina Krzyzanowska, a young lady of noble but

poor family, whom he married in the year 1806, and who became the mother

of four children, three daughters and one son, the latter being no other

than Frederick Chopin, the subject of this biography. The position of

Nicholas Chopin in the house of the Countess must have been a pleasant

one, for ever after there seems to have existed a friendly relation

between the two families. His pupil, Count Frederick Skarbek, who

prosecuted his studies at Warsaw and Paris, distinguished himself

subsequently as a poet, man of science, professor at the University

of Warsaw, state official, philanthropist, and many-sided author--more

especially as a politico--economical writer. When in his Memoirs the

Count looks back on his youth, he remembers gratefully and with respect

his tutor, speaking of him in highly appreciative terms. In teaching,

Nicholas Chopin's chief aim was to form his pupils into useful,

patriotic citizens; nothing was farther from his mind than the desire or

unconscious tendency to turn them into Frenchmen. And now approaches the

time when the principal personage makes his appearance on the stage.

Frederick Chopin, the only son and the third of the four children of

Nicholas and Justina Chopin, was born on February 22, 1810,

[FOOTNOTE: See Preface, p. xii. In the earlier editions the date given

was March 1,1809, as in the biography by Karasowski, with whom agree

the earlier J. Fontana (Preface to Chopin's posthumous works.--1855),

C. Sowinski (Les musiciens polonais et slaves.--1857), and the writer

of the Chopin article in Mendel's Musikalisches Conversations-Lexikon

(1872). According to M. A. Szulc (Fryderyk Chopin.--1873) and the

inscription on the memorial (erected in 1880) in the Holy Cross Church

at Warsaw, the composer was born on March 2, 1809. The monument in Pere

Lachaise, at Paris, bears the date of Chopin's death, but not that of

his birth. Felis, in his Biographie universelle des musiciens, differs

widely from these authorities. The first edition (1835--1844) has

only the year--1810; the second edition (1861--1865) adds month and

day--February 8.]

in a mean little house at Zelazowa Wola, a village about twenty-eight

English miles from Warsaw belonging to the Countess Skarbek.

[FOOTNOTE: Count Wodzinski, after indicating the general features of

Polish villages--the dwor (manor-house) surrounded by a "bouquet of

trees"; the barns and stables forming a square with a well in the

centre; the roads planted with poplars and bordered with thatched huts;

the rye, wheat, rape, and clover fields, &c.--describes the birthplace

of Frederick Chopin as follows: "I have seen there the same dwor

embosomed in trees, the same outhouses, the same huts, the same plains

where here and there a wild pear-tree throws its shadow. Some steps from

the mansion I stopped before a little cot with a slated roof, flanked

by a little wooden perron. Nothing has been changed for nearly a hundred

years. A dark passage traverses it. On the left, in a room illuminated

by the reddish flame of slowly-consumed logs, or by the uncertain

light of two candles placed at each extremity of the long table,

the maid-servants spin as in olden times, and relate to each other a

thousand marvellous legends. On the right, in a lodging of three rooms,

so low that one can touch the ceiling, a man of some thirty years,

brown, with vivacious eyes, the face closely shaven." This man was

of course Nicholas Chopin. I need hardly say that Count Wodzinski's

description is novelistically tricked out. His accuracy may be judged

by the fact that a few pages after the above passage he speaks of the

discoloured tiles of the roof which he told his readers before was of

slate.]

The son of the latter, Count Frederick Skarbek, Nicholas Chopin's pupil,

a young man of seventeen, stood godfather and gave his name to the

new-born offspring of his tutor. Little Frederick's residence at the

village cannot have been of long duration.

The establishment of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw in 1807 had ushered in a

time big with chances for a capable man, and we may be sure that a

young husband and father, no doubt already on the look-out for some more

lucrative and independent employment, was determined not to miss them.

Few peaceful revolutions, if any, can compare in thoroughness with the

one that then took place in Poland; a new sovereign ascended the throne,

two differently-constituted representative bodies superseded the old

Senate and Diet, the French code of laws was introduced, the army and

civil service underwent a complete re-organisation, public instruction

obtained a long-needed attention, and so forth. To give an idea of the

extent of the improvement effected in matters of education, it is enough

to mention that the number of schools rose from 140 to 634, and that

a commission was formed for the publication of suitable books of

instruction in the Polish language. Nicholas Chopin's hopes were not

frustrated; for on October 1, 1810, he was appointed professor of the

French language at the newly-founded Lyceum in Warsaw, and a little more

than a year after, on January 1, 1812, to a similar post at the School

of Artillery and Engineering.

The exact date when Nicholas Chopin and his family settled in Warsaw is

not known, nor is it of any consequence. We may, however, safely assume

that about this time little Frederick was an inhabitant of the Polish

metropolis. During the first years of his life the parents may

have lived in somewhat straitened circumstances. The salary of the

professorship, even if regularly paid, would hardly suffice for a family

to live comfortably, and the time was unfavourable for gaining much by

private tuition. M. de Pradt, describing Poland in 1812, says:--

Nothing could exceed the misery of all classes. The army was

not paid, the officers were in rags, the best houses were in

ruins, the greatest lords were compelled to leave Warsaw from

want of money to provide for their tables. No pleasures, no

society, no invitations as in Paris and in London. I even saw

princesses quit Warsaw from the most extreme distress. The

Princess Radziwill had brought two women from England and

France, she wished to send them back, but had to keep them

because she was unable to pay their salaries and travelling

expenses. I saw in Warsaw two French physicians who informed

me that they could not procure their fees even from the

greatest lords.

But whatever straits the parents may have been put to, the weak,

helpless infant would lack none of the necessaries of life, and enjoy

all the reasonable comforts of his age.

When in 1815 peace was restored and a period of quiet followed, the

family must have lived in easy circumstances; for besides holding

appointments as professor at some public schools (under the Russian

government he became also one of the staff of teachers at the Military

Preparatory School), Nicholas Chopin kept for a number of years a

boarding-school, which was patronised by the best families of the

country. The supposed poverty of Chopin's parents has given rise to all

sorts of misconceptions and misstatements. A writer in Larousse's

"Grand dictionnaire universel du XIXe siecle" even builds on it a

theory explanatory of the character of Chopin and his music: "Sa famille

d'origine francaise," he writes, "jouissait d'une mediocre fortune; de

la, peut-etre, certains froissements dans l'organisation nerveuse et

la vive sensibilite de l'enfant, sentiments qui devaient plus tard

se refleter dans ses oeuvres, empreintes generalement d'une profonde

melancolie." If the writer of the article in question had gone a little

farther back, he might have found a sounder basis for his theory in the

extremely delicate physical organisation of the man, whose sensitiveness

was so acute that in early infancy he could not hear music without

crying, and resisted almost all attempts at appeasing him.

The last-mentioned fact, curious and really noteworthy in itself,

acquires a certain preciousness by its being the only one transmitted

to us of that period of Chopin's existence. But this scantiness of

information need not cause us much regret. During the first years of a

man's life biography is chiefly concerned with his surroundings, with

the agencies that train his faculties and mould his character. A

man's acts and opinions are interesting in proportion to the degree of

consolidation attained by his individuality. Fortunately our material is

abundant enough to enable us to reconstruct in some measure the milieu

into which Chopin was born and in which he grew up. We will begin with

that first circle which surrounds the child--his family. The negative

advantages which our Frederick found there--the absence of the

privations and hardships of poverty, with their depressing and often

demoralising influence--have already been adverted to; now I must say a

few words about the positive advantages with which he was favoured.

And it may be at once stated that they cannot be estimated too highly.

Frederick enjoyed the greatest of blessings that can be bestowed upon

mortal man--viz., that of being born into a virtuous and well-educated

family united by the ties of love. I call it the greatest of blessings,

because neither catechism and sermons nor schools and colleges can take

the place,, or compensate for the want, of this education that does not

stop at the outside, but by its subtle, continuous action penetrates to

the very heart's core and pervades the whole being. The atmosphere in

which Frederick lived was not only moral and social, but also distinctly

intellectual.

The father, Nicholas Chopin, seems to have been a man of worth and

culture, honest of purpose, charitable in judgment, attentive to duty,

and endowed with a good share of prudence and commonsense. In support of

this characterisation may be advanced that among his friends he counted

many men of distinction in literature, science, and art; that between

him and the parents of his pupils as well as the pupils themselves there

existed a friendly relation; that he was on intimate terms with several

of his colleagues; and that his children not only loved, but also

respected him. No one who reads his son's letters, which indeed give us

some striking glimpses of the man, can fail to notice this last point.

On one occasion, when confessing that he had gone to a certain dinner

two hours later than he had been asked, Frederick foresees his father's

anger at the disregard for what is owing to others, and especially

to one's elders; and on another occasion he makes excuses for his

indifference to non-musical matters, which, he thinks, his father will

blame. And mark, these letters were written after Chopin had attained

manhood. What testifies to Nicholas Chopin's, abilities as a teacher and

steadiness as a man, is the unshaken confidence of the government: he

continued in his position at the Lyceumtill after the revolution in

1831, when this institution, like many others, was closed; he was then

appointed a member of the board for the examination of candidates for

situations as schoolmasters, and somewhat later he became professor of

the French language at the Academy of the Roman Catholic Clergy.

It is more difficult, or rather it is impossible, to form anything like

a clear picture of his wife, Justina Chopin. None of those of her son's

letters that are preserved is addressed to her, and in those addressed

to the members of the family conjointly, or to friends, nothing occurs

that brings her nearer to us, or gives a clue to her character. George

Sand said that she was Chopin's only passion. Karasowski describes

her as "particularly tender-hearted and rich in all the truly womanly

virtues.....For her quietness and homeliness were the greatest

happiness." K. W. Wojcicki, in "Cmentarz Powazkowski" (Powazki

Cemetery), expresses, himself in the same strain. A Scotch lady, who had

seen Justina Chopin in her old age, and conversed with her in French,

told me that she was then "a neat, quiet, intelligent old lady, whose

activeness contrasted strongly with the languor of her son, who had

not a shadow of energy in him." With regard to the latter part of this

account, we must not overlook the fact that my informant knew Chopin

only in the last year of his life--i.e., when he was in a very suffering

state of mind and body. This is all the information I have been able to

collect regarding the character of Chopin's mother. Moreover, Karasowski

is not an altogether trustworthy informant; as a friend of the Chopin

family he sees in its members so many paragons of intellectual and moral

perfection. He proceeds on the de mortuis nil nisi bonum principle,

which I venture to suggest is a very bad principle. Let us apply this

loving tenderness to our living neighbours, and judge the dead according

to their merits. Thus the living will be doubly benefited, and no harm

be done to the dead. Still, the evidence before us--including that

exclamation about his "best of mothers" in one of Chopin's letters,

written from Vienna, soon after the outbreak of the Polish

insurrection in 1830: "How glad my mamma will be that I did not come

back!"--justifies us, I think, in inferring that Justina Chopin was a

woman of the most lovable type, one in whom the central principle of

existence was the maternal instinct, that bright ray of light which,

dispersed in its action, displays itself in the most varied and lovely

colours. That this principle, although often all-absorbing, is not

incompatible with the wider and higher social and intellectual interests

is a proposition that does not stand in need of proof. But who could

describe that wondrous blending of loving strength and lovable weakness

of a true woman's character? You feel its beauty and sublimity, and if

you attempt to give words to your feeling you produce a caricature.

The three sisters of Frederick all manifested more or less a taste

for literature. The two elder sisters, Louisa (who married Professor

Jedrzejewicz, and died in 1855) and Isabella (who married Anton

Barcinski--first inspector of schools, and subsequently director of

steam navigation on the Vistula--and died in 1881), wrote together for

the improvement of the working classes. The former contributed now and

then, also after her marriage, articles to periodicals on the education

of the young. Emilia, the youngest sister, who died at the early age of

fourteen (in 1827), translated, conjointly with her sister Isabella,

the educational tales of the German author Salzmann, and her poetical

efforts held out much promise for the future.

CHAPTER II

FREDERICK'S FIRST MUSICAL INSTRUCTION AND MUSIC-MASTER, ADALBERT

ZYWNY.--HIS DEBUT AND SUCCESS AS A PIANIST.--HIS EARLY INTRODUCTION INTO

ARISTOCRATIC SOCIETY AND CONSTANT INTERCOURSE WITH THE ARISTOCRACY.--HIS

FIRST COMPOSITIONS.--HIS STUDIES AND MASTER IN HARMONY, COUNTERPOINT,

AND COMPOSITION, JOSEPH ELSNER.

OUR little friend, who, as we have seen, at first took up a hostile

attitude towards music--for his passionate utterances, albeit

inarticulate, cannot well be interpreted as expressions of satisfaction

or approval--came before long under her mighty sway. The pianoforte

threw a spell over him, and, attracting him more and more, inspired

him with such a fondness as to induce his parents to provide him,

notwithstanding his tender age, with an instructor. To lessen the

awfulness of the proceeding, it was arranged that one of the elder

sisters should join him in his lessons. The first and only pianoforte

teacher of him who in the course of time became one of the greatest and

most original masters of this instrument, deserves some attention from

us. Adalbert Zywny [FOOTNOTE: This is the usual spelling of the name,

which, as the reader will see further on, its possessor wrote Ziwny.

Liszt calls him Zywna.], a native of Bohemia, born in 1756, came to

Poland, according to Albert Sowinski (Les musiciens polonais et slaves),

during the reign of Stanislas Augustus Poniatowski (1764--1795), and

after staying for some time as pianist at the court of Prince Casimir

Sapieha, settled in Warsaw as a teacher of music, and soon got into good

practice, "giving his lessons at three florins (eighteen pence) per hour

very regularly, and making a fortune." And thus teaching and composing

(he is said to have composed much for the pianoforte, but he never

published anything), he lived a long and useful life, dying in 1842 at

the age of 86 (Karasowski says in 1840). The punctual and, no doubt,

also somewhat pedantic music-master who acquired the esteem and goodwill

of his patrons, the best families of Warsaw, and a fortune at the same

time, is a pleasant figure to contemplate. The honest orderliness and

dignified calmness of his life, as I read it, are quite refreshing in

this time of rush and gush. Having seen a letter of his, I can imagine

the heaps of original MSS., clearly and neatly penned with a firm

hand, lying carefully packed up in spacious drawers, or piled up on

well-dusted shelves. Of the man Zywny and his relation to the Chopin

family we get some glimpses in Frederick's letters. In one of the year

1828, addressed to his friend Titus Woyciechowski, he writes: "With us

things are as they used to be; the honest Zywny is the soul of all our

amusements." Sowinski informs us that Zywny taught his pupil according

to the classical German method--whatever that may mean--at that time in

use in Poland. Liszt, who calls him "an enthusiastic student of Bach,"

speaks likewise of "les errements d'une ecole entierement classique."

Now imagine my astonishment when on asking the well-known pianoforte

player and composer Edouard Wolff, a native of Warsaw, [Fooynote: He

died at Paris on October 16, 1880.] what kind of pianist Zywny was,

I received the answer that he was a violinist and not a pianist.

That Wolff and Zywny knew each other is proved beyond doubt by the

above-mentioned letter of Zywny's, introducing the former to Chopin,

then resident in Paris. The solution of the riddle is probably this.

Zywny, whether violinist or not, was not a pianoforte virtuoso--at

least, was not heard in public in his old age. The mention of a single

name, that of Wenzel W. Wurfel, certainly shows that he was not the best

pianist in Warsaw. But against any such depreciatory remarks we have

to set Chopin's high opinion of Zywny's teaching capability. Zywny's

letter, already twice alluded to, is worth quoting. It still further

illustrates the relation in which master and pupil stood to each other,

and by bringing us in close contact with the former makes us better

acquainted with his character. A particularly curious fact about the

letter--considering the nationality of the persons concerned--is its

being written in German. Only a fac-simile of the original, with its

clear, firm, though (owing to the writer's old age) cramped penmanship,

and its quaint spelling and capricious use of capital and small

initials, could fully reveal the expressiveness of this document.

However, even in the translation there may be found some of the man's

characteristic old-fashioned formality, grave benevolence, and quiet

homeliness. The outside of the sheet on which the letter is written

bears the words, "From the old music-master Adalbert Ziwny [at least

this I take to be the meaning of the seven letters followed by dots],

kindly to be transmitted to my best friend, Mr. Frederick Chopin, in

Paris." The letter itself runs as follows:--

DEAREST MR. F. CHOPIN,--Wishing you perfect health I have the

honour to write to you through Mr. Eduard Wolf. [FOOTNOTE:

The language of the first sentence is neither logical nor

otherwise precise. I shall keep throughout as close as

possible to the original, and also retain the peculiar

spelling of proper names.] I recommend him to your esteemed

friendship. Your whole family and I had also the pleasure of

hearing at his concert the Adagio and Rondo from your

Concerto, which called up in our minds the most agreeable

remembrance of you. May God give you every prosperity! We are

all well, and wish so much to see you again. Meanwhile I send

you through Mr. Wolf my heartiest kiss, and recommending

myself to your esteemed friendship, I remain your faithful

friend,

ADALBERT ZIWNY.

Warsaw, the 12th of June, 1835.

N.B.--Mr. Kirkow, the merchant, and his son George, who was

at Mr. Reinschmid's at your farewell party, recommend

themselves to you, and wish you good health. Adieu.

Julius Fontana, the friend and companion of Frederick, after stating (in

his preface to Chopin's posthumous works) that Chopin had never another

pianoforte teacher than Zywny, observes that the latter taught his

pupil only the first principles. "The progress of the child was so

extraordinary that his parents and his professor thought they could do

no better than abandon him at the age of 12 to his own instincts, and

follow instead of directing him." The progress of Frederick must indeed

have been considerable, for in Clementina Tanska-Hofmanowa's Pamiatka po

dobrej matce (Memorial of a good Mother) [FOOTNOTE: Published in 1819.]

the writer relates that she was at a soiree at Gr----'s, where she found

a numerous party assembled, and heard in the course of the evening young

Chopin play the piano--"a child not yet eight years old, who, in the

opinion of the connoisseurs of the art, promises to replace Mozart."

Before the boy had completed his ninth year his talents were already so

favourably known that he was invited to take part in a concert which was

got up by several persons of high rank for the benefit of the poor. The

bearer of the invitation was no less a person than Ursin Niemcewicz, the

publicist, poet, dramatist, and statesman, one of the most remarkable

and influential men of the Poland of that day. At this concert, which

took place on February 24, 1818, the young virtuoso played a concerto

by Adalbert Gyrowetz, a composer once celebrated, but now ignominiously

shelved--sic transit gloria mundi--and one of Riehl's "divine

Philistines." An anecdote shows that at that time Frederick was neither

an intellectual prodigy nor a conceited puppy, but a naive, modest child

that played the pianoforte, as birds sing, with unconscious art. When

he came home after the concert, for which of course he had been arrayed

most splendidly and to his own great satisfaction, his mother said to

him: "Well, Fred, what did the public like best?"--"Oh, mamma," replied

the little innocent, "everybody was looking at my collar."

The debut was a complete success, and our Frederick--Chopinek

(diminutive of Chopin) they called him--became more than ever the pet of

the aristocracy of Warsaw. He was invited to the houses of the Princes

Czartoryski, Sapieha, Czetwertynski, Lubecki, Radziwill, the Counts

Skarbek, Wolicki, Pruszak, Hussarzewski, Lempicki, and others. By the

Princess Czetwertynska, who, says Liszt, cultivated music with a true

feeling of its beauties, and whose salon was one of the most brilliant

and select of Warsaw, Frederick was introduced to the Princess Lowicka,

the beautiful Polish wife of the Grand Duke Constantine, who, as

Countess Johanna Antonia Grudzinska, had so charmed the latter that,

in order to obtain the Emperor's consent to his marriage with her, he

abdicated his right of succession to the throne. The way in which

she exerted her influence over her brutal, eccentric, if not insane,

husband, who at once loved and maltreated the Poles, gained her the

title of "guardian angel of Poland." In her salon Frederick came of

course also in contact with the dreaded Grand Duke, the Napoleon of

Belvedere (thus he was nicknamed by Niemcewicz, from the palace where

he resided in Warsaw), who on one occasion when the boy was improvising

with his eyes turned to the ceiling, as was his wont, asked him why he

looked in that direction, if he saw notes up there. With the exalted

occupants of Belvedere Frederick had a good deal of intercourse, for

little Paul, a boy of his own age, a son or adopted son of the Grand

Duke, enjoyed his company, and sometimes came with his tutor, Count de

Moriolles, to his house to take him for a drive. On these occasions

the neighbours of the Chopin family wondered not a little what business

brought the Grand Duke's carriage, drawn by four splendid horses, yoked

in the Russian fashion--i.e., all abreast--to their quarter.

Chopin's early introduction into aristocratic society and constant

intercourse with the aristocracy is an item of his education which must

not be considered as of subordinate importance. More than almost any

other of his early disciplines, it formed his tastes, or at least

strongly assisted in developing certain inborn traits of his nature, and

in doing this influenced his entire moral and artistic character. In the

proem I mentioned an English traveller's encomiums on the elegance in

the houses, and the exquisite refinement in the entertainments, of the

wealthy nobles in the last quarter of the eighteenth century. We may be

sure that in these respects the present century was not eclipsed by

its predecessors, at least not in the third decade, when the salons of

Warsaw shone at their brightest. The influence of French thought and

manners, for the importation and spreading of which King Stanislas

Leszczinski was so solicitous that he sent at his own expense many young

gentlemen to Paris for their education, was subsequently strengthened by

literary taste, national sympathies, and the political connection during

the first Empire. But although foreign notions and customs caused

much of the old barbarous extravagance and also much of the old

homely simplicity to disappear, they did not annihilate the national

distinctiveness of the class that was affected by them. Suffused with

the Slavonic spirit and its tincture of Orientalism, the importation

assumed a character of its own. Liszt, who did not speak merely from

hearsay, emphasises, in giving expression to his admiration of the

elegant and refined manners of the Polish aristocracy, the absence of

formalism and stiff artificiality:--

In these salons [he writes] the rigorously observed

proprieties were not a kind of ingeniously-constructed

corsets that served to hide deformed hearts; they only

necessitated the spiritualisation of all contacts, the

elevation of all rapports, the aristocratisation of all

impressions.

But enough of this for the present.

A surer proof of Frederick's ability than the applause and favour of the

aristocracy was the impression he made on the celebrated Catalani, who,

in January, 1820, gave four concerts in the town-hall of Warsaw, the

charge for admission to each of which was, as we may note in passing, no

less than thirty Polish florins (fifteen shillings). Hearing much of the

musically-gifted boy, she expressed the wish to have him presented to

her. On this being done, she was so pleased with him and his playing

that she made him a present of a watch, on which were engraved the

words: "Donne par Madame Catalani a Frederic Chopin, age de dix ans."

As yet I have said nothing of the boy's first attempts at composition.

Little Frederick began to compose soon after the commencement of his

pianoforte lessons and before he could handle the pen. His master had

to write down what the pupil played, after which the youthful maestro,

often dissatisfied with his first conception, would set to work with the

critical file, and try to improve it. He composed mazurkas, polonaises,

waltzes, &c. At the age of ten he dedicated a march to the Grand Duke

Constantine, who had it scored for a military band and played on parade

(subsequently it was also published, but without the composer's name),

and these productions gave such evident proof of talent that his father

deemed it desirable to get his friend Elsner to instruct him in

harmony and counterpoint. At this time, however, it was not as yet in

contemplation that Frederick should become a professional musician; on

the contrary, he was made to understand that his musical studies must

not interfere with his other studies, as he was then preparing for his

entrance into the Warsaw Lyceum. As we know that this event took place

in 1824, we know also the approximate time of the commencement of

Elsner's lessons. Fontana says that Chopin began these studies when he

was already remarkable as a pianist. Seeing how very little is known

concerning the nature and extent of Chopin's studies in composition, it

may be as well to exhaust the subject at once. But before I do so I must

make the reader acquainted with the musician who, as Zyvny was Chopin's

only pianoforte teacher, was his only teacher of composition.

Joseph Elsner, the son of a cabinet and musical instrument maker at

Grottkau, in Silesia, was born on June 1, 1769. As his father intended

him for the medical profession, he was sent in 1781 to the Latin school

at Breslau, and some years later to the University at Vienna. Having

already been encouraged by the rector in Grottkau to cultivate his

beautiful voice, he became in Breslau a chorister in one of the

churches, and after some time was often employed as violinist and singer

at the theatre. Here, where he got, if not regular instruction, at least

some hints regarding harmony and kindred matters (the authorities are

hopelessly at variance on this and on many other points), he made his

first attempts at composition, writing dances, songs, duets, trios, nay,

venturing even on larger works for chorus and orchestra. The musical

studies commenced in Breslau were continued in Vienna; preferring

musical scores to medical books, the conversations of musicians to

the lectures of professors, he first neglected and at last altogether

abandoned the study of the healing art. A. Boguslawski, who wrote a

biography of Elsner, tells the story differently and more poetically.

When, after a long illness during his sojourn in Breslau, thus runs his

version, Elsner went, on the day of the Holy Trinity in the year 1789,

for the first time to church, he was so deeply moved by the sounds of

the organ that he fainted. On recovering he felt his whole being filled

with such ineffable comfort and happiness that he thought he saw in this

occurrence the hand of destiny. He, therefore, set out for Vienna,

in order that he might draw as it were at the fountain-head the great

principles of his art. Be this as it may, in 1791 we hear of Elsner

as violinist in Brunn, in 1792 as musical conductor at a theatre in

Lemberg--where he is busy composing dramatic and other works--and near

the end of the last century as occupant of the same post at the National

Theatre in Warsaw, which town became his home for the rest of his life.

There was the principal field of his labours; there he died, after a

sojourn of sixty-two years in Poland, on April 18, 1854, leaving

behind him one of the most honoured names in the history of his adopted

country. Of the journeys he undertook, the longest and most important

was, no doubt, that to Paris in 1805. On the occasion of this visit

some of his compositions were performed, and when Chopin arrived there

twenty-five years afterwards, Elsner was still remembered by Lesueur,

who said: "Et que fait notre bon Elsner? Racontez-moi de ses nouvelles."

Elsner was a very productive composer: besides symphonies, quartets,

cantatas, masses, an oratorio, &c., he composed twenty-seven Polish

operas. Many of these works were published, some in Warsaw, some in

various German towns, some even in Paris. But his activity as a teacher,

conductor, and organiser was perhaps even more beneficial to the

development of the musical art in Poland than that as a composer. After

founding and conducting several musical societies, he became in 1821

director of the then opened Conservatorium, at the head of which he

continued to the end of its existence in 1830. To complete the idea of

the man, we must not omit to mention his essay In how far is the Polish

language suitable for music? As few of his compositions have been heard

outside of Poland, and these few long ago, rarely, and in few places, it

is difficult to form a satisfactory opinion with regard to his position

as a composer. Most accounts, however, agree in stating that he wrote in

the style of the modern Italians, that is to say, what were called the

modern Italians in the later part of the last and the earlier part of

this century. Elsner tried his strength and ability in all genres, from

oratorio, opera, and symphony, down to pianoforte variations, rondos,

and dances, and in none of them did he fail to be pleasing and

intelligible, not even where, as especially in his sacred music, he

made use--a sparing use--of contrapuntal devices, imitations, and fugal

treatment. The naturalness, fluency, effectiveness, and practicableness

which distinguish his writing for voices and instruments show that he

possessed a thorough knowledge of their nature and capability. It was,

therefore, not an empty rhetorical phrase to speak of him initiating

his pupils "a la science du contre-point et aux effets d'une savante

instrumentation."

[FOOTNOTE: "The productions of Elsner," says Fetis, "are in the style of

Paer and Mayer's music. In his church music there is a little too much

of modern and dramatic forms; one finds in them facility and a natural

manner of making the parts sing, but little originality and variety in

his ideas. Elsner writes with sufficient purity, although he shows in

his fugues that his studies have not been severe."]

For the pupils of the Conservatorium he wrote vocal pieces in from one

to ten parts, and he composed also a number of canons in four and five

parts, which fact seems to demonstrate that he had no ill-will against

the scholastic forms. And now I shall quote a passage from an apparently

well-informed writer [FOOTNOTE: The writer of the article Elsner in

Schilling's Universal-Lexikon der Tonkunst] (to whom I am, moreover,

otherwise indebted in this sketch), wherein Elsner is blamed for certain

shortcomings with which Chopin has been often reproached in a less

charitable spirit. The italics, which are mine, will point out the words

in question:--

One forgives him readily [in consideration of the general

excellence of his style] THE OFFENCES AGAINST THE LAW OF

HARMONIC CONNECTION THAT OCCUR HERE AND THERE, AND THE

FACILITY WITH WHICH HE SOMETIMES DISREGARDS THE FIXED RULES

OF STRICT PART-WRITING, especially in the dramatic works,

where he makes effect apparently the ultimate aim of his

indefatigable endeavours.

The wealth of melody and technical mastery displayed in "The Passion

of our Lord Jesus Christ" incline Karasowski to think that it is the

composer's best work. When the people at Breslau praised Elsner's

"Echo Variations" for orchestra, Chopin exclaimed: "You must hear his

Coronation Mass, then only can you judge of him as a composer." To

characterise Elsner in a few words, he was a man of considerable musical

aptitude and capacity, full of nobleness of purpose, learning, industry,

perseverance, in short, possessing all qualities implied by talent, but

lacking those implied by genius.

A musician travelling in 1841 in Poland sent at the time to the Neue

Zeitschrift fur Musik a series of "Reiseblatter" (Notes of Travel),

which contain so charming and vivid a description of this interesting

personality that I cannot resist the temptation to translate and insert

it here almost without any abridgment. Two noteworthy opinions of the

writer may be fitly prefixed to this quotation--namely, that Elsner was

a Pole with all his heart and soul, indeed, a better one than thousands

that are natives of the country, and that, like Haydn, he possessed the

quality of writing better the older he grew:--

The first musical person of the town [Warsaw] is still the

old, youthful Joseph Elsner, a veteran master of our art, who

is as amiable as he is truly estimable. In our day one hardly

meets with a notable Polish musician who has not studied

composition under Pan [i.e., Mr.] Elsner; and he loves all

his pupils, and all speak of him with enthusiasm, and,

according to the Polish fashion, kiss the old master's

shoulder, whereupon he never forgets to kiss them heartily on

both cheeks. Even Charles Kurpinski, the pensioned

Capelhneister of the Polish National Theatre, whose hair is

already grey, is, if I am not very much misinformed, also a

pupil of Joseph Elsner's. One is often mistaken with regard

to the outward appearance of a celebrated man; I mean, one

forms often a false idea of him before one has seen him and

knows a portrait of him. I found Elsner almost exactly as I

had imagined him. Wisocki, the pianist, also a pupil of his,

took me to him. Pan Elsner lives in the Dom Pyarow [House of

Piarists]. One has to start early if one wishes to find him

at home; for soon after breakfast he goes out, and rarely

returns to his cell before evening. He inhabits, like a

genuine church composer, two cells of the old Piarist

Monastery in Jesuit Street, and in the dark passages which

lead to his rooms one sees here and there faded laid-aside

pictures of saints lying about, and old church banners

hanging down. The old gentleman was still in bed when we

arrived, and sent his servant to ask us to wait a little in

the anteroom, promising to be with us immediately. All the

walls of this room, or rather cell, were hung to the ceiling

with portraits of musicians, among them some very rare names

and faces. Mr. Elsner has continued this collection down to

the present time; also the portraits of Liszt, Thalberg,

Chopin, and Clara Wieck shine down from the old monastic

walls. I had scarcely looked about me in this large company

for a few minutes, when the door of the adjoining room

opened, and a man of medium height (not to say little),

somewhat stout, with a round, friendly countenance, grey

hair, but very lively eyes, enveloped in a warm fur dressing-

gown, stepped up to us, comfortably but quickly, and bade us

welcome. Wisocki kissed him, according to the Polish fashion,

as a token of respect, on the right shoulder, and introduced

me to him, whereupon the old friendly gentleman shook hands

with me and said some kindly words.

This, then, was Pan Joseph Elsner, the ancestor of modern

Polish music, the teacher of Chopin, the fine connoisseur and

cautious guide of original talents. For he does not do as is

done only too often by other teachers in the arts, who insist

on screwing all pupils to the same turning-lathe on which

they themselves were formed, who always do their utmost to

ingraft their own I on the pupil, so that he may become as

excellent a man as they imagine themselves to be. Joseph

Elsner did not proceed thus. When all the people of Warsaw

thought Frederick Chopin was entering on a wrong path, that

his was not music at all, that he must keep to Himmel and

Hummel, otherwise he would never do anything decent--the

clever Pan Elsner had already very clearly perceived what a

poetic kernel there was in the pale young dreamer, had long

before felt very clearly that he had before him the founder

of a new epoch of pianoforte-playing, and was far from laying

upon him a cavesson, knowing well that such a noble

thoroughbred may indeed be cautiously led, but must not be

trained and fettered in the usual way if he is to conquer.

Of Chopin's studies under this master we do not know much more than

of his studies under Zywny. Both Fontana and Sowinski say that he went

through a complete course of counterpoint and composition. Elsner, in a

letter written to Chopin in 1834, speaks of himself as "your teacher

of harmony and counterpoint, of little merit, but fortunate." Liszt

writes:--

Joseph Elsner taught Chopin those things that are most

difficult to learn and most rarely known: to be exacting

to one's self, and to value the advantages that are only

obtained by dint of patience and labour.

What other accounts of the matter under discussion I have got from books

and conversations are as general and vague as the foregoing. I therefore

shall not weary the reader with them. What Elsner's view of teaching was

may be gathered from one of his letters to his pupil. The gist of his

remarks lies in this sentence:--

That with which the artist (who learns continually from his

surroundings) astonishes his contemporaries, he can only

attain by himself and through himself.

Elsner had insight and self-negation (a rare quality with teachers)

enough to act up to his theory, and give free play to the natural

tendencies of his pupil's powers. That this was really the case is seen

from his reply to one who blamed Frederick's disregard of rules and

custom:--

Leave him in peace [he said], his is an uncommon way because

his gifts are uncommon. He does not strictly adhere to the

customary method, but he has one of his own, and he will

reveal in his works an originality which in such a degree has

not been found in anyone.

The letters of master and pupil testify to their unceasing mutual esteem

and love. Those of the master are full of fatherly affection and advice,

those of the pupil full of filial devotion and reverence. Allusions to

and messages for Elsner are very frequent in Chopin's letters. He seems

always anxious that his old master should know how he fared, especially

hear of his success. His sentiments regarding Elsner reveal themselves

perhaps nowhere more strikingly than in an incidental remark which

escapes him when writing to his friend Woyciechowski. Speaking of a new

acquaintance he has made, he says, "He is a great friend of Elsner's,

which in my estimation means much." No doubt Chopin looked up with more

respect and thought himself more indebted to Elsner than to Zywny; but

that he had a good opinion of both his masters is evident from his pithy

reply to the Viennese gentleman who told him that people were astonished

at his having learned all he knew at Warsaw: "From Messrs. Zywny and

Elsner even the greatest ass must learn something."

CHAPTER III

FREDERICK ENTERS THE WARSAW LYCEUM.--VARIOUS EDUCATIONAL

INFLUENCES.--HIS FATHER'S FRIENDS.--RISE OF ROMANTICISM IN POLISH

LITERATURE.--FREDERICK'S STAY AT SZAFARNIA DURING HIS FIRST SCHOOL

HOLIDAYS.--HIS TALENT FOR IMPROVISATION.--HIS DEVELOPMENT AS A COMPOSER

AND PIANIST.--HIS PUBLIC PERFORMANCES.--PUBLICATION OF OP. I.--EARLY

COMPOSITIONS.--HIS PIANOFORTE STYLE.

FREDERICK, who up to the age of fifteen was taught at home along with

his father's boarders, became in 1824 a pupil of the Warsaw Lyceum, a

kind of high-school, the curriculum of which comprised Latin, Greek,

modern languages, mathematics, history, &c. His education was so

far advanced that he could at once enter the fourth class, and the

liveliness of his parts, combined with application to work, enabled him

to distinguish himself in the following years as a student and to carry

off twice a prize. Polish history and literature are said to have been

his favourite studies.

Liszt relates that Chopin was placed at an early age in one of the first

colleges of Warsaw, "thanks to the generous and intelligent protection

which Prince Anton Radziwill always bestowed upon the arts and upon

young men of talent." This statement, however, has met with a direct

denial on the part of the Chopin family, and may, therefore, be

considered as disposed of. But even without such a denial the statement

would appear suspicious to all but those unacquainted with Nicholas

Chopin's position. Surely he must have been able to pay for his son's

schooling! Moreover, one would think that, as a professor at the Lyceum,

he might even have got it gratis. As to Frederick's musical education

in Warsaw, it cannot have cost much. And then, how improbable that the

Prince should have paid the comparatively trifling school-fees and left

the young man when he went abroad dependent upon the support of his

parents! The letters from Vienna (1831) show unmistakably that Chopin

applied to his father repeatedly for money, and regretted being such a

burden to him. Further, Chopin's correspondence, which throws much light

on his relation to Prince Radziwili, contains nothing which would lead

one to infer any such indebtedness as Liszt mentions. But in order that

the reader may be in possession of the whole evidence and able to judge

for himself, I shall place before him Liszt's curiously circumstantial

account in its entirety:--

The Prince bestowed upon him the inappreciable gift of a good

education, no part of which remained neglected. His elevated

mind enabling him to understand the exigencies of an artist's

career, he, from the time of his protege's entering the

college to the entire completion of his studies, paid the

pension through the agency of a friend, M. Antoine

Korzuchowski, [FOOTNOTE: Liszt should have called this

gentleman Adam Kozuchowski.] who always maintained cordial

relations and a constant friendship with Chopin.

Liszt's informant was no doubt Chopin's Paris friend Albert Grzymala,

[FOOTNOTE: M. Karasowski calls this Grzymala erroneously Francis. More

information about this gentleman will be given in a subsequent chapter.]

who seems to have had no connection with the Chopin family in Poland.

Karasowski thinks that the only foundation of the story is a letter and

present from Prince Radziwill--acknowledgments of the dedication to him

of the Trio, Op. 8--which Adam Kozuchowski brought to Chopin in 1833.

[FOOTNOTE: M. Karasowski, Fryderyk Chopin, vol. i., p. 65.]

Frederick was much liked by his school-fellows, which, as his manners

and disposition were of a nature thoroughly appreciated by boys, is

not at all to be wondered at. One of the most striking features in

the character of young Chopin was his sprightliness, a sparkling

effervescence that manifested itself by all sorts of fun and mischief.

He was never weary of playing pranks on his sisters, his comrades,

and even on older people, and indulged to the utmost his fondness for

caricaturing by pictorial and personal imitations. In the course of a

lecture the worthy rector of the Lyceum discovered the scapegrace making

free with the face and figure of no less a person than his own rectorial

self. Nevertheless the irreverent pupil got off easily, for the master,

with as much magnanimity as wisdom, abstained from punishing the

culprit, and, in a subscript which he added to the caricature, even

praised the execution of it. A German Protestant pastor at Warsaw, who

made always sad havoc of the Polish language, in which he had every

Sunday to preach one of his sermons, was the prototype of one of the

imitations with which Frederick frequently amused his friends. Our

hero's talent for changing the expression of his face, of which

George Sand, Liszt, Balzac, Hiller, Moscheles, and other personal

acquaintances, speak with admiration, seems already at this time to have

been extraordinary. Of the theatricals which the young folks were wont

to get up at the paternal house, especially on the name-days of their

parents and friends, Frederick was the soul and mainstay. With a good

delivery he combined a presence of mind that enabled him to be always

ready with an improvisation when another player forgot his part. A

clever Polish actor, Albert Piasecki, who was stage-manager on these

occasions, gave it as his opinion that the lad was born to be a great

actor. In after years two distinguished members of the profession in

France, M. Bocage and Mdme. Dorval, expressed similar opinions. For

their father's name-day in 1824, Frederick and his sister Emilia wrote

conjointly a one-act comedy in verse, entitled THE MISTAKE; OR, THE

PRETENDED ROGUE, which was acted by a juvenile company. According to

Karasowski, the play showed that the authors had a not inconsiderable

command of language, but in other respects could not be called a very

brilliant achievement. Seeing that fine comedies are not often written

at the ages of fifteen and eleven, nobody will be in the least surprised

at the result.

These domestic amusements naturally lead us to inquire who were the

visitors that frequented the house. Among them there was Dr. Samuel

Bogumil Linde, rector of the Lyceum and first librarian of the National

Library, a distinguished philologist, who, assisted by the best Slavonic

scholars, wrote a valuable and voluminous "Dictionary of the Polish

Language," and published many other works on the Slavonic languages.

After this oldest of Nicholas Chopin's friends I shall mention Waclaw

Alexander Maciejowski, who, like Linde, received his university

education in Germany, taught then for a short time at the Lyceum,

and became in 1819 a professor at the University of Warsaw. His

contributions to various branches of Slavonic history (law, literature,

&c.) are very numerous. However, one of the most widely known of those

who were occasionally seen at Chopin's home was Casimir Brodzinski, the

poet, critic, and champion of romanticism, a prominent figure in Polish

literary history, who lived in Warsaw from about 1815 to 1822, in which

year he went as professor of literature to the University of Cracow.

Nicholas Chopin's pupil, Count Frederick Skarbek, must not be forgotten;

he had now become a man of note, being professor of political economy at

the university, and author of several books that treat of that science.

Besides Elsner and Zywny, who have already been noticed at some

length, a third musician has to be numbered among friends of the Chopin

family--namely, Joseph Javurek, the esteemed composer and professor at

the Conservatorium; further, I must yet make mention of Anton Barcinski,

professor at the Polytechnic School, teacher at Nicholas Chopin's

institution, and by-and-by his son-in-law; Dr. Jarocki, the zoologist;

Julius Kolberg, the engineer; and Brodowski, the painter. These and

others, although to us only names, or little more, are nevertheless not

without their significance. We may liken them to the supernumeraries on

the stage, who, dumb as they are, help to set off and show the position

of the principal figure or figures.

The love of literature which we have noticed in the young Chopins, more

particularly in the sisters, implanted by an excellent education and

fostered by the taste, habits, and encouragement of their father, cannot

but have been greatly influenced and strengthened by the characters and

conversation of such visitors. And let it not be overlooked that

this was the time of Poland's intellectual renascence--a time when the

influence of man over man is greater than at other times, he being, as

it were, charged with a kind of vivifying electricity. The

misfortunes that had passed over Poland had purified and fortified the

nation--breathed into it a new and healthier life. The change which the

country underwent from the middle of the eighteenth to the earlier

part of the nineteenth century was indeed immense. Then Poland, to

use Carlyle's drastic phraseology, had ripened into a condition

of "beautifully phosphorescent rot-heap"; now, with an improved

agriculture, reviving commerce, and rising industry, it was more

prosperous than it had been for centuries. As regards intellectual

matters, the comparison with the past was even more favourable to

the present. The government that took the helm in 1815 followed the

direction taken by its predecessors, and schools and universities

flourished; but a most hopeful sign was this, that whilst the epoch of

Stanislas Augustus was, as Mickiewicz remarked (in Les Slaves), little

Slavonic and not even national, now the national spirit pervaded the

whole intellectual atmosphere, and incited workers in all branches of

science and art to unprecedented efforts. To confine ourselves to one

department, we find that the study of the history and literature of

Poland had received a vigorous impulse, folk-songs were zealously

collected, and a new school of poetry, romanticism, rose victoriously

over the fading splendour of an effete classicism. The literature of

the time of Stanislas was a court and salon literature, and under the

influence of France and ancient Rome. The literature that began to

bud about 1815, and whose germs are to be sought for in the preceding

revolutionary time, was more of a people's literature, and under the

influence of Germany, England, and Russia. The one was a hot-house

plant, the other a garden flower, or even a wild flower. The classics

swore by the precepts of Horace and Boileau, and held that among

the works of Shakespeare there was not one veritable tragedy. The

romanticists, on the other hand, showed by their criticisms and works

that their sympathies were with Schiller, Goethe, Burger, Byron,

Shukovski, &c. Wilna was the chief centre from which this movement

issued, and Brodziriski one of the foremost defenders of the new

principles and the precursor of Mickiewicz, the appearance of whose

ballads, romances, "Dziady" and "Grazyna" (1822), decided the war in

favour of romanticism. The names of Anton Malczewski, Bogdan Zaleski,

Severyn Goszczynski, and others, ought to be cited along with that of

the more illustrious Mickiewicz, but I will not weary the reader either

with a long disquisition or with a dry enumeration. I have said above

that Polish poetry had become more of a people's poetry. This, however,

must not be understood in the sense of democratic poetry.

The Polish poets [says C. Courriere, to whose "Histoire de la

litterature chez les Slaves" I am much indebted] ransacked with avidity

the past of their country, which appeared to them so much the more

brilliant because it presented a unique spectacle in the history of

nations. Instead of breaking with the historic traditions they respected

them, and gave them a new lustre, a new life, by representing them under

a more beautiful, more animated, and more striking form. In short, if

Polish romanticism was an evolution of poetry in the national sense, it

did not depart from the tendencies of its elder sister, for it saw

in the past only the nobility; it was and remained, except in a few

instances, aristocratic.

Now let us keep in mind that this contest of classicism and romanticism,

this turning away from a dead formalism to living ideals, was taking

place at that period of Frederick Chopin's life when the human mind is

most open to new impressions, and most disposed to entertain bold and

noble ideas. And, further, let us not undervalue the circumstance that

he must have come in close contact with one of the chief actors in this

unbloody revolution.

Frederick spent his first school holidays at Szafarnia, in Mazovia, the

property of the Dziewanowski family. In a letter written on August

19, 1824, he gives his friend and school-fellow William Kolberg, some

account of his doings there--of his strolls and runs in the garden, his

walks and drives to the forest, and above all of his horsemanship. He

tells his dear Willie that he manages to keep his seat, but would

not like to be asked how. Indeed, he confesses that, his equestrian

accomplishments amount to no more than to letting the horse go slowly

where it lists, and sitting on it, like a monkey, with fear. If he had

not yet met with an accident, it was because the horse had so far not

felt any inclination to throw him off. In connection with his drives--in

britzka and in coach--he does not forget to mention that he is always

honoured with a back-seat. Still, life at Szafarnia was not unmixed

happiness, although our hero bore the ills with admirable stoicism:--

Very often [he writes] the flies sit on my prominent nose--

this, however, is of no consequence, it is the habit of these

little animals. The mosquitoes bite me--this too, however, is

of no consequence, for they don't bite me in the nose.

The reader sees from this specimen of epistolary writing that Frederick

is still a boy, and if I had given the letter in extenso, the boyishness

would have been even more apparent, in the loose and careless style as

well as in the frolicsome matter.

His letters to his people at home took on this occasion the form of a

manuscript newspaper, called, in imitation of the "Kuryer Warszawski"

("Warsaw Courier"), "Kuryer Szafarski" ("Szafarnia Courier"), which the

editor, in imitation of the then obtaining press regulation, did not

send off until it had been seen and approved of by the censor, Miss

Dziewanowska. One of the numbers of the paper contains among other news

the report of a musical gathering of "some persons and demi-persons"

at which, on July 15, 1824, Mr. Pichon (anagram of Chopin) played a

Concerto of Kalkbrenner's and a little song, the latter being received

by the youthful audience with more applause than the former.

Two anecdotes that relate to this stay at Szafarnia further exemplify

what has already been said of Frederick's love of fun and mischief.

Having on one of his visits to the village of Oberow met some Jews

who had come to buy grain, he invited them to his room, and there

entertained them with music, playing to them "Majufes."

[FOOTNOTE: Karasowski describes "Majufes" as a kind of Jewish wedding

march. Ph. Lobenstein says that it means "the beautiful, the pleasing

one." With this word opened a Hebrew song which dates from the time of

the sojourn of the Jews in Spain, and which the orthodox Polish Jews

sing on Saturdays after dinner, and whose often-heard melody the Poles

imitate as a parody of Jewish singing.]

His guests were delighted--they began to dance, told him that he played

like a born Jew, and urged him to come to the next Jewish wedding and

play to them there. The other anecdote would be a very ugly story were

it not for the redeeming conclusion. Again we meet with one of the

numerous, but by no means well-loved, class of Polish citizens.

Frederick, having heard that a certain Jew had bought grain from

Mr. Romecki, the proprietor of Oberow, sent this gentleman a letter

purporting to be written by the grain-dealer in question, in which he

informed him that after reconsidering the matter he would rather not

take the grain. The imitation of the jargon in use among the Polish Jews

was so good, and the spelling and writing so bad, that Mr. Romecki was

taken in. Indeed, he flew at once into such a passion that he sent for

the Jew with the intention of administering to him a sound thrashing.

Only Frederick's timely confession saved the poor fellow from his

undeserved punishment. But enough of Szafarnia, where the young

scapegrace paid so long a holiday visit (from his letter to William

Kolberg we learn that he would not see his friend for four weeks more),

and where, judging from what has already been told, and also from a

remark in the same letter, he must have "enjoyed himself pretty well."

And now we will return to Warsaw, to Nicholas Chopin's boarding-school.

To take away any bad impression that may be left by the last anecdote, I

shall tell another of a more pleasing character, which, indeed, has had

the honour of being made the subject of a picture. It was often told,

says Karasowski, by Casimir Wodzinski, a boarder of Nicholas Chopin's.

One day when the latter was out, Barcinski, the assistant master,

could not manage the noisy boys. Seeing this, Frederick, who just then

happened to come into the room, said to them that he would improvise a

pretty story if they would sit down and be quiet. This quickly restored

silence. He thereupon had the lights extinguished, took his seat at the

piano, and began as follows:--

Robbers set out to plunder a house. They come nearer and

nearer. Then they halt, and put up the ladders they have

brought with them. But just when they are about to enter

through the windows, they hear a noise within. This gives

them a fright. They run away to the woods. There, amidst the

stillness and darkness of the night, they lie down and

before long fall fast asleep.

When Frederick had got to this part of the story he began to play softer

and softer, and ever softer, till his auditors, like the robbers, were

fast asleep. Noticing this he stole out of the room, called in the other

inmates of the house, who came carrying lights with them, and then

with a tremendous, crashing chord disturbed the sweet slumbers of the

evil-doers.

Here we have an instance of "la richesse de son improvisation," by

which, as Fontana tells us, Chopin, from his earliest youth, astonished

all who had the good fortune to hear him. Those who think that there

is no salvation outside the pale of absolute music, will no doubt be

horror-stricken at the heretical tendency manifested on this occasion by

an otherwise so promising musician. Nay, even the less orthodox, those

who do not altogether deny the admissibility of programme-music if it

conforms to certain conditions and keeps within certain limits, will

shake their heads sadly. The duty of an enthusiastic biographer, it

would seem, is unmistakable; he ought to justify, or, at least, excuse

his hero--if nothing else availed, plead his youth and inexperience.

My leaving the poor suspected heretic in the lurch under these

circumstances will draw upon me the reproach of remissness; but, as

I have what I consider more important business on hand, I must not be

deterred from proceeding to it by the fear of censure.

The year 1825 was, in many respects, a memorable one in the life of

Chopin. On May 27 and June 10 Joseph Javurek, whom I mentioned a few

pages back among the friends of the Chopin family, gave two concerts for

charitable purposes in the large hall of the Conservatorium. At one of

these Frederick appeared again in public. A Warsaw correspondent of the

"Leipzig Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung" says in the course of one of

his letters:--

The Academist Chopin performed the first Allegro of

Moscheles' Pianoforte Concerto in F [G?] minor, and an

improvisation on the aeolopantaleon. This instrument,

invented by the cabinet-maker Dlugosz, of this town, combines

the aeolomelodicon [FOOTNOTE: An instrument of the organ

species, invented by Professor Hoffmann, and constructed by

the mechanician Brunner, of Warsaw.] with the piano-

forte....Young Chopin distinguished himself in his

improvisation by wealth of musical ideas, and under his hands

this instrument, of which he is a thorough master, made a

great impression.

Unfortunately we learn nothing of Chopin's rendering of the movement

from Moscheles' Concerto. Still, this meagre notice, written by a

contemporary--an ear-witness, who wrote down his impressions soon after

the performance--is very precious, indeed more precious than the

most complete and elaborate criticism written fifty years after the

occurrence would be. I cannot help thinking that Karasowski somewhat

exaggerates when he says that Chopin's pianoforte playing transported

the audience into a state of enthusiasm, and that no concert had a

brilliant success unless he took part in it. The biographer seems either

to trust too much to the fancy-coloured recollections of his informants,

or to allow himself to be carried away by his zeal for the exaltation of

his hero. At any rate, the tenor of the above-quoted notice, laudatory

as it is, and the absence of Chopin's name from other Warsaw letters,

do not remove the doubts which such eulogistic superlatives raise in the

mind of an unbiassed inquirer. But that Chopin, as a pianist and as

a musician generally, had attained a proficiency far beyond his years

becomes evident if we examine his compositions of that time, to which I

shall presently advert. And that he had risen into notoriety and saw his

talents appreciated cannot be doubted for a moment after what has been

said. Were further proof needed, we should find it in the fact that he

was selected to display the excellences of the aeolomelodicon when the

Emperor Alexander I, during his sojourn in Warsaw in 1825, [FOOTNOTE:

The Emperor Alexander opened the Diet at Warsaw on May 13, 1825, and

closed it on June 13.] expressed the wish to hear this instrument.

Chopin's performance is said to have pleased the august auditor, who, at

all events, rewarded the young musician with a diamond ring.

A greater event than either the concert or the performance before the

Emperor, in fact, THE event of the year 1825, was the publication of

Chopin's Opus 1. Only he who has experienced the delicious sensation of

seeing himself for the first time in print can realise what our young

author felt on this occasion. Before we examine this work, we will

give a passing glance at some less important early compositions of the

maestro which were published posthumously.

There is first of all a Polonaise in G sharp minor, said to be of

the year 1822, [FOOTNOTE: See No. 15 of the Posthumous Works in the

Breitkopf and Hartel edition.] but which, on account of the savoir-faire

and invention exhibited in it, I hold to be of a considerably later

time. Chopin's individuality, it is true, is here still in a rudimentary

state, chiefly manifested in the light-winged figuration; the thoughts

and the expression, however, are natural and even graceful, bearing

thus the divine impress. The echoes of Weber should be noted. Of

two mazurkas, in G and B flat major, of the year 1825, the first is,

especially in its last part, rather commonplace; the second is more

interesting, because more suggestive of better things, which the first

is only to an inconsiderable extent. In No. 2 we meet already with

harmonic piquancies which charmed musicians and lovers of music so

much in the later mazurkas. Critics and students will not overlook the

octaves between, treble and bass in the second bar of part two in No.

1. A. Polonaise in B flat minor, superscribed "Farewell to William

Kolberg," of the year 1826, has not less naturalness and grace than the

Polonaise of 1822, but in addition to these qualities, it has also at

least one thought (part 1) which contains something of the sweet ring of

Chopinian melancholy. The trio of the Polonaise is headed by the words:

"Au revoir! after an aria from 'Gazza ladra'." Two foot-notes accompany

this composition in the Breitkopf and Hartel edition (No. 16 of the

Posthumous Works). The first says that the Polonaise was composed "at

Chopin's departure from [should be 'for'] Reinerz"; and the second, in

connection with the trio, that "some days before Chopin's departure the

two friends had been present at a performance of Rossini's opera."

There is one other early posthumously-published work of Chopin's, whose

status, however, differs from the above-mentioned ones in this, that

the composer seems to have intended to publish it. The composition in

question is the Variations sur un air national allemand.

Szulc says that Oskar Kolberg related that he had still in his

possession these Variations on the theme of Der Schweizerbub, which

Chopin composed between his twelfth and seventeenth years at the house

of General Sowinski's wife in the course of "a few quarter-hours."

The Variations sur un air national allemand were published after the

composer's death along with his Sonata, Op. 4, by Haslinger, of Vienna,

in 1851. They are, no doubt, the identical composition of which Chopin

in a letter from Vienna (December 1, 1830) writes: "Haslinger received

me very kindly, but nevertheless would publish neither the Sonata nor

the Second Variations." The First Variations were those on La ci darem,

Op. 2, the first of his compositions that was published in Germany.

Without inquiring too curiously into the exact time of its production

and into the exact meaning of "a few quarter-hours," also leaving it

an open question whether the composer did or did not revise his first

conception of the Variations before sending them to Vienna, I shall

regard this unnumbered work--which, by the way, in the Breitkopf and

Hartel edition is dated 1824--on account of its greater simplicity and

inferior interest, as an earlier composition than the Premier Rondeau

(C minor), Op. 1, dedicated to Mdme. de Linde (the wife of his father's

friend and colleague, the rector Dr. Linde), a lady with whom Frederick

often played duets. What strikes one at once in both of them is

the almost total absence of awkwardness and the presence of a

rarely-disturbed ease. They have a natural air which is alike free from

affected profundity and insipid childishness. And the hand that wrote

them betrays so little inexperience in the treatment of the instrument

that they can hold their ground without difficulty and honourably among

the better class of light drawing-room pieces. Of course, there are

weak points: the introduction to the Variations with those interminable

sequences of dominant and tonic chords accompanying a stereotyped run,

and the want of cohesiveness in the Rondo, the different subjects of

which are too loosely strung together, may be instanced. But, although

these two compositions leave behind them a pleasurable impression,

they can lay only a small claim to originality. Still, there are slight

indications of it in the tempo di valse, the concluding portion of the

Variations, and more distinct ones in the Rondo, in which it is

possible to discover the embryos of forms--chromatic and serpentining

progressions, &c.--which subequently develop most exuberantly. But if on

the one hand we must admit that the composer's individuality is as yet

weak, on the other hand we cannot accuse him of being the imitator of

any one master--such a dominant influence is not perceptible.

[FOOTNOTE: Schumann, who in 1831 became acquainted with Chopin's Op.

2, and conceived an enthusiastic admiration for the composer, must have

made inquiries after his Op. 1, and succeeded in getting it. For on

January 1832, he wrote to Frederick Wieck: "Chopin's first work (I

believe firmly that it is his tenth) is in my hands: a lady would

say that it was very pretty, very piquant, almost Moschelesque. But

I believe you will make Clara [Wieck's daughter, afterwards Mdme.

Schumann] study it; for there is plenty of Geist in it and few

difficulties. But I humbly venture to assert that there are between this

composition and Op. 2 two years and twenty works"]

All this, however, is changed in another composition, the Rondeau a

la Mazur, Op. 5, dedicated to the Comtesse Alexandrine de Moriolles (a

daughter of the Comte de Moriolles mentioned in Chapter II), which, like

the Rondo, Op. 1, was first published in Warsaw, and made its appearance

in Germany some years later. I do not know the exact time of its

composition, but I presume it was a year or two after that of the

previously mentioned works. Schumann, who reviewed it in 1836, thought

it had perhaps been written in the eighteenth year of the composer, but

he found in it, some confused passages excepted, no indications of the

author's youth. In this Rondeau a la Mazur the individuality of Chopin

and with it his nationality begin to reveal themselves unmistakably. Who

could fail to recognise him in the peculiar sweet and persuasive flows

of sound, and the serpent-like winding of the melodic outline, the

wide-spread chords, the chromatic progressions, the dissolving of the

harmonies and the linking of their constituent parts! And, as I have

said elsewhere in speaking of this work: "The harmonies are often novel,

and the matter is more homogeneous and better welded into oneness."

Chopin's pianoforte lessons, as has already been stated, came to an end

when he was twelve years old, and thenceforth he was left to his own

resources.

The school of that time [remarks Fontana] could no longer

suffice him, he aimed higher, and felt himself impelled

towards an ideal which, at first vague, before long grew into

greater distinctness. It was then that, in trying his

strength, he acquired that touch and style, so different from

those of his predecessors, and that he succeeded in creating

at last that execution which since then has been the

admiration of the artistic world.

The first stages of the development of his peculiar style may be traced

in the compositions we have just now discussed. In the variations and

first Rondo which Chopin wrote at or before the age of fifteen, the

treatment of the instrument not only proves that he was already as much

in his element on the pianoforte as a fish in the water, but also shows

that an as yet vaguely-perceived ideal began to beckon him onward.

Karasowski, informed by witnesses of the boy's studies in pianoforte

playing, relates that Frederick, being struck with the fine effect of

a chord in extended harmony, and unable, on account of the smallness of

his hands, to strike the notes simultaneously, set about thinking how

this physical obstacle could be overcome. The result of his cogitations

was the invention of a contrivance which he put between his fingers and

kept there even during the night, by this means endeavouring to increase

the extensibility and flexibility of his hands. Who, in reading of this

incident in Chopin's life, is not reminded of Schumann and his attempt

to strengthen his fingers, an attempt that ended so fatally for his

prospects as a virtuoso! And the question, an idle one I admit, suggests

itself: Had Chopin been less fortunate than he was, and lost, like

Schumann, the command of one of his hands before he had formed his

pianoforte style, would he, as a composer, have risen to a higher

position than we know him to have attained, or would he have achieved

less than he actually did? From the place and wording of Karasowski's

account it would appear that this experiment of Chopin's took place at

or near the age of ten. Of course it does not matter much whether we

know or do not know the year or day of the adoption of the practice,

what is really interesting is the fact itself. I may, however, remark

that Chopin's love of wide-spread chords and skips, if marked at all,

is not strongly marked in the Variations on the German air and the first

Rondo. Let the curious examine with regard to this matter the Tempo di

Valse of the former work, and bars 38-43 of the Piu lento of the latter.

In the Rondeau a la Mazur, the next work in chronological order, this

peculiarity begins to show itself distinctly, and it continues to grow

in the works that follow. It is not my intention to weary the reader

with microscopical criticism, but I thought the first manifestations of

Chopin's individuality ought not to be passed over in silence. As to his

style, it will be more fully discussed in a subsequent chapter, where

also the seeds from which it sprang will be pointed out.

CHAPTER IV.

FREDERICK WORKS TOO HARD.--PASSES PART OF HIS HOLIDAYS (1826)

IN REINERZ.--STAYS ALSO AT STRZYZEWO, AND PAYS A VISIT TO PRINCE

RADZIWILL.--HE TERMINATES HIS STUDIES AT THE LYCEUM (1827). ADOPTION

OF MUSIC AS HIS PROFESSION.--EXCURSIONS.--FOLK-MUSIC AND THE POLISH

PEASANTRY.--SOME MORE COMPOSITIONS.--PROJECTED TRAVELS FOR HIS

IMPROVEMENT.--HIS OUTWARD APPEARANCE AND STATE OF HEALTH.

THE art which had attracted the child took every day a stronger hold of

the youth. Frederick was not always in that sportive humour in which

we have seen him repeatedly. At times he would wander about silent and

solitary, wrapped in his musical meditations. He would sit up late, busy

with his beloved music, and often, after lying down, rise from his bed

in the middle of the night in order, to strike a few chords or try a

short phrase--to the horror of the servants, whose first thought was of

ghosts, the second that their dear young master was not quite right in

his mind. Indeed, what with his school-work and his musical studies,

our young friend exerted himself more than was good for him. When,

therefore, in the holidays of 1826 his youngest sister, Emilia, was

ordered by the physicians to go to Reinerz, a watering-place in

Prussian Silesia, the parents thought it advisable that the too diligent

Frederick should accompany her, and drink whey for the benefit of his

health. The travelling party consisted of the mother, two sisters,

and himself. A letter which he wrote on August 28, 1826, to his friend

William Kolberg, furnishes some information about his doings there. It

contains, as letters from watering-places usually do, criticisms of the

society and accounts of promenadings, excursions, regular meals, and

early hours in going to bed and in rising. As the greater part of the

contents can be of no interest to us, I shall confine myself to picking

up what seems to me worth preserving. He had been drinking whey and the

waters for a fortnight and found he was getting somewhat stouter and at

the same time lazy. People said he began to look better. He enjoyed

the sight of the valleys from the hills which surround Reinerz, but

the climbing fatigued him, and he had sometimes to drag himself down

on all-fours. One mountain, the rocky Heuscheuer, he and other delicate

persons were forbidden to ascend, as the doctor was afraid that the

sharp air at the top would do his patients harm. Of course, Frederick

tried to make fun of everything and everyone--for instance, of the

wretched wind-band, which consisted of about a dozen "caricatures,"

among whom a lean bassoon-player with a snuffy hook-nose was the most

notable. To the manners of the country, which in some respects seem to

have displeased him, he got gradually accustomed.

At first I was astonished that in Silesia the women work

generally more than the men, but as I am doing nothing myself

just now I have no difficulty in falling in with this

arrangement.

During his stay at Reinerz he gave also a concert on behalf of two

orphans who had come with their sick mother to this watering-place, and

at her death were left so poor as to be unable even to pay the funeral

expenses and to return home with the servant who took care of them.

From Reinerz Frederick went to Strzyzewo, the property of Madame

Wiesiolowska, his godmother, and sister of his godfather, Count

Frederick Skarbek. While he was spending here the rest of his holidays,

he took advantage of an invitation he had received from Prince Radziwill

(governor of the grand duchy of Posen, and, through his wife, a daughter

of Prince Ferdinand, related to the royal family of Prussia) to visit

him at his country-seat Antonin, which was not very far from Strzyzewo.

The Prince, who had many relations in Poland, and paid frequent visits

to that country, must on these occasions have heard of and met with the

musical prodigy that was the pet of the aristocracy. Moreover, it is

on record that he was present at the concert at Warsaw in 1825 at

which Frederick played. We have already considered and disposed of the

question whether the Prince, as has been averred by Liszt, paid for

young Chopin's education. As a dilettante Prince Radziwill occupied a

no less exalted position in art and science than as a citizen and

functionary in the body politic. To confine ourselves to music, he was

not only a good singer and violoncellist, but also a composer; and in

composition he did not confine himself to songs, duets, part-songs, and

the like, but undertook the ambitious and arduous task of writing music

to the first part of Goethe's Faust. By desire of the Court the Berlin

Singakademie used to bring this work to a hearing once every year, and

they gave a performance of it even as late as 1879. An enthusiastic

critic once pronounced it to be among modern works one of those that

evince most genius. The vox populi seems to have repealed this judgment,

or rather never to have taken cognisance of the case, for outside Berlin

the work has not often been heard. Dr. Langhans wrote to me after the

Berlin performance in 1879:--

I heard yesterday Radziwill's Faust for the first time, and,

I may add, with much satisfaction; for the old-fashioned

things to be found in it (for instance, the utilisation of

Mozart's C minor Quartet fugue as overture, the strictly

polyphonous treatment of the choruses, &c.) are abundantly

compensated for by numerous traits of genius, and by the

thorough knowledge and the earnest intention with which the

work is conceived and executed. He dares incredible things in

the way of combining speech and song. That this combination

is an inartistic one, on that point we are no doubt at one,

but what he has effected by this means is nevertheless in the

highest degree remarkable....

By-and-by Chopin will pay the Prince a longer visit, and then we shall

learn what he thought of Faust, and how he enjoyed himself at this

nobleman's house.

Chopin's studies at the Lyceum terminated in the year 1827. Through his

final examination, however, he did not pass so brilliantly as through

his previous ones; this time he carried off no prize. The cause of this

falling-off is not far to seek; indeed, has already been hinted at.

Frederick's inclination and his successes as a pianist and composer,

and the persuasions of Elsner and other musical friends, could not

but lessen and at last altogether dispel any doubts and misgivings the

parents may at first have harboured. And whilst in consequence of this

change of attitude they became less exacting with their son in the

matter of school-work, the latter, feeling the slackening of the reins,

would more and more follow his natural bent. The final examination was

to him, no doubt, a kind of manumission which freed him from the last

remnant of an oppressive bondage. Henceforth, then, Chopin could,

unhindered by disagreeable tasks or other obstacles, devote his whole

time and strength to the cultivation of his chosen art. First, however,

he spent now, as in the preceding year, some weeks with his friends

in Strzyzewo, and afterwards travelled to Danzig, where he visited

Superintendent von Linde, a brother of the rector of the Warsaw Lyceum.

Chopin was fond of listening to the singing and fiddling of the country

people; and everyone acquainted with the national music of Poland as

well as with the composer's works knows that he is indebted to it

for some of the most piquant rhythmic, melodic, and even harmonic

peculiarities of his style. These longer stays in the country would

offer him better opportunities for the enjoyment and study of this land

of music than the short excursions which he occasionally made with his

father into the neighbourhood of Warsaw. His wonder always was who

could have composed the quaint and beautiful strains of those mazurkas,

polonaises, and krakowiaks, and who had taught these simple men and

women to play and sing so truly in tune. The conditions then existing

in Poland were very favourable to the study of folk-lore of any kind.

Art-music had not yet corrupted folk-music; indeed, it could hardly be

said that civilisation had affected the lower strata of society at

all. Notwithstanding the emancipation of the peasants in 1807, and the

confirmation of this law in 1815--a law which seems to have remained

for a long time and in a great measure a dead letter--the writer of an

anonymous book, published at Boston in 1834, found that the freedom of

the wretched serfs in Russian Poland was much the same as that of their

cattle, they being brought up with as little of human cultivation; nay,

that the Polish peasant, poor in every part of the country, was of all

the living creatures he had met with in this world or seen described

in books, the most wretched. From another publication we learn that the

improvements in public instruction, however much it may have benefited

the upper classes, did not affect the lowest ones: the parish schools

were insufficient, and the village schools not numerous enough. But the

peasants, although steeped in superstition and ignorance, and too much

addicted to brandy-drinking with its consequences--quarrelsomeness and

revengefulness--had not altogether lost the happier features of their

original character--hospitality, patriotism, good-naturedness, and,

above all, cheerfulness and love of song and dance. It has been said

that a simple Slavonic peasant can be enticed by his national songs

from one end of the world to the other. The delight which the Slavonic

nations take in dancing seems to be equally great. No other nation,

it has been asserted, can compare with them in ardent devotion to

this amusement. Moreover, it is noteworthy that song and dance were in

Poland--as they were of course originally everywhere--intimately

united. Heine gives a pretty description of the character of the Polish

peasant:--

It cannot be denied [he writes] that the Polish peasant has

often more head and heart than the German peasant in some

districts. Not infrequently did I find in the meanest Pole

that original wit (not Gemuthswitz, humour) which on every

occasion bubbles forth with wonderful iridescence, and that

dreamy sentimental trait, that brilliant flashing of an

Ossianic feeling for nature whose sudden outbreaks on

passionate occasions are as involuntary as the rising of the

blood into the face.

The student of human nature and its reflex in art will not call these

remarks a digression; at least, not one deserving of censure.

We may suppose that Chopin, after his return to Warsaw and during the

following winter, and the spring and summer of 1828, continued his

studies with undiminished and, had this been possible, with redoubled

ardour. Some of his compositions that came into existence at this time

were published after his death by his friend Julius Fontana, who was a

daily visitor at his parents' house. We have a Polonaise (D minor) and a

Nocturne (E minor) of 1827, and another Polonaise (B flat) and the Rondo

for two pianos of 1828. The Sonata, Op. 4, and La ci darem la mano,

varie for pianoforte, with orchestral accompaniments, belong also to

this time. The Trio (Op. 8), although not finished till 1829, was begun

and considerably advanced in 1828. Several of the above compositions are

referred to in a letter written by him on September 9, 1828, to one

of his most intimate friends, Titus Woyciechowski. The Rondo in C had

originally a different form and was recast by him for two pianos at

Strzyzewo, where he passed the whole summer of 1828. He tried it

with Ernemann, a musician living in Warsaw, at the warehouse of the

pianoforte-manufacturer Buchholtz, and was pretty well pleased with his

work.

We intend to play it some day at the Ressource. As to my new

compositions, I have nothing to show except the as yet

unfinished Trio (G minor), which I began after your

departure. The first Allegro I have already tried with

accompaniment. It appears to me that this trio will have the

same fate as my sonata and the variations. Both works are now

in Vienna; the first I have, as a pupil of Elsner's,

dedicated to him, and on the second I have placed (perhaps

too boldly) your name. I followed in this the impulse of my

heart and you will not take it unkindly.

The opportunities which Warsaw offered being considered insufficient for

the completion of his artistic education, ways and means were discussed

as to how his wants could be best provided for. The upshot of the

discussions was the project of excursions to Berlin and Vienna. As,

however, this plan was not realised till the autumn of 1828, and

no noteworthy incidents or interesting particulars concerning the

intervening period of his life have become known, I shall utilise this

break in the narrative by trying my hand at a slight sketch of that

terra incognita, the history of music in Poland, more particularly the

history of the musical life in Warsaw, shortly before and in Chopin's

time. I am induced to undertake this task by the consideration that a

knowledge of the means of culture within the reach of Chopin during his

residence in the Polish capital is indispensable if we wish to form a

clear and complete idea of the artist's development, and that such

a knowledge will at the same time help us to understand better the

contents of some of the subsequent portions of this work. Before,

however, I begin a new chapter and with it the above-mentioned sketch, I

should like to advert to a few other matters.

The reader may perhaps already have asked the question--What was Chopin

like in his outward appearance? As I have seen a daguerreotype from a

picture painted when he was seventeen, I can give some sort of answer to

this question. Chopin's face was clearly and finely cut, especially

the nose with its wide nostrils; the forehead was high, the eyebrows

delicate, the lips thin, and the lower one somewhat protruding. For

those who know A. Bovy's medallion I may add that the early portrait is

very like it; only, in the latter, the line formed by the lower jawbone

that runs from the chin towards the ear is more rounded, and the whole

has a more youthful appearance. As to the expression, it is not only

meditative but even melancholy. This last point leads me naturally to

another question. The delicate build of Chopin's body, his early death

preceded by many years of ill-health, and the character of his music,

have led people into the belief that from childhood he was always sickly

in body, and for the most part also melancholy in disposition. But as

the poverty and melancholy, so also disappears on closer investigation

the sickliness of the child and youth. To jump, however, from this to

the other extreme, and assert that he enjoyed vigorous health, would be

as great a mistake. Karasowski, in his eagerness to controvert Liszt,

although not going quite this length, nevertheless overshoots the mark.

Besides it is a misrepresentation of Liszt not to say that the passage

excerpted from his book, and condemned as not being in accordance with

the facts of the case, is a quotation from G. Sand's novel Lucrezia

Floriani (of which more will be said by-and-by), in which the authoress

is supposed, although this was denied by her, to have portrayed Chopin.

Liszt is a poet, not a chronicler; he must be read as such, and not

be taken au pied de la lettre. However, even Karasowski, in whom one

notices a perhaps unconscious anxiety to keep out of sight anything

which might throw doubt on the health and strength of his hero, is

obliged to admit that Chopin was "delicate," although he hastens to

add, "but nevertheless healthy and pretty strong." It seems to me

that Karasowski makes too much of the statement of a friend of

Chopin's--namely, that the latter was, up to manhood, only once ill, and

then with nothing worse than a cold. Indeed, in Karasowski's narrative

there are not wanting indications that the health of Chopin cannot have

been very vigorous; nor his strength have amounted to much; for in one

place we read that the youth was no friend of long excursions on foot,

and preferred to lie down and dream under beautiful trees; in another

place, that his parents sent him to Reinerz and some years afterwards

to Vienna, because they thought his studies had affected his health,

and that rest and change of air and scene would restore his strength.

Further, we are told that his mother and sisters never tired of

recommending him to wrap up carefully in cold and wet weather, and

that, like a good son and brother, he followed their advice. Lastly,

he objected to smoking. Some of the items of this evidence are very

trivial, but taken collectively they have considerable force. Of greater

significance are the following additional items. Chopin's sister Emilia

was carried off at the age of fourteen by pulmonary disease, and his

father, as a physician informed me, died of a heart and chest complaint.

Stephen Heller, who saw Chopin in 1830 in Warsaw, told me that the

latter was then in delicate health, thin and with sunken cheeks, and

that the people of Warsaw said that he could not live long, but would,

like so many geniuses, die young. The real state of the matter seems

to me to have been this. Although Chopin in his youth was at no time

troubled with any serious illness, he enjoyed but fragile health, and if

his frame did not alreadv contain the seeds of the disease to which he

later fell a prey, it was a favourable soil for their reception.

How easily was an organisation so delicately framed over-excited and

disarranged! Indeed, being vivacious, active, and hard-working, as he

was, he lived on his capital. The fire of youth overcame much, not,

however, without a dangerous waste of strength, the lamentable results

of which we shall see before we have gone much farther. This statement

of the case we find, I think, confirmed by Chopin's correspondence--the

letter written at Reinerz is in this respect noteworthy.

CHAPTER V.

MUSIC AND MUSICIANS IN POLAND BEFORE AND IN CHOPIN'S TIME.

THE golden age of Polish music, which coincides with that of Polish

literature, is the sixteenth century, the century of the Sigismonds. The

most remarkable musician of that time, and probably the greatest that

Poland produced previous to the present century, was Nicolas Gomolka,

who studied music in Italy, perhaps under Palestrina, in whose style

he wrote. Born in or about the beginning of the second half of the

sixteenth century, he died on March 5, 1609. During the reigns of the

kings of the house of Saxony (1697-1763) instrumental music is said

to have made much progress. Be this as it may, there was no lack of

opportunities to study good examples. Augustus the Strong (I. of

Saxony and II of Poland) established a special Polish band, called,

in contradistinction to the Grosse Kammermusik (Great Chamber-band) in

Dresden, Kleine Kammermusik (Little Chamber-band), whose business it was

to be in attendance when his majesty went to Poland. These visits took

place usually once a year, and lasted from, August to December, but

sometimes were more frequent, and shorter or longer, just as occasion

might call for. Among the members of the Polish band--which consisted

of a leader (Premier), four violins, one oboe, two French horns, three

bassoons, and one double bass--we meet with such well-known men as

Johann Joachim Quanz and Franz Benda. Their conductor was Alberto

Ristori, who at the same time held the post of composer to the Italian

actors, a company that, besides plays, performed also little operas,

serenades, intermezzi, &c. The usual retinue of the King on his visits

to Poland included also a part of the French ballet and comedy. These

travels of the artistic forces must have been rich in tragic, comic, and

tragi-comic incidents, and would furnish splendid material for the pen

of a novelist. But such a journey from the Saxon capital to Warsaw,

which took about eight days, and cost on an average from 3,000 to

3,500 thalers (450 to 525 pounds), was a mere nothing compared with the

migration of a Parisian operatic company in May, 1700. The ninety-three

members of which it was composed set out in carriages and drove by

Strasburg to Ulm, there they embarked and sailed to Cracow, whence the

journey was continued on rafts. [FOOTNOTE: M. Furstenau, Zur Geschichte

der Music und des Theaters am Hofe zu Dresden.] So much for artistic

tours at the beginning of the eighteenth century. Frederick Augustus (II

of Saxony and III of Poland, 1733-1763) dissolved the Polish band, and

organised a similar body which was destined solely for Poland, and was

to be resident there. It consisted in 1753 of an organist, two singers,

twenty instrumentalists (almost all Germans), and a band-servant, their

salary amounting to 5,383 thalers, 10 groschen (a little more than 805

pounds). Notwithstanding this new arrangement, the great Dresden band

sometimes accompanied the King to Poland, and when it did not, some of

its members at least had to be in attendance for the performance of the

solos at the chamber concerts and in the operas. Also such singers, male

and female, as were required for the operas proposed for representation

had to take to the road. Hasse and his wife Faustina came several times

to Poland. That the constellation of the Dresden musical establishment,

in its vocal as well as instrumental department, was one of the most

brilliant imaginable is sufficiently proved by a glance at the names

which we meet with in 1719: Lotti, Heinichen, Veracini, Volumier,

Senesino, Tesi, Santa Stella Lotti, Durastanti, &c. Rousseau, writing in

1754, calls the Dresden orchestra the first in Europe. And Burney says

in 1772 that the instrumental performers had been some time previously

of the first class. No wonder, then, if the visits of such artists

improved the instrumental music of Poland.

From Sowinski's Les Musiciens Polonais we learn that on great occasions

the King's band was reinforced by those of Prince Czartoryski and Count

Wielhorski, thus forming a body of 100 executants. This shows that

outside the King's band good musicians were to be found in Poland.

Indeed, to keep in their service private bands of native and foreign

singers and players was an ancient custom among the Polish magnates; it

obtained for a long time, and had not yet died out at the beginning of

this century. From this circumstance, however, we must not too rashly

conclude that these wealthy noblemen were all animated by artistic

enthusiasm. Ostentatiousness had, I am afraid, more to do with it than

love of art for art's sake. Music was simply one of the indispensable

departments of their establishments, in the splendour and vastness of

which they tried to outdo each other and vie with sovereign rulers. The

promiscuous enumeration of musicians, cooks, footmen, &c., in the lady's

description of a nobleman's court which I referred to in the proem,

is in this respect very characteristic. Towards the middle of the last

century Prince Sanguszko, who lived at Dubno, in Volhynia, had in his

service no less than two bands, to which was sometimes joined a third

belonging to Prince Lubomirski. But, it will be asked, what music did

they play? An author of Memoirs of the reign of Augustus III tells us

that, according to the Polish fashion, they had during meal-times

to play national airs, polonaises, mazurkas, &c., arranged for

wind-instruments, with or without violins. For special occasions the

Prince got a new kind of music, then much in favour--viz., a band of

mountaineers playing on flutes and drums. And while the guests were

sitting at the banquet, horns, trumpets, and fifes sounded fanfares.

Besides the ordinary and extraordinary bands, this exalted personage

had among his musical retainers a drummer who performed solos on his

instrument. One is glad to learn that when the Prince was alone or had

little company, he took delight in listening to trios for two violins

and bass, it being then the fashion to play such ensemble pieces. Count

Ilinski, the father of the composer John Stanislas Ilinski, engaged for

his private theatre two companies, one from Germany and one from Italy.

The persons employed in the musical department of his household numbered

124. The principal band, conducted by Dobrzyrnski pere, a good violinist

and conductor, consisted of four violins, one viola, one violoncello,

one double bass, one flute, one oboe, one clarinet, and one bassoon.

Villagers were trained by these players to assist them. Then there

was yet another band, one of wind instruments, under the direction of

Karelli, a pupil of the Russian composer Bartnianski [Footnote: The

Russian Palestrina, whose name is oftener met with in the forms of

Bortnianski and Bortniansky]. The chorus was composed of twenty four

voices, picked from the young people on Count Ilinski's estates. However

questionable the taste of many of these noble art patrons may have been,

there were not wanting some who cultivated music with a purer spirit.

Some of the best bands were those of the Princes D. Radziwill, Adam

Czartoryski, F. Sulkowski, Michael Lubomirski, Counts Ilinski, Oginski,

and Wielhorski. Our inquiry into the cultivation of music at the courts

of the Polish magnates has carried us beyond the point we had reached in

our historical survey. Let us now retrace our steps.

The progress of music above spoken of was arrested by the anarchy and

the civil and other wars that began to rage in Poland with such fury in

the middle of the last century. King Stanislas Poniatowski (1764-1795)

is credited with having exercised great influence on the music of

Poland; at any rate, he patronised the arts and sciences right royally.

The Italian opera at Warsaw cannot have been of mean standing, seeing

that artists such as the composers Paisiello and Cimarosa, and the great

violinist, composer, and conductor Pugnani, with his pupil Viotti (the

latter playing second violin in the orchestra), were members of the

company. And the King's band of foreign and native players has been

called one of the best in Europe. Still, all this was but the hothouse

bloom of exotics. To bring about a natural harvest of home produce

something else was wanted than royal patronage, and this something

sprang from the series of disasters that befell the nation in the latter

half of the last century, and by shaking it to its very heart's core

stirred up its nobler self. As in literature, so in music, the national

element came now more and more into action and prominence.

Up to 1778 there had been heard in Poland only Italian and French

operas; in this year, for the first time, a Polish opera was put on

the stage. It is true the beginning was very modest. The early attempts

contained few ensemble pieces, no choruses, and no complex finales. But

a new art does not rise from the mind of a nation as Minerva is said to

have risen from the head of Jupiter. Nay, even the fact that the first

three composers of Polish operas (Kamienski, Weynert, and Kajetani) were

not Poles, but foreigners endeavouring to write in the Polish style,

does not destroy the significance of the movement. The following

statistics will, no doubt, take the reader by surprise:--From the

foundation of the national Polish opera in 1778 till April 20, 1859,

5,917 performances of 285 different operas with Polish words took place

in Poland. Of these 92 were national Polish operas, the remaining 193 by

Italian, French, and German composers; 1,075 representations being given

of the former, 4,842 of the latter. The libretti of 41 of the 92 Polish

operas were originals, the other 51 were translations. And, lastly, the

majority of the 16 musicians who composed the 92 Polish operas were not

native Poles, but Czechs, Hungarians, and Germans [FOOTNOTE: Ladislas

von Trocki, Die Entwickelung der Oper in Polen. (Leipzig, 1867.)]

A step hardly less important than the foundation of a national opera was

the formation, in 1805, of a Musical Society, which had for its object

the improvement as well as the amusement of its members. The idea, which

originated in the head of one of the Prussian officials then in Warsaw,

finding approval, and the pecuniary supplies flowing in abundantly, the

Oginski Palace was rented and fitted up, two masters were engaged for

the teaching of solo and choral singing, and a number of successful

concerts were given. The chief promoters seem to have been Count

Krasinski and the two Prussian officials Mosqua and E. Th. A. Hoffmann.

In the last named the reader will recognise the famous author of

fantastic tales and of no less fantastic musical criticisms, the

conductor and composer of operas and other works, &c. According to his

biographer, J. E. Hitzig, Hoffmann did not take much interest in the

proceedings of the Musical Ressource (that was the name of the society)

till it bought the Mniszech Palace, a large building, which, having been

damaged by fire, had to undergo extensive repairs. Then, indeed, he

set to work with a will, planned the arrangement and fitting-up of the

rooms, designed and partly painted the decorations--not without freely

indulging his disposition for caricature--and when all was ready, on

August 3, 1806 (the King of Prussia's birthday), conducted the first

concert in the splendid new hall. The activity of the society was great,

and must have been beneficial; for we read that they had every Sunday

performances of quartets and other kinds of chamber music, that ladies

frequently came forward with pianoforte sonatas, and that when the

celebrated violinist Moser, of Berlin, visited Warsaw, he made them

acquainted with the finest quartets of Mozart and Haydn. Still, I should

not have dwelt so long on the doings of the Musical Ressource were it

not that it was the germ of, or at least gave the impulse to, even more

influential associations and institutions that were subsequently founded

with a view to the wider diffusion and better cultivation of the musical

art in Poland. After the battle of Jena the French were not long in

making their appearance in Warsaw, whereby an end was put to Prussia's

rule there, and her officials were sent about, or rather sent out of,

their business. Thus the Musical Ressource lost many of its members,

Hoffmann and Mosqua among others. Still, it survived, and was

reconstructed with more national elements. In Frederick Augustus of

Saxony's reign it is said to have been transformed into a school of

singing.

The year 1815 brought into existence two musical institutions that

deserve to be noticed--society for the cultivation of church music,

which met at the College of the Pianists, and had at its head Count

Zabiello as president and Elsner as conductor; and an association,

organised by the last-named musician, and presided over by the Princess

Sophia Zamoyska, which aimed at the advancement of the musical art in

Poland, and provided for the education of music teachers for schools,

organists for churches, and singers for the stage. Although I try to

do my best with the unsatisfactory and often contradictory newspaper

reports and dictionary articles from which I have to draw my data, I

cannot vouch for the literal correctness of my notes. In making use of

Sowinski's work I am constantly reminded of Voltaire's definition of

dictionaries: "Immenses archives de mensonges et d'un peu de verite."

Happy he who need not consult them! In 1816 Elsner was entrusted by the

minister Staszyc with the direction of a school of dramatic singing and

recitation; and in 1821, to crown all previous efforts, a conservatorium

was opened, the programme of which might almost have satisfied a

Berlioz. The department of instrumental music not only comprised

sections for the usual keyed, stringed, and wind instruments, but also

one for instruments of percussion. Solo and choral singing were to be

taught with special regard to dramatic expression. Besides these and the

theoretical branches of music, the curriculum included dancing, Polish

literature, French, and Italian. After reading the programme it is

superfluous to be informed that the institution was chiefly intended for

the training of dramatic artists. Elsner, who was appointed director,

selected the teaching staff, with one exception, however, that of the

first singing-master, for which post the Government engaged the composer

Carlo Evasio Soliva, a pupil of Asioli and Frederici.

The musical taste and culture prevailing in Poland about 1819 is pretty

accurately described by a German resident at Cracow. So far as music was

concerned Poland had hitherto been ignored by the rest of Europe, and

indeed could lay no claim to universal notice in this respect. But the

improved culture and greater insight which some had acquired in foreign

lands were good seeds that began to bear fruit. As yet, however, the

greater part of the public took little or no interest in the better

class of music, and was easily pleased and satisfied with polonaises,

mazurkas, and other trivial things. In fact, the music in Cracow,

notwithstanding the many professional musicians and amateurs living

there, was decidedly bad, and not comparable to the music in many a

small German town. In Warsaw, where the resources were more plentiful,

the state of music was of course also more prosperous. Still, as late

as 1815 we meet with the complaint that what was chiefly aimed at in

concerts was the display of virtuosity, and that grand, serious works

were neglected, and complete symphonies rarely performed. To remedy this

evil, therefore, 150 amateurs combined and organised in 1818 a concert

institution. Their concerts took place once a week, and at every meeting

a new and entire symphony, an overture, a concerto, an aria, and

a finale, were performed. The names of Beethoven, Haydn, Mozart,

Cherubini, Spohr, Mehul, Romberg, &c., were to be found on their

programmes. Strange to say, there were no less than seven conductors:

Lessel, Lentz, Wurfel, Haase, Javurek, Stolpe, and Peschke, all good

musicians. The orchestra consisted in part of amateurs, who were

most numerous among the violins, tenors, and violoncellos. The solo

department seems to have been well stocked. To confine ourselves to one

instrument, they could pride themselves on having four excellent

lady pianists, one of whom distinguished herself particularly by

the wonderful dexterity with which she played the most difficult

compositions of Beethoven, Field, Ries, and Dussek. Another good sign

of the improving taste was a series of twenty-four matinees given

on Sundays from twelve to two during the winter of 1818-1819 by Carl

Arnold, and much patronised by the highest nobility. The concert-giver,

a clever pianist and composer, who enjoyed in his day a good reputation

in Germany, Russia, and Poland, produced at every matinee a new

pianoforte concerto by one of the best composers--sometimes one of

his own--and was assisted by the quartet party of Bielawski, a good

violinist, leader in the orchestra, and professor at the Conservatorium.

Although Arnold's stay was not of long duration, his departure did not

leave the town without good pianists. Indeed, it is a mistake to suppose

that Warsaw was badly off with regard to musicians. This will be evident

to the reader as soon as I have named some of those living there in

the time of Chopin. Wenzel W. Wurfel, one of the professors at the

Conservatorium, who stayed in Warsaw from 1815 to 1824, and afterwards

went to Vienna, where he became conductor at the Karnthnerthor Theater,

was an esteemed pianist and composer, and frequently gave concerts, at

one of which he played Field's Concerto in C.

[FOOTNOTE: Wenzel Wilhelm Wurfel, in most dictionaries called Wilhelm

Wurfel (exceptions are: E. Bernsdorf's "Neues Universal-Lexikon

der Tonkunst", and Dr. Hugo Riemann's "Opern-Handbuch"). A Warsaw

correspondent of a German musical paper called him Waclaw Wurfel. In

Whistling's "Handbuch der musikalischen Literatur" his Christian names

are only indicated by initials--W. W.]

If we scan the list of professors at the Conservatorium we find other

musicians whose reputation was not confined to the narrow limits of

Warsaw or even Poland. There was, for instance, the pianist and

composer Franz Lessel, the favourite pupil of Haydn; and, further, that

interesting character Heinrich Gerhard Lentz, who, born and educated at

Cologne, went in 1784 to Paris, played with success his first concerto

at the Concert Spirituel, published some of his compositions and taught

in the best families, arrived in London in 1791, lived in friendly

intercourse with Clementi and Haydn, and had compositions of his

performed at Solomon's concerts, returned to Germany in 1795, stayed

with Prince Louis Ferdinand of Prussia till Dussek supplanted him, and

so, wandering about, reached Warsaw, where he gave lessons, founded

a pianoforte manufactory, became professor of the organ at the

Conservatorium, married twice, and died in 1839. The only other

professor at the Conservatorium about whom I shall say a few words is C.

E. Soliva, whose name and masters I have already mentioned. Of his works

the opera "La testa di bronzo" is the best known. I should have said

"was," for nobody now knows anything of his. That loud, shallow talker

Count Stendhal, or, to give him his real name, Marie Henry Beyle, heard

it at Milan in 1816, when it was first produced. He had at first some

difficulty in deciding whether Soliva showed himself in that opera a

plagiarist of Mozart or a genius. Finally he came to the conclusion

that--

there is in it a warmth, a dramatic life, and a strength in

all its effects, which are decidedly not in the style of

Mozart. But Soliva, who is a young man and full of the

warmest admiration for Mozart, has imbibed certain tints of

his colouring.

The rest is too outrageously ridiculous to be quoted. Whatever Beyle's

purely literary merits and his achievements in fiction may be, I quite

agree with Berlioz, who remarks, a propos of this gentleman's Vie de

Rossini, that he writes "les plus irritantes stupidites sur la musique,

dont il croyait avoir le secret." To which cutting dictum may be added

a no less cutting one of M. Lavoix fils, who, although calling Beyle

an "ecrivain d'esprit," applies to him the appellation of "fanfaron

d'ignorance en musique." I would go a step farther than either of these

writers. Beyle is an ignorant braggart, not only in music, but in art

generally, and such esprit as his art criticisms exhibit would be even

more common than it unfortunately now is, if he were oftener equalled

in conceit and arrogance. The pillorying of a humbug is so laudable an

object that the reader will excuse the digression, which, moreover, may

show what miserable instruments a poor biographer has sometimes to

make use of. Another informant, unknown to fame, but apparently more

trustworthy, furnishes us with an account of Soliva in Warsaw. The

writer in question disapproves of the Italian master's drill-method in

teaching singing, and says that as a composer his power of invention

was inferior to his power of construction; and, further, that he was

acquainted with the scores of the best musicians of all times, and an

expert in accompanying on the pianoforte. As Elsner, Zywny, and the

pianist and composer Javurek have already been introduced to the reader,

I shall advert only to one other of the older Warsaw musicians--namely,

Charles Kurpinski, the most talented and influential native composer

then living in Poland. To him and Elsner is chiefly due the progress

which Polish music made in the first thirty years of this century.

Kurpinski came to Warsaw in 1810, was appointed second conductor at

the National Opera-house, afterwards rose to the position of first

conductor, was nominated maitre de chapelle de la cour de Varsovie, was

made a Knight of the St. Stanislas Order, &c. He is said to have learnt

composition by diligently studying Mozart's scores, and in 1811 began to

supply the theatre with dramatic works. Besides masses, symphonies,

&c., he composed twenty-four operas, and published also some theoretical

works and a sketch of the history of the Polish opera. Kurpinski was

by nature endowed with fine musical qualities, uniting sensibility and

energy with easy productivity. Chopin did homage to his distinguished

countryman in introducing into his Grande Fantaisie sur des airs

polonais, Op. 13, a theme of Kurpinski's. Two younger men, both born in

1800, must yet be mentioned to compete the picture. One of them, Moritz

Ernemann, a pupil of Mendelssohn's pianoforte-master, L. Berger,

played with success in Poland and Germany, and has been described by

contemporaries as a finished and expressive, but not brilliant, pianist.

His pleasing compositions are of an instructive and mildly-entertaining

character. The other of the two was Joseph Christoph Kessler, a musician

of very different mettle. After studying philosophy in Vienna, and

composing at the house of Count Potocki in Lemberg his celebrated

Etudes, Op. 20 (published at Vienna, reprinted at Paris, recommended

by Kalkbrenner in his Methode, quoted by Fetis and Moscheles in their

Methode des Methodes, and played in part by Liszt at his concerts),

he tried in 1829 his luck in Warsaw. Schumann thought (in 1835) that

Kessler had the stuff in him to do something great, and always looked

forward with expectation to what he would yet accomplish. Kessler's

studies might be dry, but he was assuredly a "Mann von Geist und sogar

poetischem Geist." He dedicated his twenty-four Preludes, Op. 31, to

Chopin, and Chopin his twenty-four Preludes, Op. 28, to him--that is to

say, the German edition.

By this time the reader must have found out that Warsaw was not such a

musical desert as he may at first have imagined. Perfect renderings

of great orchestral works, it is true, seem to have been as yet

unattainable, and the performances of operas failed likewise to satisfy

a pure and trained taste. Nay, in 1822 it was even said that the opera

was getting worse. But when the fruits of the Conservatorium had had

time to ripen and could be gathered in, things would assume a more

promising aspect. Church music, which like other things had much

deteriorated, received a share of the attention which in this century

was given to the art. The best singing was in the Piarist and University

churches. In the former the bulk of the performers consisted of

amateurs, who, however, were assisted by members of the opera. They sang

Haydn's masses best and oftenest. In the other church the executants

were students and professors, Elsner being the conductor. Besides these

choirs there existed a number of musical associations in connection with

different churches in Warsaw. Indeed, it cannot be doubted that great

progress was made in the first thirty years of this century, and had

it not been for the unfortunate insurrection of 1830, Poland would

have succeeded in producing a national art and taking up an honourable

position among the great musical powers of Europe, whereas now it can

boast only of individual artists of more or less skill and originality.

The musical events to which the death of the Emperor Alexander I.

gave occasion in 1826, show to some extent the musical capabilities

of Warsaw. On one day a Requiem by Kozlowski (a Polish composer, then

living in St. Petersburg; b. 1757, d. 1831), with interpolations of

pieces by other composers, was performed in the Cathedral by two hundred

singers and players under Soliva. On another day Mozart's Requiem,

with additional accompaniments by Kurpinski (piccolos, flutes, oboes,

clarinets, and horns to the Dies irae and Sanctus; harps to the Hostias

and Benedictus; and a military brass-band to the closing chorus!!!), was

given in the same place by two hundred and fifty executants under

the last-mentioned musician. And in the Lutheran church took place a

performance of Elsner's Requiem for male voices, violoncellos, bassoons,

horns, trumpets, trombones, and drums.

Having made the reader acquainted with the musical sphere in which

Chopin moved, I shall take up the thread of the narrative where I left

it, and the reader may follow without fear of being again detained by so

long an interruption.

CHAPTER VI

Fourteen days in Berlin (From September 14 to 28, 1828).--Return by

Posen (Prince Radziwill) and Zullichau (anecdotes) to Warsaw.--Chopin's

doings there in the following winter and spring.--his home-life,

companions, and preparations for a journey to Vienna.

Chopin, leaving his apprenticeship behind him, was now entering on that

period of his life which we may call his Wanderjahre (years of travel).

This change in his position and circumstances demands a simultaneous

change in the manner of the biographical treatment. Hitherto we have

been much occupied with the agencies that made and moulded the man,

henceforth we shall fix our main attention on his experiences, actions,

and utterances. The materials at our disposal become now more abundant

and more trustworthy. Foremost in importance among them, up to Chopin's

arrival in Paris, are the letters he wrote at that time, the publication

of which we owe to Karasowski. As they are, however, valuable only

as chronicles of the writer's doings and feelings, and not, like

Mendelssohn's and Berlioz's, also as literary productions, I shall,

whilst fully availing myself of the information they contain, confine my

quotations from them to the characteristic passages.

Chopin's long-projected and much-desired visit to Berlin came about in

this way. In 1828 Frederick William III of Prussia requested the Berlin

University to invite the most eminent natural philosophers to take part

in a congress to be held in that city under the presidency of Alexander

von Humboldt. Nicholas Chopin's friend Dr. Jarocki, the zoologist and

professor at the Warsaw University, who had studied and obtained his

degree at Berlin, was one of those who were honoured with an invitation.

The favourable opportunity which thus presented itself to the

young musician of visiting in good company one of the centres of

civilisation--for the professor intended to comply with the invitation,

and was willing to take his friend's son under his wing--was not allowed

to slip by, on the contrary, was seized eagerly. With what feelings,

with what an infinitude of youthful hopes and expectations, Chopin

looked forward to this journey may be gathered from some expressions in

a letter of his (September 9, 1828) addressed to Titus Woyciechowski,

where he describes himself as being at the time of writing "like a

madman," and accounts for his madness by the announcement: "For I am

going to-day to Berlin." To appear in public as a pianist or composer

was not one of the objects he had in view. His dearest wishes were to

make the acquaintance of the musical celebrities of Berlin, and to

hear some really good music. From a promised performance of Spontini's

Ferdinand Cortez he anticipated great things.

Professor Jarocki and Chopin left Warsaw on the 9th of September, 1828,

and after five days' posting arrived in Berlin, where they put up at

the Kronprinz. Among the conveniences of this hotel our friend had the

pleasant surprise of finding a good grand piano. He played on it every

day, and was rewarded for his pains not only by the pleasure it gave

him, but also by the admiration of the landlord. Through his travelling

companion's friend and teacher, M. H. K. Lichtenstein, professor of

zoology and director of the Zoological Museum, who was a member of

the Singakademie and on good terms with Zelter, the conductor of that

society, he hoped to be made acquainted with the most distinguished

musicians of the Prussian capital, and looked to Prince Radziwill for

an introduction to the musical autocrat Spontini, with whom Lichtenstein

was not on a friendly footing. In these hopes, however, Chopin was

disappointed, and had to content himself with looking at the stars from

afar. Speaking of a performance of the Singakademie at which he was

present, he says:--

Spontini, Zelter, and Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy were also

there; but I spoke to none of these gentlemen, as I did not

think it becoming to introduce myself.

It is not difficult to discover the circumstances that in this respect

caused matters to turn out so little in accordance with the young man's

wishes. Prince Radziwill was not in Berlin when Chopin arrived, and,

although he was expected, perhaps never came, or came too late to be

of any use. As to Lichtenstein, his time was too much taken up by his

duties as secretary to the congress. Had this not been so, the professor

could not only have brought the young artist in contact with many of

the musical celebrities in Berlin, but also have told him much about his

intimate friend Carl Maria von Weber, who had died little more than

two years before. Lichtenstein's connection with Weber was probably

the cause of his disagreement with Spontini, alluded to by Chopin.

The latter relates in an off-hand way that he was introduced to and

exchanged a few words with the editor of the Berliner Musikzeitung,

without mentioning that this was Marx. The great theorist had of course

then still to make his reputation.

One cannot help wondering at the absence from Chopin's Berlin letters

of the name of Ludwig Berger, who, no doubt, like Bernhard Klein,

Rungenhagen, the brothers Ganz, and many another composer and virtuoso

in Berlin, was included in the collective expression "distinguished

musicians." But one would have thought that the personality of the pupil

of Clementi, the companion of A. Klengel, the friend of Steibelt, Field,

and Crotch, and the teacher of Mendelssohn and Taubert, would have

particularly interested a young pianist. Berger's compositions cannot

have been unknown to Chopin, who, moreover, must have heard of him from

his Warsaw acquaintance Ernemann. However, be this as it may, our friend

was more fortunate as regards hearing good music, which certainly was a

more important business than interviewing celebrities, often, alas,

so refrigerating in its effect on enthusiastic natures. Before his

departure from Warsaw Chopin wrote:--"It is much to hear a really good

opera, were it only once; it enables one to form an idea of what a

perfect performance is like." Although the most famous singers were

on leave of absence, he greatly enjoyed the performances of Spontini's

"Ferdinand Cortez", Cimarosa's "Die heimliche Eke" ("Il Matrimonio

segreto"), Onslow's "Der Hausirer" ("Le colporteur"), and Winter's "Das

unterbrochene Opferfest." Still, they gave rise to some "buts," which

he thought would be wholly silenced only in Paris; nay, one of the two

singers he liked best, Fraulein von Schatzel (Signora Tibaldi was

the other), reminded him by her omissions of chromatic scales even of

Warsaw. What, however, affected him more than anything else was Handel's

"Ode on St. Cecilia's Day," which he heard at the Singakademie; it came

nearest, he said, to the ideal of sublime music which he harboured in

his soul. A propos of another musical event he writes:--

To-morrow the "Freischutz" will be performed; this is the

fulfilment of my most ardent wish. When I hear it I shall be

able to make a comparison between the singers here and our

own.

The "Freischutz" made its first appearance on the Warsaw stage in 1826,

and therefore was known to Chopin; whereas the other operas were either

unknown to him or were not considered decisive tests.

Music and things connected with music, such as music-shops and

pianoforte-manufactories, took up Chopin's attention almost exclusively.

He declines with thanks the offer of a ticket for the meetings of the

congress:--

I should gain little or nothing for my mind from these

discussions, because I am too little of a savant; and,

moreover, the professional gentlemen might perhaps look at

me, the layman, and think: "How comes Saul among the

prophets?"

Of the Royal Library, to which he went with Professor Jarocki, he has

no more to say than that "it is very large, but contains few musical

works"; and when he visits the Zoological Museum, he thinks all the time

what a bore it is, and how he would rather be at Schlesinger's, the best

music-shop in the town, and an enterprising publishing house. That

he neglects many things which educated men generally prize, he feels

himself, and expresses the fear that his father will reproach him with

one-sidedness. In his excuse he says:--

I have come to Berlin for my musical education, and the

library of Schlesinger, consisting of the most interesting

works of the composers of all countries and times, must

interest me more than any other collections.

The words, he adds, add nothing to the strength of his argument.

It is a comfort to think that I, too, shall yet come to

Schlesinger's, and that it is always good for a young man to

see much, as from everything something may be learnt.

According to Karasowski, who reports, no doubt faithfully, what he has

heard, Chopin was so well versed in all the branches of science, which

he cultivated at the Lyceum, that all who knew him were astonished at

his attainments, and prognosticated for him a brilliant future. I am

afraid the only authorities for this statement were the parents, the

sisters, and other equally indiscriminately-admiring connections, who

often discover genius where it is hidden from the cold, unfeeling world

outside this sympathetic circle. Not that I would blame an amiable

weakness without which love, friendship, in short, happiness were

well-nigh impossible. Only a biographer who wishes to represent a man as

he really was, and not as he appeared to be to one or more individuals,

has to be on his guard against it. Let us grant at once that Chopin made

a good figure at the Lyceum--indeed, a quick-witted boy who found

help and encouragement at home (the secret of almost all successful

education) could hardly do otherwise. But from this to a master of all

the arts, to an admirable Crichton, is a great step. Where there is

genius there is inclination. Now, however well Chopin acquitted himself

of his school-tasks--and even therein you will remember a falling-off

was noticeable when outward pressure ceased--science and kindred

subjects were subsequently treated by him with indifference. The

thorough training which he received in general knowledge entirely failed

to implant in him the dispositions of a scholar or thinker. His nature

was perhaps a soil unfavourable to such growths, and certainly already

preoccupied by a vegetation the luxuriance of which excluded, dwarfed,

or crushed everything else. The truth of these remarks is proved

by Chopin's letters and his friends' accounts of his tastes and

conversation. In connection with this I may quote a passage from a

letter which Chopin wrote immediately before starting on his Berlin

trip. Jedrzejewicz, a gentleman who by-and-by became Chopin's

brother-in-law, and was just then staying in Paris, made there the

acquaintance of the Polish musician Sowinski. The latter hearing thus of

his talented countryman in Warsaw, and being co-editor with Fetis of the

"Revue musicale" (so at least we read in the letter in question, but

it is more likely that Sowinski was simply a contributor to the paper),

applied to him for a description of the state of music in Poland, and

biographical notes on the most celebrated executants and composers. Now

let us see what Chopin says in reference to this request.

All these are things with which I have no intention to

meddle. I shall write to him from Berlin that this affair is

not in my line, and that, moreover, I cannot yet form a

judgment such as would be worthy of a Parisian journal, which

must contain only mature and competent opinions, &c.

How much of this is self-knowledge, modesty, or disinclination, I leave

the reader to decide, who, no doubt, will smile at the young man's

innocence in imagining that Parisian, or, indeed, any journals

distinguish themselves generally by maturity and competence of judgment.

At the time of the Berlin visit Chopin was a lively, well-educated, and

well-mannered youth, who walked through life pleased and amused with

its motley garb, but as yet unconscious of the deeper truths, and the

immensities of joy and sadness, of love and hate, that lie beneath.

Although the extreme youthfulness, nay boyishness, of the letters

written by him at that time, and for some time after, makes him appear

younger than he really was, the criticisms and witticisms on what is

going on around which they contain, show incontestably that he had

more than the usual share of clear and quick-sightedness. His power of

observation, however, was directed rather to dress, manners, and the

peculiarities and eccentricities of outward appearance generally, than

to the essentials which are not always indicated and are often hidden

by them. As to his wit, it had a decided tendency towards satire and

caricature. He notices the pleasing orderliness and cleanliness of the

otherwise not well-favoured surroundings of Berlin as he approaches,

considers the city itself too much extended for the number of its

inhabitants, of whom it could hold twice as many, is favourably

impressed by the fine large palace, the spacious well-built streets,

the picturesque bridges, and congratulates himself that he and his

fellow-traveller did not take lodgings in the broad but rather too

quiet Franzosische Strasse. Yes, our friend is fond of life and society.

Whether he thought man the proper study of mankind or not, as Pope

held, he certainly found it the most attractive. The passengers in the

stage-coach were to him so many personages of a comedy. There was an

advocate who tried to shine with his dull jokes, an agriculturist to

whom travelling had given a certain varnish of civilisation, and a

German Sappho who poured forth a stream of pretentious and at the same

time ludicrous complaints. The play unwittingly performed by these

unpaid actors was enjoyed by our friend with all the zest the feeling

of superiority can give. What a tragi-comical arrangement it is that

in this world of ours everybody is laughing at everybody else! The

scientists of the congress afforded Chopin an almost unlimited scope for

the exercise of his wit. Among them he found so many curious and various

specimens that he was induced not only to draw but also to classify

them. Having already previously sent home some sketches, he concludes

one of his letters with the words "the number of caricatures is

increasing." Indeed, there seems to have been only one among these

learned gentlemen who impressed him with a feeling of respect and

admiration--namely, Alexander von Humboldt. As Chopin's remarks on him

are the best part of his three Berlin letters, I shall quote them in

full. On seeing Von Humboldt at Lichtenstein's he writes:--

He is not above middle height, and his countenance cannot be

called beautiful; but the somewhat protruding, broad, and

well-moulded forehead, and the deep inquiring eye, announce

the all-embracing mind which animates this humane as well as

much-travelled savant. Humboldt spoke French, and as well as

his mother-tongue.

One of the chief events of Chopin's visit to Berlin was, according to

his own account, his second dinner with the natural philosophers, which

took place the day before the close of the congress, and was very lively

and entertaining:--

Many appropriate songs were sung in which every one joined with more

or less energy. Zelter conducted; he had standing before him on a red

pedestal as a sign of his exalted musical dignity a large gilt goblet,

which seemed to give him much pleasure. On this day the food was much

better than usual. People say the natural philosophers had at their

meetings been specially occupied with the amelioration of roasts,

sauces, soups, and the like.

"The Berliners are such an impertinent race," says Goethe, "that to keep

one's self above water one must have Haare auf den Zahnen, and at times

be rude." Such a judgment prepares one for much, but not for what Chopin

dares to say:--

Marylski [one of his Warsaw friends] has not the faintest

shadow of taste if he asserts that the ladies of Berlin dress

prettily. They deck themselves out, it is true; but it is a

pity for the fine stuffs which are cut up for such puppets!

What blasphemy!

After a fortnight's stay in the Prussian capital Professor Jarocki and

Chopin turned homeward on September 28, 1828. They did not, however,

go straight to Warsaw, but broke their journey at Posen, where they

remained two days "in gratiam of an invitation from Archbishop Wolicki."

A great part of the time he was at Posen he spent at the house of Prince

Radziwill, improvising and playing sonatas of Mozart, Beethoven, and

Hummel, either alone or with Capellmeister Klingohr. On October 6 the

travellers arrived in Warsaw, which Chopin was so impatient to reach

that the professor was prevailed upon to take post-horses from Lowicz.

Before I have done with this trip to Berlin I must relate an incident

which occurred at a stage between Frankfort on the Oder and Posen.

On arriving at Zullichau our travellers were informed by the postmaster

that they would have to wait an hour for horses. This announcement

opened up an anything but pleasing prospect. The professor and

his companion did the best that could be done in these distressing

circumstances--namely, took a stroll through the small town, although

the latter had no amenities to boast of, and the fact of a battle having

been fought there between the Russians and Prussians in 1759 would

hardly fire their enthusiasm. Matters, however, became desperate when

on their return there was still neither sign nor sound of horses. Dr.

Jarocki comforted himself with meat and drink, but Chopin began to look

uneasily about him for something to while away the weariness of waiting.

His search was not in vain, for in an adjoining room he discovered an

old piano of unpromising appearance, which, on being opened and tried,

not only turned out to be better than it looked, but even in tune. Of

course our artist did not bethink himself long, but sat down at once,

and launched out into an improvisation on a Polish air. One of his

fellow-passengers, a German, and an inveterate smoker, attracted by the

music, stepped in, and was soon so wrapped up in it that he forgot even

his pipe. The other passengers, the postmaster, his buxom wife, and

their pretty daughters, came dropping in, one after the other. But when

this peaceful conventicle had for some time been listening silently,

devoutly, and admiringly, lo, they were startled by a stentorian voice

bawling into the room the words:--"Gentlemen, the horses are put in."

The postmaster, who was indignant at this untimely interruption, begged

the musician to continue. But Chopin said that they had already

waited too long, it was time to depart. Upon this there was a general

commotion; the mistress of the house solicited and cajoled, the young

ladies bashfully entreated with their eyes, and all pressed around the

artist and supported the request, the postmaster even offering extra

horses if Chopin would go on with his playing. Who could resist? Chopin

sat down again, and resumed his fantasia. When he had ended, a servant

brought in wine, the postmaster proposed as a toast "the favourite of

Polyhymnia," and one of the audience, an old musician, gave voice to his

feelings by telling the hero that, "if Mozart had heard you, he would

have shaken hands with you and exclaimed 'Bravo!' An insignificant

man like me dare not do that." After Chopin had played a mazurka as a

wind-up, the tall postmaster took him in his arms, carried him to the

coach--the pockets of which the ladies had already filled with wine and

eatables--and, bidding him farewell, said that as long as he lived he

would think with enthusiasm of Frederick Chopin.

We can have no difficulty in believing the statement that in after-life

our artist recalled with pleasure this incident at the post-house of

Zullichau, and that his success among these unsophisticated people was

dearer to him than many a more brilliant one in the great world of art

and fashion. But, it may be asked, did all this happen in exactly the

same way in which it is told here? Gentle reader, let us not inquire too

curiously into this matter. Of course you have heard of myth-making and

legend-making. Well, anecdote-making is a process of a similar nature, a

process of accumulation and development. The only difference between the

process in the first two cases and that in the third is, that the former

is carried on by races, the latter by individuals. A seed-corn of fact

falls on the generous soil of the poetic imagination, and forthwith it

begins to expand, to sprout, and to grow into flower, shrub, or tree.

But there are well and ill-shapen plants, and monstrosities too. The

above anecdote is a specimen of the first kind. As a specimen of the

last kind may be instanced an undated anecdote told by Sikorski and

others. It is likewise illustrative of Chopin's power and love of

improvisation. The seed-corn of fact in the case seems to be that

one Sunday, when playing during divine service in the Wizytek Church,

Chopin, taking for his subjects some motives of the part of the Mass

that had just been performed, got so absorbed in his improvisation that

he entirely forgot all his surroundings, and turned a deaf ear to the

priest at the altar, who had already for the second time chanted 'Per

omnia saecula saeculurum.' This is a characteristic as well as a pretty

artist-story, which, however, is marred, I think, by the additions of a

choir that gathers round the organist and without exception forgets like

him time and place, and of a mother superior who sends the sacristan to

remind those music-enthusiasts in the organ-gallery of the impatiently

waiting priest and acolyte, &c. Men willingly allow themselves to

be deceived, but care has to be taken that their credulity be not

overtaxed. For if the intention is perceived, it fails in its object; as

the German poet says:--"So fuehrt man Absicht und man ist verstimmt."

On the 6th of October, as has already been said, Chopin returned to

Warsaw. Judging from a letter written by him at the end of the year

(December 27, 1828) to his friend Titus Woyciechowski, he was busy

composing and going to parties. The "Rondeau a la Krakowiak," Op. 14,

was now finished, and the Trio, Op. 8, was nearly so. A day on which he

had not been musically productive seems to have been regarded by him as

a lost day. The opening phrase of the following quotation reminds one of

the famous exclamation of the Emperor Titus:--

During the last week I have composed nothing worthy either of

God or of man. I run from Ananias to Caiaphas; to-night I

shall be at Madame Wizegerod's, from there I shall drive to a

musical soiree at Miss Kicka's. You know how pleasant it is

to be forced to improvise when one is tired! I have not often

such happy thoughts as come sometimes under my fingers when I

am with you. And then the miserable instruments!

In the same letter he relates that his parents are preparing a small

room for him:--

A staircase leads from the entrance directly into it; there I

shall have an old writing-desk, and this nook will be my

retreat.

This remark calls up a passage in a letter written two years later from

Vienna to his friend John Matuszynski:--

When your former colleagues, for instance, Rostkowski,

Schuch, Freyer, Kyjewski, Hube, &c., are holding merry

converse in my room, then think that I am laughing and

enjoying myself with you.

A charming little genre picture of Chopin's home-life is to be found in

one of his letters from Vienna (December 1, 1830) Having received news

from Warsaw, he writes:--

The joy was general, for Titus also had letters from home. I

thank Celinski lor the enclosed note; it brought vividly back

to me the time when I was still amongst you: it seemed to me

as if I were sitting at the piano and Celinski standing

opposite me looking at Mr. Zywny, who just then treated

Linowski to a pinch of snuff. Only Matuszynski was wanting to

make the group complete.

Several names in the above extract remind me that I ought to say a few

words about the young men with whom Chopin at that time associated. Many

of them were no doubt companions in the noblest sense of the word.

Of this class may have been Celinski, Hube, Eustachius Marylski, and

Francis Maciejowski (a nephew of the previously-mentioned Professor

Waclaw Maciejowski), who are more or less frequently mentioned in

Chopin's correspondence, but concerning whom I have no information to

give. I am as badly informed about Dziewanowski, whom a letter quoted

by Karasowski shows to have been a friend of Chopin's. Of two other

friends, Stanislas Kozmian and William Kolberg, we know at least that

the one was a few years ago still living at Posen and occupied the post

of President of the Society of the Friends of Science, and that the

other, to whom the earliest letters of Chopin that have come down to

us are addressed, became, not to mention lesser offices and titles, a

Councillor of State, and died on June 4,1877. Whatever the influence of

the friends I have thus far named may have been on the man Chopin, one

cannot but feel inclined to think that Stephen Witwicki and Dominic

Magnuszewski, especially the former, must have had a greater influence

on the artist. At any rate, these two poets, who made their mark in

Polish literature, brought the musician in closest contact with the

strivings of the literary romanticism of those days. In later years

Chopin set several of Witwicki's songs to music. Both Magnuszewski and

Witwicki lived afterwards, like Chopin, in Paris, where they continued

to associate with him. Of the musical acquaintances we have to notice

first and foremost Julius Fontana, who himself said that he was a daily

visitor at Chopin's house. The latter writes in the above-mentioned

letter (December 27, 1828) to Titus Woyciechowski:--

The Rondo for two pianos, this orphan child, has found a step-

father in Fontana (you may perhaps have seen him at our

house, he attends the university); he studied it for more

than a month, but then he did learn it, and not long ago we

tried how it would sound at Buchholtz's.

Alexander Rembielinski, described as a brilliant pianist and a composer

in the style of Fesca, who returned from Paris to Warsaw and died

young, is said to have been a friend of Chopin's. Better musicians than

Fontana, although less generally known in the western part of Europe,

are Joseph Nowakowski and Thomas Nidecki. Chopin, by some years their

junior, had intercourse with them during his residence in Poland as

well as afterwards abroad. It does not appear that Chopin had what can

rightly be called intimate friends among the young Polish musicians. If

we may believe the writer of an article in Sowinski's Dictionary, there

was one exception. He tells us that the talented Ignaz Felix Dobrzynski

was a fellow-pupil of Chopin's, taking like him private lessons from

Elsner. Dobrzynski came to Warsaw in 1825, and took altogether thirty

lessons.

Working together under the same master, having the same

manner of seeing and feeling, Frederick Chopin and I.F.

Dobrzynski became united in a close friendship. The same

aims, the same artistic tendency to seek the UNKNOWN,

characterised their efforts. They communicated to each other

their ideas and impressions, followed different routes to

arrive at the same goal.

This unison of kindred minds is so beautiful that one cannot but wish

it to have been a fact. Still, I must not hide the circumstance that

neither Liszt nor Karasowski mentions Dobrzynski as one of Chopin's

friends, and the even more significant circumstance that he is only

mentioned twice and en passant in Chopin's letters. All this, however,

does not necessarily nullify the lexicographer's statements, and until

contradictory evidence is forthcoming we may hold fast by so pleasing

and ennobling a creed.

The most intimate of Chopin's early friends, indeed, of all

his friends--perhaps the only ones that can be called his bosom

friends--have still to be named, Titus Woyciechowski and John

Matuszynski. It was to them that Chopin wrote his most interesting and

self-revealing letters. We shall meet them and hear of them often in

the course of this narrative, for their friendship with the musician was

severed only by death. It will therefore suffice to say here that Titus

Woyciechowski, who had been Chopin's school-fellow, lived, at the period

of the latter's life we have now reached, on his family estates, and

that John Matuszynski was then studying medicine in Warsaw.

In his letter of December 27, 1828, Chopin makes some allusions to the

Warsaw theatres. The French company had played Rataplan, and at the

National Theatre they had performed a comedy of Fredro's, Weber's

Preciosa, and Auber's Macon. A musical event whichmust have interested

Chopin much more than the performances of the two last-mentioned

works took place in the first half of the year 1829--namely, Hummel's

appearance in Warsaw. He and Field were, no doubt, those pianists who

through the style of their compositions most influenced Chopin. For

Hummel's works Chopin had indeed a life-long admiration and love. It is

therefore to be regretted that he left in his letters no record of

the impression which Hummel, one of the four most distinguished

representatives of pianoforte-playing of that time, made upon him. It

is hardly necessary to say that the other three representatives--of

different generations and schools let it be understood--were Field,

Kalkbrenner, and Moscheles. The only thing we learn about this visit of

Hummel's to Warsaw is that he and the young Polish pianist made a good

impression upon each other. As far as the latter is concerned this is a

mere surmise, or rather an inference from indirect proofs, for, strange

to say, although Chopin mentions Hummel frequently in his letters, he

does not write a syllable that gives a clue to his sentiments regarding

him. The older master, on the other hand, shows by his inquiries after

his younger brother in art and the visits he pays him that he had a real

regard and affection for him.

It is also to be regretted that Chopin says in his letters nothing of

Paganini's appearance in Warsaw. The great Italian violinist, who made

so deep an impression on, and exercised so great an influence over,

Liszt, cannot have passed by without producing some effect on Chopin.

That the latter had a high opinion of Paganini may be gathered from

later utterances, but what one would like is a description of his

feelings and thoughts when he first heard him. Paganini came to Warsaw

in 1829, after his visit to Berlin. In the Polish capital he was

worshipped with the same ardour as elsewhere, and also received the

customary tributes of applause, gold, and gifts. From Oreste Bruni's

Niccolo Paganini, celebre violinista Genovese, we learn that his

Warsaw worshippers presented him with a gold snuff-box, which bore the

following inscription:--Al Cav. Niccolo Paganini. Gli ammiratori del suo

talento. Varsovia 19 Luglio 1829.

Some months after this break in what he, no doubt, considered the

monotonous routine of Warsaw life, our friend made another excursion,

one of far greater importance in more than one respect than that to

Berlin. Vienna had long attracted him like a powerful magnet, the

obstacles to his going thither were now removed, and he was to see that

glorious art-city in which Gluck, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert,

and many lesser but still illustrious men had lived and worked.

CHAPTER VII

CHOPIN JOURNEYS TO VIENNA BY WAY OF CRACOW AND OJCOW.--STAYS THERE

FOR SOME WEEKS, PLAYING TWICE IN PUBLIC.--RETURNS TO WARSAW BY WAY OF

PRAGUE, DRESDEN, AND BRESLAU.

IT was about the middle of July, 1829, that Chopin, accompanied by his

friends Celinski, Hube, and Francis Maciejowski, set out on his journey

to Vienna. They made a week's halt at the ancient capital of the Polish

Republic, the many-towered Cracow, which rises picturesquely in a

landscape of great loveliness. There they explored the town and its

neighbourhood, both of which are rich in secular and ecclesiastical

buildings, venerable by age and historical associations, not a few of

them remarkable also as fine specimens of architecture. Although we have

no detailed account of Chopin's proceedings, we may be sure that

our patriotic friend did not neglect to look for and contemplate the

vestiges of his nation's past power and greatness: the noble royal

palace, degraded, alas, into barracks for the Austrian soldiery; the

grand, impressive cathedral, in which the tombs of the kings present

an epitome of Polish history; the town-hall, a building of the 14th

century; the turreted St. Florian's gate; and the monumental hillock,

erected on the mountain Bronislawa in memory of Kosciuszko by the

hands of his grateful countrymen, of which a Frenchman said:--"Void une

eloquence touts nouvelle: un peuple qui ne peut s'exprimer par la

parole ou par les livres, et qui parle par des montagnes." On a Sunday

afternoon, probably on the 24th of July, the friends left Cracow, and in

a rustic vehicle drove briskly to Ojcow. They were going to put up not

in the place itself, but at a house much patronised by tourists, lying

some miles distant from it and the highway. This circumstance led to

something like a romantic incident, for as the driver was unacquainted

with the bye-roads, they got into a small brook, "as clear and silvery

bright as brooks in fairytales," and having walls of rock on the

right and left, they were unable to extricate themselves "from this

labyrinth." Fortunately they met towards nine o'clock in the evening two

peasants who conducted them to their destination, the inn of Mr. Indyk,

in which also the Polish authoress Clementina Tanska, who has described

this district in one of her works, had lodged--a fact duly reported by

Chopin to his sister Isabella and friend Titus. Arriving not only tired

but also wet to above the knees, his first business was to guard against

taking a cold. He bought a Cracow double-woven woollen night-cap, which

he cut in two pieces and wrapped round his feet. Then he sat down by the

fire, drank a glass of red wine, and, after talking for a little while

longer, betook himself to bed, and slept the sleep of the just. Thus

ended the adventure of that day, and, to all appearance, without the

dreaded consequences of a cold. The natural beauties of the part of

the country where Chopin now was have gained for it the name of Polish

Switzerland. The principal sights are the Black Cave, in which during

the bloody wars with the Turks and Tartars the women and children used

to hide themselves; the Royal Cave, in which, about the year 1300,

King Wladyslaw Lokietek sought refuge when he was hardly pressed by

the usurper Wenceslas of Bohemia; and the beautifully-situated ruins

of Ojcow Castle, once embowered in thick forests. Having enjoyed to the

full the beauties of Polish Switzerland, Chopin continued his journey

merrily and in favourable weather through the picturesque countries of

Galicia, Upper Silesia, and Moravia, arriving in Vienna on July 31.

Chopin's letters tell us very little of his sight-seeing in the Austrian

capital, but a great deal of matters that interest us far more deeply.

He brought, of course, a number of letters of introduction with him.

Among the first which he delivered was one from Elsner to the publisher

Hashnger, to whom Chopin had sent a considerable time before some of his

compositions, which, however, still remained in manuscript. Haslinger

treated Elsner's pupil with an almost embarrassing politeness, and,

without being reminded of the MSS. in question, informed his visitor

that one of them, the variations on La ci darem la mano, would before

long appear in the Odeon series. "A great honour for me, is it not?"

writes the happy composer to his friend Titus. The amiable publisher,

however, thought that Chopin would do well to show the people of Vienna

what his difficult and by no means easily comprehensible composition was

like. But the composer was not readily persuaded. The thought of playing

in the city where Mozart and Beethoven had been heard frightened him,

and then he had not touched a piano for a whole fortnight. Not even

when Count Gallenberg entered and Haslinger presented Chopin to him as

a coward who dare not play in public was the young virtuoso put on his

mettle. In fact, he even declined with thanks the theatre which was

placed at his disposal by Count Gallenberg, who was then lessee of the

Karnthnerthor Theatre, and in whom the reader has no doubt recognised

the once celebrated composer of ballets, or at least the husband of

Beethoven's passionately-loved Countess Giulia Guicciardi. Haslinger and

Gallenberg were not the only persons who urged him to give the Viennese

an opportunity to hear him. Dining at the house of Count Hussarzewski,

a worthy old gentleman who admired his young countryman's playing very

much, Chopin was advised by everybody present--and the guests belonged

to the best society of Vienna--to give a concert. The journalist

Blahetka, best known as the father of his daughter, was not sparing in

words of encouragement; and Capellmeister Wurfel, who had been kind

to Chopin in Warsaw, told him plainly that it would be a disgrace to

himself, his parents, and his teachers not to make a public appearance,

which, he added, was, moreover, a politic move for this reason, that

no one who has composed anything new and wishes to make a noise in the

world can do so unless he performs his works himself. In fact, everybody

with whom he got acquainted was of the same opinion, and assured him

that the newspapers would say nothing but what was flattering. At last

Chopin allowed himself to be persuaded, Wurfel took upon him the care

of making the necessary arrangements, and already the next morning the

bills announced the coming event to the public of Vienna. In a long

postscript of a long and confused letter to his people he writes: "I

have made up my mind. Blahetka asserts that I shall create a furore,

'being,' as he expressed it, 'an artist of the first rank, and occupying

an honourable place by the side of Moscheles, Herz, and Kalkbrenner.'"

To all appearance our friend was not disposed to question the

correctness of this opinion; indeed, we shall see that although he had

his moments of doubting, he was perfectly conscious of his worth.

No blame, however, attaches to him on this account; self-respect

and self-confidence are not only irreprehensible but even

indispensable--that is, indispensable for the successful exercise of any

talent. That our friend had his little weaknesses shall not be denied

nor concealed. I am afraid he cannot escape the suspicion of having

possessed a considerable share of harmless vanity. "All journalists," he

writes to his parents and sisters, "open their eyes wide at me, and the

members of the orchestra greet me deferentially because I

walk with the director of the Italian opera arm-in-arm." Two

pianoforte-manufacturers--in one place Chopin says three--offered to

send him instruments, but he declined, partly because he had not room

enough, partly because he did not think it worth while to begin to

practise two days before the concert. Both Stein and Graff were very

obliging; as, however, he preferred the latter's instruments, he chose

one of this maker's for the concert, and tried to prevent the other from

taking offence by speaking him fair.

Chopin made his first public appearance in Vienna at the Karnthnerthor

Theatre on August 11, 1829. The programme comprised the following items:

Beethoven's Overture to Prometheus; arias of Rossini's and Vaccaj's,

sung by Mdlle. Veltheim, singer to the Saxon Court; Chopin's variations

on La ci darem la mano and Krakowiak, rondeau de concert (both for

pianoforte and orchestra), for the latter of which the composer

substituted an improvisation; and a short ballet. Chopin, in a letter to

his people dated August 12, 1829, describes the proceedings thus:--

Yesterday--i.e., Tuesday, at 7 p.m., I made my debut in the

Imperial Opera-house before the public of Vienna. These

evening concerts in the theatre are called here "musical

academies." As I claimed no honorarium, Count Gallenberg

hastened on my appearance.

In a letter to Titus Woyciechowski, dated September 12, 1829, he says:--

The sight of the Viennese public did not at all excite me,

and I sat down, pale as I was, at a wonderful instrument of

Graff's, at the time perhaps the best in Vienna. Beside me I

had a painted young man, who turned the leaves for me in the

Variations, and who prided himself on having rendered the

same service to Moscheles, Hummel, and Herz. Believe me when

I say that I played in a desperate mood; nevertheless, the

Variations produced so much effect that I was called back

several times. Mdlle. Veltheim sang very beautifully. Of my

improvisation I know only that it was followed by stormy

applause and many recalls.

To the cause of the paleness and the desperate mood I shall advert anon.

Chopin was satisfied, nay, delighted with his success; he had a friendly

greeting of "Bravo!" on entering, and this "pleasant word" the audience

repeated after each Variation so impetuously that he could not hear

the tuttis of the orchestra. At the end of the piece he was called back

twice. The improvisation on a theme from La Dame blanche and the Polish

tune Chmiel, which he substituted for the Krakowiak, although it did

not satisfy himself, pleased, or as Chopin has it, "electrified"

the audience. Count Gallenberg commended his compositions, and Count

Dietrichstein, who was much with the Emperor, came to him on the stage,

conversed with him a long time in French, complimented him on his

performance, and asked him to prolong his stay in Vienna. The only

adverse criticism which his friends, who had posted themselves in

different parts of the theatre, heard, was that of a lady who remarked,

"Pity the lad has not a better tournure." However, the affair did not

pass off altogether without unpleasant incidents:--

The members of the orchestra [Chopin writes to his friend

Titus Woyciechowski] showed me sour faces at the rehearsal;

what vexed them most was that I wished to make my debut with

a new composition. I began with the Variations which are

dedicated to you; they were to be followed by the Rondo

Krakowiak. We got through the Variations well, the Rondo, on

the other hand, went so badly that we had to begin twice from

the beginning; the cause of this was said to be the bad

writing. I ought to have placed the figures above and not

below the rests (that being the way to which the Viennese

musicians are accustomed). Enough, these gentlemen made such

faces that I already felt inclined to send word in the

evening that I was ill. Demar, the manager, noticed the bad

disposition of the members of the orchestra, who also don't

like Wurfel. The latter wished to conduct himself, but the

orchestra refused (I don't know for what reason) to play

under his direction. Mr. Demar advised me to improvise, at

which proposal the orchestra looked surprised. I was so

irritated by what had happened that in my desperation I

agreed to it; and who knows if my bad humour and strange mood

were not the causes of the great success which my playing

obtained.

Although Chopin passes off lightly the grumbling and grimacing of the

members of the orchestra respecting the bad writing of his music, they

seem to have had more serious reasons for complaint than he alleges

in the above quotation. Indeed, he relates himself that after the

occurrence his countryman Nidecki, who was very friendly to him and

rejoiced at his success, looked over the orchestral parts of the Rondo

and corrected them. The correction of MSS. was at no time of his life

a strong point of Chopin's. That the orchestra was not hostile to him

appears from another allusion of his to this affair:--

The orchestra cursed my badly-written music, and was not at

all favourably inclined towards me until I began the

improvisation; but then it joined in the applause of the

public. From this I saw that it had a good opinion of me.

Whether the other artists had so too I did not know as yet;

but why should they be against me? They must see that I do

not play for the sake of material advantages.

After such a success nothing was more natural than that Chopin should

allow himself to be easily persuaded to play again--il n'y a que le

premier pas qui coute--but he said he would not play a third time.

Accordingly, on August 18, he appeared once more on the stage of the

Karnthnerthor Theatre. Also this time he received no payment, but played

to oblige Count Gallenberg, who, indeed, was in anything but flourishing

circumstances. On this occasion Chopin succeeded in producing the

Krakowiak, and repeated, by desire of the ladies, the Variations.

Two other items of the programme were Lindpaintner's Overture to Der

Bergkonig and a polonaise of Mayseder's played by the violinist Joseph

Khayl, a very young pupil of Jansa's.

The rendering of the Rondo especially [Chopin writes] gave me

pleasure, because Gyrowetz, Lachner, and other masters, nay,

even the orchestra, were so charmed--excuse the expression--

that they called me back twice.

In another letter he is more loquacious on the subject:--

If the public received me kindly on my first appearance, it

was yesterday still more hearty. When I appeared on the stage

I was greeted with a twice-repeated, long-sustained "Bravo!"

The public had gathered in greater numbers than at the first

concert. The financier of the theatre, Baron--I do not

remember his name--thanked me for the recette and said that

if the attendance was great, it was not on account of the

ballet, which had already been often performed. With my Rondo

I have won the good opinion of all professional musicians--

from Capellmeister Lachner to the pianoforte-tuner, all

praise my composition.

The press showed itself not less favourable than the public. The fullest

account of our artist's playing and compositions, and the impression

they produced on this occasion, I found on looking over the pages of the

Wiener Theaterzeitung. Chopin refers to it prospectively in a letter to

his parents, written on August 19. He had called on Bauerle, the editor

of the paper, and had been told that a critique of the concert would

soon appear. To satisfy his own curiosity and to show his people that he

had said no more than what was the truth in speaking of his success,

he became a subscriber to the Wiener Theaterzeitung, and had it sent to

Warsaw. The criticism is somewhat long, but as this first step into the

great world of art was an event of superlative importance to Chopin,

and is one of more than ordinary interest to us, I do not hesitate to

transcribe it in full so far as it relates to our artist. Well, what we

read in the Wiener Theaterzeitung of August 20, 1829, is this:--

[Chopin] surprised people, because they discovered in him not

only a fine, but a really very eminent talent; on account of

the originality of his playing and compositions one might

almost attribute to him already some genius, at least, in so

far as unconventional forms and pronounced individuality are

concerned. His playing, like his compositions--of which we

heard on this occasion only variations--has a certain

character of modesty which seems to indicate that to shine is

not the aim of this young man, although his execution

conquered difficulties the overcoming of which even here, in

the home of pianoforte virtuosos, could not fail to cause

astonishment; nay, with almost ironical naivete he takes it

into his head to entertain a large audience with music as

music. And lo, he succeeded in this. The unprejudiced public

rewarded him with lavish applause. His touch, although neat

and sure, has little of that brilliance by which our

virtuosos announce themselves as such in the first bars; he

emphasised but little, like one conversing in a company of

clever people, not with that rhetorical aplomb which is

considered by virtuosos as indispensable. He plays very

quietly, without the daring elan which generally at once

distinguishes the artist from the amateur. Nevertheless, our

fine-feeling and acute-judging public recognised at once in

this youth, who is a stranger and as yet unknown to fame, a

true artist; and this evening afforded the unprejudiced

observer the pleasing spectacle of a public which, considered

as a moral person, showed itself a true connoisseur and a

virtuoso in the comprehension and appreciation of an artistic

performance which, in no wise grandiose, was nevertheless

gratifying.

There were defects noticeable in the young man's playing,

among which are perhaps especially to be mentioned the non-

observance of the indication by accent of the commencement of

musical phrases. Nevertheless, he was recognised as an artist

of whom the best may be expected as soon as he has heard

more....As in his playing he was like a beautiful young tree

that stands free and full of fragrant blossoms and ripening

fruits, so he manifested as much estimable individuality in

his compositions, where new figures, new passages, new forms

unfolded themselves in the introduction, in the first,

second, and fourth Variations, and in the concluding

metamorphosis of Mozart's theme into a polacca.

Such is the ingenuousness of the young virtuoso that he

undertook to come forward at the close of the concert with a

free fantasia before a public in whose eyes few improvisers,

with the exception of Beethoven and Hummel, have as yet found

favour. If the young man by a manifold change of his themes

aimed especially at amusement, the calm flow of his thoughts

and their firm connection and chaste development were

nevertheless a sufficient proof of his capability as regards

this rare gift. Mr. Chopin gave to-day so much pleasure to a

small audience that one cannot help wishing he may at another

performance play before a larger one....

Although the critic of the Wiener Theaterzeitung is more succinct in

his report (September 1, 1829) of the second concert, he is not less

complimentary. Chopin as a composer as well as an executant justified on

this occasion the opinion previously expressed about him.

He is a young man who goes his own way, and knows how to

please in this way, although his style of playing and writing

differs greatly from that of other virtuosos; and, indeed

chiefly in this, that the desire to make good music

predominates noticeably in his case over the desire to

please. Also to-day Mr. Chopin gave general satisfaction.

These expressions of praise are so enthusiastic that a suspicion might

possibly arise as to their trustworthiness. But this is not the only

laudatory account to be found in the Vienna papers. Der Sammler, for

instance, remarked: "In Mr. Chopin we made the acquaintance of one of

the most excellent pianists, full of delicacy and deepest feeling."

The Wiener Zeitschrift fur Kunst, Literatur, Theater und Mode, too, had

appreciative notices of the concerts.

He executes the greatest difficulties with accuracy and

precision, and renders all passages with neatness. The

tribute of applause which the public paid to this clever

artist was very great; the concert-piece with orchestra (the

Variations) especially pleased.

This was written after the first concert, and printed on August 22,

1829. From the criticism on the second concert, which appeared in the

same paper a week later (August 29), I cull the following sentences:--

Chopin performed a new Rondo for pianoforte and orchestra of

his own composition. This piece is written throughout in the

chromatic style, rarely rises to geniality, but has passages

which are distinguished by depth and thoughtful working-out.

On the whole, however, he seems to be somewhat lacking in

variety. The master showed in it his dexterity as a pianist

to perfection, and conquered the greatest difficulties with

felicity. A longer stay in Vienna might be to the advantage

of his touch as well as of his ensemble playing with the

orchestra. He received much applause, and was repeatedly

called back....At the close Mr. Chopin played to-day the

Variations on a theme of Mozart's, which he had already

performed with so much bravura and felicity at his first

concert. The pleasing and yet substantial variety of this

composition as well as the fine, successful playing obtained

also to-day loud applause for the pianist. Connoisseurs and

amateurs manifested joyously and loudly their recognition of

his clever playing. This young man...shows in his

compositions a serious striving to interweave by interesting

combinations the orchestra with the pianoforte.

In conclusion, let me quote one other journal, this time a purely

musical one--namely, the Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung (No. 46,

November 18, 1829). The notice, probably written by that debauched

genius F.A. Kanne, runs thus:--

Mr. Chopin, a pianist from Warsaw, according to report a

pupil of Wurfel's [which report was of course baseless], came

before us a master of the first rank. The exquisite delicacy

of his touch, his indescribable mechanical dexterity, his

finished shading and portamento, which reflect the deepest

feeling; the lucidity of his interpretation, and his

compositions, which bear the stamp of great genius--

variazioni di bravura, rondo, free fantasia--reveal a

virtuoso most liberally endowed by nature, who, without

previous blasts of trumpets, appears on the horizon like one

of the most brilliant meteors.

Still, the sweets of success were not altogether without some admixture

of bitterness, as we may perceive from the following remarks of

Chopin's:--

I know that I have pleased the ladies and the musicians.

Gyrowetz, who sat beside Celinski, made a terrible noise, and

shouted "Bravo." Only the out-and-out Germans seem not to

have been quite satisfied.

And this, after having a few days before attributed the applause to

the Germans, who "could appreciate improvisations." Tantae animis

coelestibus irae? But what was the reason of this indignation?

Simply this: a gentleman, who after the second concert came into the

coffee-room of the hotel where Chopin was staying, on being asked by

some of the guests how he liked the performance, answered laconically,

"the ballet was very pretty"; and, although they put some further

questions, he would say no more, having no doubt noticed a certain

person. And hinc illae lacrimae. Our sensitive friend was indeed so much

ruffled at this that he left the room in a pet and went to bed, so

as not to hinder, as he explains, the outpouring of the gentleman's

feelings. The principal stricture passed on the virtuoso was that he

played too softly, or, rather, too delicately. Chopin himself says that

on that point all were unanimous. But the touchy artist, in true artist

fashion-- or shall we be quite just and say "in true human fashion"?

adds:--

They are accustomed to the drumming of the native pianoforte

virtuosos. I fear that the newspapers will reproach me with

the same thing, especially as the daughter of an editor is

said to drum frightfully. However, it does not matter; as

this cannot be helped, I would rather that people say I play

too delicately than too roughly.

When Count Moritz Lichnowski, to whom Chopin was introduced by Wurfel,

learned after the first concert that the young virtuoso was going to

play again, he offered to lend him his own piano for the occasion, for

he thought Chopin's feebleness of tone was owing to the instrument he

had used. But Chopin knew perfectly the real state of the matter: "This

is my manner of playing, which pleases the ladies so very much." Chopin

was already then, and remained all his life, nay, even became more and

more, the ladies' pianist par excellence. By which, however, I do not

mean that he did not please the men, but only that no other pianist was

equally successful in touching the most tender and intimate chords of

the female heart. Indeed, a high degree of refinement in thought and

feeling combined with a poetic disposition are indispensable requisites

for an adequate appreciation of Chopin's compositions and style of

playing. His remark, therefore, that he had captivated the learned and

the poetic natures, was no doubt strictly correct with regard to

his success in Vienna; but at the same time it may be accepted as a

significant foreshadowing of his whole artistic career. Enough has now

been said of these performances, and, indeed, too much, were it not that

to ascertain the stage of development reached by an original master,

and the effect which his efforts produced on his artistically-cultivated

contemporaries, are objects not undeserving a few pages of discussion.

During the twenty days which Chopin spent in Vienna he displayed great

activity. He was always busy, and had not a moment to spare. His own

public performances did not make him neglect those of others. He heard

the violinist Mayseder twice, and went to representations of Boieldieu's

"La Dame blanche," Rossini's "Cenerentola," Meyerbeer's "Crociato in

Egitto," and other operas. He also visited the picture gallery and

the museum of antiquities, delivered letters of introduction, made

acquaintances, dined and drank tea with counts and countesses, &c.

Wherever Chopin goes we are sure to see him soon in aristocratic and in

Polish society.

Everybody says that I have pleased the nobility here

exceedingly The Schwarzenbergs, Wrbnas, &c., were quite

enraptured by the delicacy and elegance of my playing. As a

further proof I may mention the visit which Count

Dietrichstein paid me on the stage.

Chopin called repeatedly on the "worthy old gentleman" Count

Hussarzewski and his "worthy lady," with whom he dined once, and who

wished him to stay for dinner when he made his farewell call. With the

Countess Lichnowska and her daughter he took tea two days after the

first concert. They were inexpressibly delighted to hear that he was

going to give a second, asked him to visit them on his way through

Vienna to Paris, and promised him a letter of introduction to a sister

of the Count's. This Count Lichnowski was Count Moritz Lichnowski, the

friend of Beethoven, to whom the great master dedicated the Variations,

Op. 35, and the Sonata, Op. 90, in which are depicted the woes and

joys of the Count's love for the singer Mdlle. Strammer, who afterwards

became his wife, and, in fact, was the Countess Lichnowska with whom

Chopin became acquainted.

[Footnote: Count Moritz Lichnowski must not be confounded with his elder

brother Prince Carl Lichnowski, the pupil and friend of Mozart, and the

friend and patron of Beethoven, to whom the latter dedicated his Op. 1,

and who died in 1814.]

Among the letters of introduction which Chopin brought with him

there was also one for Schuppanzigh, whose name is in musical history

indissolubly connected with those of Beethoven and Lichnowski. The

eminent quartet leader, although his quartet evenings were over, held

out to Chopin hopes of getting up another during his visitor's stay in

Vienna--he would do so, he said, if possible. To no one, however, either

professional or amateur, was Chopin so much indebted for guidance and

furtherance as to his old obliging friend Wurfel, who introduced him not

only to Count Gallenberg, Count Lichnowski, and Capellmeister Seyfried,

but to every one of his acquaintances who either was a man of influence

or took an interest in musical matters. Musicians whose personal

acquaintance Chopin said he was glad to make were: Gyrowetz, the author

of the concerto with which little Frederick made his debut in Warsaw at

the age of nine, an estimable artist, as already stated, who had the sad

misfortune to outlive his popularity; Capellmeister Seyfried, a prolific

but qualitatively poor composer, best known to our generation as the

editor of Albrechtsberger's theoretical works and Beethoven's studies;

Conradin Kreutzer, who had already distinguished himself as a virtuoso

on the clarinet and pianoforte, and as a conductor and composer, but had

not yet produced his "Nachtlager"; Franz Lachner, the friend of Franz

Schubert, then a young active conductor and rising composer, now one

of the most honoured veterans of his art. With Schuppanzigh's pupil

Mayseder, the prince of the Viennese violinists of that day, and indeed

one of the neatest, most graceful, and elegant, although somewhat cold,

players of his instrument, Chopin had a long conversation. The only

critical comments to be found in Chopin's letters on the musicians he

came in contact with in the Austrian capital refer to Czerny, with whom

he got well acquainted and often played duets for two pianos. Of him the

young Polish musician said, "He is a good man, but nothing more." And

after having bidden him farewell, he says, "Czerny was warmer than

all his compositions." However, it must not be supposed that Chopin's

musical acquaintances were confined to the male sex; among them there

was at least one belonging to the better and fairer half of humanity--a

pianist-composer, a maiden still in her teens, and clever and pretty

to boot, who reciprocated the interest he took in her. According to our

friend's rather conceited statement I ought to have said--but it would

have been very ungallant to do so--he reciprocated the interest she took

in him. The reader has no doubt already guessed that I am speaking of

Leopoldine Blahetka.

On the whole, Chopin passed his time in Vienna both pleasantly and

profitably, as is well shown by his exclamation on the last day of his

stay: "It goes crescendo with my popularity here, and this gives me much

pleasure." The preceding day Schuppanzigh had said to him that as he

left so soon he ought not to be long in coming back. And when Chopin

replied that he would like to return to perfect himself, the by-standers

told him he need not come for that purpose as he had no longer

anything to learn. Although the young musician remarks that these were

compliments, he cannot help confessing that he likes to hear them; and

of course one who likes to hear them does not wholly disbelieve them,

but considers them something more than a mere flatus vocis. "Nobody

here," Chopin writes exultingly, "will regard me as a pupil." Indeed,

such was the reception he met with that it took him by surprise. "People

wonder at me," he remarked soon after his arrival in Vienna, "and I

wonder at them for wondering at me." It was incomprehensible to him that

the artists and amateurs of the famous musical city should consider it a

loss if he departed without giving a concert. The unexpected compliments

and applause that everywhere fell upon his ear, together with the many

events, experiences, and thoughts that came crowding upon him, would

have caused giddiness in any young artist; Chopin they made drunk with

excitement and pleasure. The day after the second concert he writes

home: "I really intended to have written about something else, but I

can't get yesterday out of my head." His head was indeed brimful, or

rather full to overflowing, of whirling memories and expectations which

he poured into the news--budgets destined for his parents, regardless

of logical sequence, just as they came uppermost. The clear, succinct

accounts of his visit which he gives to his friend Titus after his

return to Warsaw contrast curiously with the confused interminable

letters of shreds and patches he writes from Vienna. These latter,

however, have a value of their own; they present one with a striking

picture of the state of his mind at that time. The reader may consider

this part of the biography as an annotated digest of Chopin's letters,

of those addressed to his parents as well as of those to his friend

Woyciechowski.

At last came the 19th of August, the day of our travelling-party's

departure. Chopin passed the whole forenoon in making valedictory

visits, and when in the afternoon he had done packing and writing, he

called once more on Haslinger--who promised to publish the Variations in

about five weeks--and then went to the cafe opposite the theatre, where

he was to meet Gyrowetz, Lachner, Kreutzer, and others. The rest shall

be told in Chopin's own words:--

After a touching parting--it was really a touching parting

when Miss Blahetka gave me as a souvenir her compositions

bearing her own signature, and her father sent his

compliments to you [Chopin's father] and dear mother,

congratulating you on having such a son; when young Stein

[one of the well-known family of pianoforte-manufacturers and

musicians] wept, and Schuppanzigh, Gyrowetz, in one word, all

the other artists, were much moved--well then, after this

touching parting and having promised to return soon, I

stepped into the stage-coach.

This was at nine o'clock in the evening, and Chopin and his

fellow-travellers, accompanied for half-an-hour by Nidecki and some

other Poles, leaving behind Vienna and Vienna friends, proceeded on

their way to Bohemia.

Prague was reached by our travellers on August 21. The interesting old

town did not display its beauties in vain, for Chopin writes admiringly

of the fine views from the castle hill, of the castle itself, of "the

majestic cathedral with a silver statue of St. John, the beautiful

chapel of St. Wenceslas, inlaid with amethysts and other precious

stones," and promises to give a fuller and more detailed description of

what he has seen by word of mouth. His friend Maciejowski had a

letter of introduction to Waclaw Hanka, the celebrated philologist and

librarian of the National Museum, to whom Chopin introduced himself as

the godson of Count Skarbek. On visiting the museum they were asked,

like all on whom the librarian bestowed his special attention, to write

their names in the visitors' book. Maciejowski wrote also four mazurka

strophes eulogising Hanka's scientific achievements, and Chopin set

them to music. The latter brought with him from Vienna six letters

of introduction--one from Blahetka and five from Wurfel--which were

respectively addressed to Pixis, to the manager of the theatre, and to

other musical big-wigs. The distinguished violin-virtuoso, professor

at the Conservatorium, and conductor at the theatre, Frederick Pixis

(1786--1842), received Chopin very kindly, gave up some lessons that he

might keep him longer and talk with him, and invited him to come again

in the afternoon, when he would meet August Alexander Klengel, of

Dresden, whose card Chopin had noticed on the table. For this esteemed

pianist and famous contrapuntist he had also a letter of introduction,

and he was glad to meet him in Prague, as he otherwise would have missed

seeing him, Klengel being on his way to Vienna and Italy. They made each

other's acquaintance on the stairs leading to Pixis' apartments.

I heard him play his fugues for two hours; I did not play, as

they did not ask me to do so. Klengel's rendering pleased me,

but I must confess I had expected something better (but I beg

of you not to mention this remark of mine to others).

Elsewhere he writes:--

Of all the artists whose acquaintance I have made, Klengel

pleased me most. He played me his fugues (one may say that

they are a continuation of those of Bach. There are forty-

eight of them, and the same number of canons). What a

difference between him and Czerny!

Klengel's opus magnum, the "Canons et Fugues dans tons les tons majeurs

et mineurs pour le piano, en deux parties," did not appear till 1854,

two years after his death, although it had been completed some decades

previously. He carried it about with him on all his travels, unceasingly

improving and perfecting it, and may be said to have worked at it for

the space of half his life. The two artists who met at Pixis' house

got on well together, unlike as they were in their characters and aims.

Chopin called on Klengel before the latter's departure from Prague, and

spent two hours with him in conversation, neither of them being for

a moment at a loss for material to talk about. Klengel gave Chopin

a letter of introduction to Morlacchi, the address of which ran: Al

ornatissimo Signore Cavaliere Morlacchi, primo maestro della capella

Reale, and in which he asked this gentleman to make the bearer

acquainted with the musical life of Dresden. How favourably Klengel

had impressed his younger brother in art may be gathered from the

above-quoted and the following remarks: "He was to me a very agreeable

acquaintance, whom I esteem more highly than Czerny, but of this also

don't speak, my beloved ones."

[FOOTNOTE: Their disparity of character would have revealed itself

unpleasantly to both parties if the grand seigneur Chopin had,

like Moritz Hauptmann, been the travelling-companion of the meanly

parsimonious Klengel, who to save a few bajocchi left the hotels with

uncleaned boots, and calculated the worth of the few things he cared

for by scudi.--See Moritz Hauptmann's account of his "canonic"

travelling-companion's ways and procedures in the letters to Franz

Hauser, vol. i., p. 64, and passim.]

The reader will no doubt notice and admire the caution of our young

friend. Remembering that not even Paganini had escaped being censured in

Prague, Chopin felt no inclination to give a concert, as he was advised

to do. A letter in which he describes his Prague experiences reveals to

us one of his weaknesses--one, however, which he has in common with many

men of genius. A propos of his bursting into a wrong bedroom he says: "I

am absent-minded, you know."

After three pleasant days at Prague the quatrefoil of friends betook

themselves again to the road, and wended their way to Teplitz, where

they arrived the same evening, and stopped two nights and one day. Here

they fell in with many Poles, by one of whom, Louis Lempicki, Chopin was

introduced to Prince Clary and his family, in whose castle he spent an

evening in very aristocratic society. Among the guests were an Austrian

prince, an Austrian and a Saxon general, a captain of the English navy,

and several dandies whom Chopin suspected to be Austrian princes or

counts. After tea he was asked by the mother of the Princess Clary,

Countess Chotek, to play something. Chopin at once went to the piano,

and invited those present to give him a theme to improvise upon.

Hereupon [he relates] I heard the ladies, who had taken seats

near a table, whisper to each other: "Un theme, un theme."

Three young princesses consulted together and at last turned

to Mr. Fritsche, the tutor of Prince Clary's only son, who,

with the approbation of all present, said to me: "The

principal theme of Rossini's 'Moses'." I improvised, and, it

appears, very successfully, for General Leiser [this was the

Saxon general] afterwards conversed with me for a long time,

and when he heard that I intended to go to Dresden he wrote

at once to Baron von Friesen as follows: "Monsieur Frederic

Chopin est recommande de la part du General Leiser a Monsieur

le Baron de Friesen, Maitre de Ceremonie de S.M. le Roi de

Saxe, pour lui etre utile pendant son sejour a Dresde et de

lui procurer la connaissance de plusieurs de nos artistes."

And he added, in German: "Herr Chopin is himself one of the

most excellent pianists whom I know."

In short, Chopin was made much of; had to play four times, received an

invitation to dine at the castle the following day, &c., &c. That our

friend, in spite of all these charming prospects, leaving behind

him three lovely princesses, and who knows what other aristocratic

amenities, rolled off the very next morning at five o'clock in a vehicle

hired at the low price of two thalers--i.e., six shillings--must be

called either a feat of superhuman heroism or an instance of barbarous

insensibility--let the reader decide which. Chopin's visit to Teplitz

was not part of his original plan, but the state of his finances was

so good that he could allow himself some extravagances. Everything

delighted him at Teplitz, and, short as his stay was, he did the

sight-seeing thoroughly--we have his own word for it that he saw

everything worth seeing, among the rest Dux, the castle of the

Waldsteins, with relics of their ancestor Albrecht Waldstein, or

Wallenstein.

Leaving Teplitz on the morning of August 26, he arrived in the evening

of the same day in Dresden in good health and good humour. About this

visit to Dresden little is to be said. Chopin had no intention of

playing in public, and did nothing but look about him, admiring nature

in Saxon Switzerland, and art in the "magnificent" gallery. He went to

the theatre where Goethe's Faust (the first part), adapted by Tieck, was

for the first time produced on the stage, Carl Devrient impersonating

the principal part. "An awful but grand imagination! In the entr'actes

portions from Spohr's opera "Faust" were performed. They celebrated

today Goethe's eightieth birthday." It must be admitted that the

master-work is dealt with rather laconically, but Chopin never indulges

in long aesthetical discussions. On the following Saturday Meyerbeer's

"Il Crociato" was to be performed by the Italian Opera--for at that time

there was still an Italian Opera in Dresden. Chopin, however, did not

stay long enough to hear it, nor did he very much regret missing it,

having heard the work already in Vienna. Although Baron von Friesen

received our friend most politely, he seems to have been of no

assistance to him. Chopin fared better with his letter of introduction

to Capellmeister Morlacchi, who returned the visit paid him and made

himself serviceable. And now mark this touch of boyish vanity: "Tomorrow

morning I expect Morlacchi, and I shall go with him to Miss Pechwell's.

That is to say, I do not go to him, but he comes to me. Yes, yes,

yes!" Miss Pechwell was a pupil of Klengel's, and the latter had asked

Morlacchi to introduce Chopin to her. She seems to have been not only a

technically skilful, fine-feeling, and thoughtful musician, but also in

other respects a highly-cultivated person. Klengel called her the best

pianist in Dresden. She died young, at the age of 35, having some time

previously changed her maiden name for that of Madame Pesadori. We shall

meet her again in the course of this biography.

Of the rest of Chopin's journey nothing is known except that it led him

to Breslau, but when he reached and left it, and what he did there,

are open questions, and not worth troubling about. So much, however, is

certain, that on September 12, 1829, he was settled again in his native

city, as is proved by a letter bearing that date.

CHAPTER VIII

THE WORKS OF CHOPIN'S FIRST PERIOD.

The only works of Chopin we have as yet discussed are--if we leave out

of account the compositions which the master neither published himself

nor wished to be published by anybody else--the "Premier Rondeau," Op.

1, the "Rondeau a la Mazur," Op. 5, and "Variations sur un air allemand"

(see Chapter III). We must retrace our steps as far back as 1827, and

briefly survey the composer's achievements up to the spring of 1829,

when a new element enters into his life and influences his artistic

work. It will be best to begin with a chronological enumeration of those

of Chopin's compositions of the time indicated that have come down to

us. In 1827 came into existence or were finished: a Mazurka (Op. 68, No.

2), a Polonaise (Op. 71, No. 1), and a Nocturne (Op. 72); in 1828, "La

ci darem la mano, varie" for piano and orchestra (Op. 2), a Polonaise

(Op. 71, No. 2), a Rondo for two pianos (Op. 73), a Sonata (Op. 4), a

Fantasia on Polish airs for piano and orchestra (Op. 13), a Krakowiak,

"Grand Rondeau de Concert," likewise for piano and orchestra (Op.

14), and a Trio for piano, violin, and violoncello (Op. 8); in 1829, a

Polonaise (Op. 71, No. 3), a Waltz (Op. 69, No. 2), another Waltz (in E

major, without opus number), and a Funeral March (Op. 726). I will

not too confidently assert that every one of the last four works was

composed in the spring or early summer of 1829; but whether they were or

were not, they may be properly ranged with those previously mentioned

of 1827 and 1828. The works that bear a higher opus number than 65 were

published after the composer's death by Fontana. The Waltz without opus

number and the Sonata, Op. 4, are likewise posthumous publications.

The works enumerated above may be divided into three groups, the first

of which comprises the Sonata, the Trio, and the Rondo for two pianos.

The Sonata (in C minor) for piano, Op. 4, of which Chopin wrote as early

as September 9, 1828, that it had been for some time in the hands of

Haslinger at Vienna, was kept by this publisher in manuscript till after

the composer's death, being published only in July, 1851. "As a pupil

of his I dedicated it to Elsner," says Chopin. It is indeed a pupil's

work--an exercise, and not a very successful one. The exigencies of the

form overburdened the composer and crushed all individuality out of him.

Nowhere is Chopin so little himself, we may even say so unlike himself.

The distribution of keys and the character of the themes show that the

importance of contrast in the construction of larger works was

still unsuspected by him. The two middle movements, a Menuetto and a

Larghetto--although in the latter the self-imposed fetters of the 5-4

time prevent the composer from feeling quite at his ease--are more

attractive than the rest. In them are discernible an approach to freedom

and something like a breath of life, whereas in the first and the last

movement there is almost nothing but painful labour and dull monotony.

The most curious thing, however, about this work is the lumbering

passage-writing of our graceful, light-winged Chopin.

Infinitely superior to the Sonata is the Trio for piano, violin, and

violoncello, Op. 8, dedicated to Prince Anton Radziwill, which was

published in March, 1833. It was begun early in 1828, was "not yet

finished" on September 9, and "not yet quite finished" on December 27 of

that year. Chopin tried the first movement in the summer of 1828, and we

may assume that, a few details and improvements excepted, the whole

was completed at the beginning of 1829. A considerable time, however,

elapsed before the composer declared it ready for the press. On August

31, 1830, he writes:--

I tried the Trio last Sunday and was satisfied with it,

perhaps because I had not heard it for a long time. I suppose

you will say, "What a happy man!" Something occurred to me on

hearing it--namely, that it would be better to employ a viola

instead of the violin, for with the violin the E string

dominates most, whilst in my Trio it is hardly ever used. The

viola would stand in a more proper relation to the

violoncello. Then the Trio will be ready for the press.

The composer did not make the intended alteration, and in this he was

well advised. For his remarks betray little insight; what preciousness

they possess they owe for the most part to the scarcity of similar

discussions of craftsmanship in his letters. From the above dates we see

that the composer bestowed much time, care, and thought upon the work.

Indeed, there can be no doubt that as regards conventional handling of

the sonata-form Chopin has in no instance been more successful. Were we

to look upon this work as an exercise, we should have to pronounce it a

most excellent one. But the ideal content, which is always estimable

and often truly beautiful as well as original, raises it high above the

status of an exercise. The fundamental fault of the Trio lies in this,

that the composer tried to fill a given form with ideas, and to some

extent failed to do so--the working-out sections especially testify to

the correctness of this opinion. That the notion of regarding form as

a vessel--a notion oftener acted upon than openly professed--is a

mischievous one will hardly be denied, and if it were denied, we could

not here discuss so wide a question as that of "What is form?" The

comparatively ineffective treatment of the violin and violoncello also

lays the composer open to censure. Notwithstanding its weaknesses

the work was received with favour by the critics, the most pronounced

conservatives not excepted. That the latter gave more praise to it than

to Chopin's previously-published compositions is a significant fact, and

may be easily accounted for by the less vigorous originality and less

exclusive individuality of the Trio, which, although superior in these

respects to the Sonata, Op. 4, does not equal the composer's works

written in simpler forms. Even the most hostile of Chopin's critics,

Rellstab, the editor of the Berlin musical journal Iris, admits--after

censuring the composer's excessive striving after originality, and the

unnecessarily difficult pianoforte passages with their progressions of

intervals alike repellent to hand and ear--that this is "on the whole

a praiseworthy work, which, in spite of some excursions into deviating

bye-paths, strikes out in a better direction than the usual productions

of the modern composers" (1833, No. 21). The editor of the Leipzig

"Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung," a journal which Schumann

characterises as "a sleepy place," is as eulogistic as the most rabid

Chopin admirer could wish. Having spoken of the "talented young man"

as being on the one hand under the influence of Field, and on the other

under that of Beethoven, he remarks:--

In the Trio everything is new: the school, which is the neo-

romantic; the art of pianoforte-playing, the individuality,

the originality, or rather the genius--which, in the

expression of a passion, unites, mingles, and alternates so

strangely with that amiable tenderness [Innigkeit] that the

shifting image of the passion hardly leaves the draughtsman

time to seize it firmly and securely, as he would fain do;

even the position of the phrases is unusual. All this,

however, would be ambiguous praise did not the spirit, which

is both old and new, breathe through the new form and give it

a soul.

I place these criticisms before the reader as historical documents, not

as final decisions and examples of judicial wisdom. In fact, I accept

neither the strictures of the one nor the sublimifications of the other,

although the confident self-assertion of the former and the mystic

vagueness of the latter ought, according to use and wont, to carry

the weight of authority with them. Schumann, the Chopin champion par

excellence, saw clearer, and, writing three years later (1836), said

that the Trio belonged to Chopin's earlier period when the composer

still allowed the virtuoso some privileges. Although I cannot go so far

as this too admiring and too indulgent critic, and describe the work as

being "as noble as possible, more full of enthusiasm than the work

of any other poet [so schwarmerisch wie noch kein Dichter gesungen],

original in its smallest details, and, as a whole, every note music and

life," I think that it has enough of nobility, enthusiasm, originality,

music, and life, to deserve more attention than it has hitherto

obtained.

Few classifications can at one and the same time lay claim to

the highest possible degree of convenience--the raison d'etre of

classifications--and strict accuracy. The third item of my first group,

for instance, might more properly be said to stand somewhere between

this and the second group, partaking somewhat of the nature of both. The

Rondo, Op. 73, was not originally written for two pianos. Chopin wrote

on September 9, 1828, that he had thus rearranged it during a stay at

Strzyzewo in the summer of that year. At that time he was pretty well

pleased with the piece, and a month afterwards talked of playing it with

his friend Fontana at the Ressource. Subsequently he must have changed

his opinion, for the Rondo did not become known to the world at large

till it was published posthumously. Granting certain prettinesses, an

unusual dash and vigour, and some points of interest in the working-out,

there remains the fact that the stunted melodies signify little and the

too luxuriant passage-work signifies less, neither the former nor the

latter possessing much of the charm that distinguishes them in the

composer's later works. The original in this piece is confined to the

passage-work, and has not yet got out of the rudimentary stage. Hence,

although the Rondo may not be unworthy of finding occasionally a place

in a programme of a social gathering with musical accompaniments and

even of a non-classical concert, it will disappoint those who come to it

with their expectations raised by Chopin's chefs-d'oeuvre, where all is

poetry and exquisiteness of style.

The second group contains Chopin's concert-pieces, all of which have

orchestral accompaniments. They are: (1) "La ci darem la mano, varie

pour le piano," Op. 2; (2) "Grande Fantaisie sur des airs polonais," Op.

13; (3) "Krakowiak, Grande Rondeau de Concert," Op. 14. Of these three

the first, which is dedicated to Titus Woyciechowski, has become the

most famous, not, however, on account of its greater intrinsic value,

but partly because the orchestral accompaniments can be most easily

dispensed with, and more especially because Schumann has immortalised

it by--what shall I call it?--a poetic prose rhapsody. As previously

stated, the work had already in September, 1828, been for some time at

Vienna in the hands of Haslinger; it was probably commenced as far

back as 1827, but it did not appear in print till 1830. [FOOTNOTE: It

appeared in a serial publication entitled Odeon, which was described

on the title-page as: Ausgewahlte grosse Concertstucke fur verschiedene

Instrumente (Selected Grand Concert-Pieces for different instruments).]

On April 10 of that year Chopin writes that he expects it impatiently.

The appearance of these Variations, the first work of Chopin published

outside his own country, created a sensation. Of the impression which

he produced with it on the Viennese in 1829 enough has been said in the

preceding chapter. The Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung received no less

than three reviews of it, two of them--that of Schumann and one by "an

old musician"--were accepted and inserted in the same number of the

paper (1831, Vol. xxxiii., No. 49); the third, by Friedrich Wieck,

which was rejected, found its way in the following year into the musical

journal Caecilia. Schumann's enthusiastic effusion was a prophecy rather

than a criticism. But although we may fail to distinguish in Chopin's

composition the flirting of the grandee Don Juan with the peasant-girl

Zerlina, the curses of the duped lover Masetto, and the jeers and

laughter of the knavish attendant Leporello, which Schumann thought

he recognised, we all obey most readily and reverently his injunction,

"Hats off, gentlemen: a genius!" In these words lies, indeed, the merit

of Schumann's review as a criticism. Wieck felt and expressed nearly

the same, only he felt it less passionately and expressed it in the

customary critical style. The "old musician," on the other hand, is

pedantically censorious, and the redoubtable Rellstab (in the Iris)

mercilessly condemnatory. Still, these two conservative critics, blinded

as they were by the force of habit to the excellences of the rising

star, saw what their progressive brethren overlooked in the ardour

of their admiration--namely, the super-abundance of ornament and

figuration. There is a grain of truth in the rather strong statement

of Rellstab that the composer "runs down the theme with roulades, and

throttles and hangs it with chains of shakes." What, however, Rellstab

and the "old musician"--for he, too, exclaims, "nothing but bravura and

figuration!"--did not see, but what must be patent to every candid and

unprejudiced observer, are the originality, piquancy, and grace of these

fioriture, roulades, &c., which, indeed, are unlike anything that

was ever heard or seen before Chopin's time. I say "seen," for the

configurations in the notation of this piece are so different from those

of the works of any other composer that even an unmusical person could

distinguish them from all the rest; and there is none of the timid

groping, the awkward stumbling of the tyro. On the contrary, the

composer presents himself with an ease and boldness which cannot but

command admiration. The reader will remember what the Viennese critic

said about Chopin's "aim"; that it was not to dazzle by the superficial

means of the virtuoso, but to impress by the more legitimate ones of the

genuine musician. This is true if we compare the Chopin of that day with

his fellow-virtuosos Kalkbrenner, Herz, &c.; but if we compare him with

his later self, or with Mozart, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Schumann, &c.,

the case is different. Indeed, there can be no doubt but that in

this and the other pieces of this group, Chopin's aim was that of the

virtuoso, only his nature was too rich, too noble, to sink into the

inanity of an insipid, conventional brilliancy. Moreover, whilst

maintaining that in the works specified language outruns in youthful

exuberance thought and emotion, I hasten to add that there are

premonitory signs--for instance, in the Op. 2 under discussion, more

especially in the introduction, the fifth variation, and the Finale--of

what as yet lies latent in the master's undeveloped creative power.

The Grande Fantaisie sur des airs polonais (A major) for the pianoforte

and orchestra, Op. 13, dedicated to J. P. Pixis, and published in April,

1834, and the Krakowiak, Grand Rondeau de Concert (F major) for the

pianoforte and orchestra, Op. 14, dedicated to the Princesse Adam

Czartoryska, and published in June, 1834, are the most overtly Polish

works of Chopin. Of the composition of the former, which, according

to Karasowski, was sketched in 1828, the composer's letters give no

information; but they contain some remarks concerning the latter. We

learn that the score of the Krakowiak was finished by December 27, 1828,

and find the introduction described as having "as funny an appearance

as himself in his pilot-cloth overcoat." In the Fantasia the composer

introduces and variates a Polish popular song (Juz miesiac zaszedl), and

an air by the Polish composer Kurpinski, and concludes with a Kujawiak,

a dance of the mazurka species, in 3-4 time, which derives its name from

the district called Kujawia. In connection with this composition I must

not omit to mention that the first variation on the Polish popular song

contains the germ of the charming Berceuse (Op. 57). The Rondo, Op. 14,

has the character of a Krakowiak, a dance in 2-4 time which originated

in Cracovia. In no other compositions of the master do the national

elements show themselves in the same degree of crudity; indeed, after

this he never incorporates national airs and imitates so closely

national dances. Chopin remains a true Pole to the end of his days, and

his love of and attachment to everything Polish increase with the

time of absence from his native country. But as the composer grows

in maturity, he subjects the raw material to a more and more thorough

process of refinement and development before he considers it fit for

artistic purposes; the popular dances are spiritualised, the national

characteristics and their corresponding musical idioms are subtilised

and individualised. I do not agree with those critics who think it is

owing to the strongly-marked, exclusive Polish national character that

these two works have gained so little sympathy in the musical world;

there are artistic reasons that account for the neglect, which is indeed

so great that I do not remember having heard or read of any virtuoso

performing either of these pieces in public till a few years ago, when

Chopin's talented countrywoman Mdlle. Janotha ventured on a revival

of the Fantasia, without, however, receiving, in spite of her finished

rendering, much encouragement. The works, as wholes, are not altogether

satisfactory in the matter of form, and appear somewhat patchy. This is

especially the case in the Fantasia, where the connection of parts is

anything but masterly. Then the arabesk-element predominates again quite

unduly. Rellstab discusses the Fantasia with his usual obtuseness, but

points out correctly that Chopin gives only here and there a few bars of

melody, and never a longer melodic strain. The best parts of the works,

those that contain the greatest amount of music, are certainly the

exceedingly spirited Kujawiak and Krakowiak. The unrestrained merriment

that reigns in the latter justifies, or, if it does not justify,

disposes us to forgive much. Indeed, the Rondo may be said to overflow

with joyousness; now the notes run at random hither and thither, now

tumble about head over heels, now surge in bold arpeggios, now skip

from octave to octave, now trip along in chromatics, now vent their

gamesomeness in the most extravagant capers.

The orchestral accompaniments, which in the Variations, Op. 2, are of

very little account, show in every one of the three works of this group

an inaptitude in writing for any other instrument than the piano that is

quite surprising considering the great musical endowments of Chopin in

other respects. I shall not dwell on this subject now, as we shall have

to consider it when we come to the composer's concertos.

The fundamental characteristics of Chopin's style--the loose-textured,

wide-meshed chords and arpeggios, the serpentine movements, the

bold leaps--are exaggerated in the works of this group, and in their

exaggeration become grotesque, and not unfrequently ineffective. These

works show us, indeed, the composer's style in a state of fermentation;

it has still to pass through a clearing process, in which some of its

elements will be secreted and others undergo a greater or less

change. We, who judge Chopin by his best works, are apt to condemn too

precipitately the adverse critics of his early compositions. But the

consideration of the luxuriance and extravagance of the passage-work

which distinguish them from the master's maturer creations ought to

caution us and moderate our wrath. Nay more, it may even lead us to

acknowledge, however reluctantly, that amidst the loud braying of

Rellstab there occurred occasionally utterances that were by no means

devoid of articulation and sense. Take, for instance, this--I do

not remember just now a propos of which composition, but it is very

appropriate to those we are now discussing:--"The whole striving of the

composer must be regarded as an aberration, based on decided talent,

we admit, but nevertheless an aberration." You see the most hostile of

Chopin's critics does not deny his talent; indeed, Rellstab sometimes,

especially subsequently, speaks quite patronisingly about him. I shall

take this opportunity to contradict the current notion that Chopin had

just cause to complain of backwardness in the recognition of his genius,

and even of malicious attacks on his rising reputation. The truth of

this is already partly disproved by the foregoing, and it will be fully

so by the sequel.

The pieces which I have formed into a third group show us the composer

free from the fetters that ambition and other preoccupations impose.

Besides Chopin's peculiar handling we find in them more of his

peculiar sentiment. If the works of the first group were interesting as

illustrating the development of the student, those of the second group

that of the virtuoso, and those of both that of the craftsman, the works

of the third group furnish us most valuable documents for the history of

the man and poet. The foremost in importance of the pieces comprised in

this group are no doubt the three polonaises, composed respectively

in the years 1827, 1828, and 1829. The bravura character is still

prominent, but, instead of ruling supreme, it becomes in every

successive work more and more subordinate to thought and emotion. These

polonaises, although thoroughly Chopinesque, nevertheless differ

very much from his later ones, those published by himself, which are

generally more compact and fuller of poetry. Moreover, I imagine I can

see in several passages the influence of Weber, whose Polonaise in E

flat minor, Polacca in E major, Sonata in A flat major, and Invitation

a la Valse (to mention a few apposite instances), respectively published

in 1810, 1819, 1816, and 1821, may be supposed to have been known to

Chopin. These reminiscences, if such they are, do not detract much from

the originality of the compositions; indeed, that a youth of eighteen

should have attained such a strongly-developed individuality as the D

minor Polonaise exhibits, is truly wonderful.

The Nocturne of the year 1827 (Op. 72, No. 1, E minor) is probably the

poorest of the early compositions, but excites one's curiosity as the

first specimen of the kind by the incomparable composer of nocturnes. Do

not misunderstand me, however, and imagine that I wish to exalt Chopin

at the expense of another great musician. Field has the glory not only

of having originated the genre, but also of having produced examples

that have as yet lost nothing, or very little, of their vitality. His

nocturnes are, indeed, a rich treasure, which, undeservedly neglected

by the present generation, cannot be superseded by those of his

illustrious, and now favoured successor. On the other hand, although

Field's priority and influence on Chopin must be admitted, the

unprejudiced cannot but perceive that the latter is no imitator. Even

where, as for instance in Op. 9, Nos. 1 and 2, the mejody or the form

of the accompaniment shows a distinct reminiscence of Field, such is

the case only for a few notes, and the next moment Chopin is what nobody

else could be. To watch a great man's growth, to trace a master's noble

achievements from their humble beginnings, has a charm for most minds.

I, therefore, need not fear the reader's displeasure if I direct his

attention to some points, notable on this account--in this case to

the wide-meshed chords and light-winged flights of notes, and the

foreshadowing of the Coda of Op. 9.

Of 1827 we have also a Mazurka in A minor, Op. 68, No. 2. It is simple

and rustic, and at the same time graceful. The trio (poco piu mosso),

the more original portion of the Mazurka, reappears in a slightly

altered form in later mazurkas. It is these foreshadowings of

future beauties, that make these early works so interesting. The

above-mentioned three polonaises are full of phrases, harmonic,

progressions, &c., which are subsequently reutilised in a. purer, more

emphatic, more developed, more epigrammatic, or otherwise more perfect

form. We notice the same in the waltzes which remain yet to be discussed

here.

Whether these Waltzes (in B minor, Op. 69, No. 2; and in E major,

without opus number) were really written in the early part of 1829, or

later on in the year, need not be too curiously inquired into. As I

have already remarked, they may certainly be classed along with the

above-discussed works. The first is the more interesting of them. In

both we meet with passages that point to more perfect specimens of the

kind--for instance, certain rhythmical motives, melodic inflections, and

harmonic progressions, to the familiar Waltzes in E flat major (Op.

18) and in A flat major (Op. 34, No. 1); and the D major portion of the

Waltz in B minor, to the C major part of the Waltz in A minor (Op. 34,

No. 2). This concludes our survey of the compositions of Chopin's first

period.

In the legacy of a less rich man, the Funeral March in C minor, Op. 72b,

composed (according to Fontana) in 1829, [FOOTNOTE: In Breitkopf and

Hartel's Gesammtausgabe of Chopin's works will be found 1826 instead of

1829. This, however, is a misprint, not a correction.]would be a notable

item; in that of Chopin it counts for little. Whatever the shortcomings

of this composition are, the quiet simplicity and sweet melancholy which

pervade it must touch the hearer. But the master stands in his own.

light; the famous Funeral March in B flat minor, from the Sonata in B

flat minor, Op. 35, composed about ten years later, eclipses the more

modest one in C minor. Beside the former, with its sublime force and

fervency of passion and imposing mastery of the resources of the art,

the latter sinks into weak insignificance, indeed, appears a mere

puerility. Let us note in the earlier work the anticipation, (bar 12) of

a motive of the chef-d'ceuvre (bar 7), and reminiscences of the Funeral

March from Beethoven's. Sonata in A flat major, Op. 26.

CHAPTER IX.

CHOPIN'S FIRST LOVE.--FRIENDSHIP WITH TITUS WOYCIECHOWSKI.--LIFE IN

WARSAW AFTER RETURNING FROM VIENNA.--VISIT TO PRINCE RADZIWILL AT

ANTONIN (OCTOBER, 1829).--NEW COMPOSITIONS.--GIVES TWO CONCERTS.

IN the preceding chapter I alluded to a new element that entered into

the life of Chopin and influenced his artistic work. The following

words, addressed by the young composer on October 3, 1829, to his friend

Titus Woyciechowski, will explain what kind of element it was and when

it began to make itself felt:--

Do not imagine that [when I speak of the advantages and

desirability of a stay in Vienua] I am thinking of Miss

Blahetka, of whom I have written to you; I have--perhaps to

my misfortune--already found my ideal, which I worship

faithfully and sincerely. Six months have elapsed, and I have

not yet exchanged a syllable with her of whom I dream every

night. Whilst my thoughts were with her I composed the Adagio

of my Concerto, and early this morning she inspired the Waltz

which I send along with this letter.

The influence of the tender passion on the development of heart and

mind cannot be rated too highly; it is in nine out of ten, if not in

ninety-nine out of a hundred cases that which transforms the rhymer into

a poet, the artificer into an artist. Chopin confesses his indebtedness

to Constantia, Schumann his to Clara. But who could recount all the

happy and hapless loves that have made poets? Countless is the number of

those recorded in histories, biographies, and anecdotes; greater still

the number of those buried in literature and art, the graves whence they

rise again as flowers, matchless in beauty, unfading, and of sweetest

perfume. Love is indeed the sun that by its warmth unfolds the

multitudinous possibilities that lie hidden, often unsuspected, in

the depths of the human soul. It was, then, according to Chopin, about

April, 1829, that the mighty power began to stir within him; and the

correspondence of the following two years shows us most strikingly how

it takes hold of him with an ever-increasing firmness of grasp, and

shakes the whole fabric of his delicate organisation with fearful

violence. The object of Chopin's passion, the being whom he worshipped

and in whom he saw the realisation of his ideal of womanhood, was

Constantia Gladkowska, a pupil at the Warsaw Conservatorium, of whom the

reader will learn more in the course of this and the next chapter.

What reveals perhaps more distinctly than anything else Chopin's

idiosyncrasy is his friendship for Titus Woyciechowski. At any rate, it

is no exaggeration to say that a knowledge of the nature of Chopin's two

passions, his love and his friendship--for this, too, was a passion

with him--gives into our hands a key that unlocks all the secrets of

his character, of his life, and of their outcome--his artistic work. Nay

more, with a full comprehension of, and insight into, these passions

we can foresee the sufferings and disappointments which he is fated to

endure. Chopin's friendship was not a common one; it was truly and in

the highest degree romantic. To the sturdy Briton and gay Frenchman it

must be incomprehensible, and the German of four or five generations ago

would have understood it better than his descendant of to-day is likely

to do. If we look for examples of such friendship in literature, we

find the type nowhere so perfect as in the works of Jean Paul Richter.

Indeed, there are many passages in the letters of the Polish composer

that read like extracts from the German author: they remind us of the

sentimental and other transcendentalisms of Siebenkas, Leibgeber, Walt,

Vult, and others. There was somethine in Chopin's warm, tender, effusive

friendship that may be best characterised by the word "feminine."

Moreover, it was so exacting, or rather so covetous and jealous, that

he had often occasion to chide, gently of course, the less caressing and

enthusiastic Titus. Let me give some instances.

December 27th, 1828.--If I scribble to-day again so much

nonsense, I do so only in order to remind you that you are as

much locked in my heart as ever, and that I am the same Fred

I was. You do not like to be kissed; but to-day you must

permit me to do so.

The question of kissing is frequently brought up.

September 12th, 1829.--I embrace you heartily, and kiss you

on your lips if you will permit me.

October 20th, 1829.--I embrace you heartily--many a one

writes this at the end ol his letter, but most people do so

with little thought of what they are writing. But you may

believe me, my dearest friend, that I do so sincerely, as

truly as my name is Fred.

September 4th, 1830.--Time passes, I must wash myself...do

not kiss me now...but you would not kiss me in any case--even

if I anointed myself with Byzantine oils--unless I forced you

to do so by magnetic means.

Did we not know the writer and the person addressed, one might imagine

that the two next extracts were written by a lover to his mistress or

vice versa.

November 14th, 1829.--You, my dearest one, do not require my

portrait. Believe me I am always with you, and shall not

forget you till the end of my life.

May 15th, 1830.--You have no idea how much I love you! If I

only could prove it to you! What would I not give if I could

once again right heartily embrace you!

One day he expresses the wish that he and his friend should travel

together. But this was too commonplace a sentiment not to be refined

upon. Accordingly we read in a subsequent letter as follows:--

September 18th, 1830.--I should not like to travel with you,

for I look forward with the greatest delight to the moment

when we shall meet abroad and embrace each other; it will be

worth more than a thousand monotonous days passed with you on

the journey.

From another passage in one of these letters we get a good idea of the

influence Titus Woyciechowski exercised on his friend.

April 10, 1830.--Your advice is good. I have already refused

some invitations for the evening, as if I had had a

presentiment of it--for I think of you in almost everything I

undertake. I do not know whether it comes from my having

learned from you how to feel and perceive; but when I compose

anything I should much like to know whether it pleases you;

and I believe that my second Concerto (E minor) will have no

value for me until you have heard it and approved of it.

I quoted the above passage to show how Chopin felt that this friendship

had been a kind of education to him, and how he valued his friend's

opinion of his compositions--he is always anxious to make Titus

acquainted with anything new he may have composed. But in this passage

there is another very characteristic touch, and it may easily be

overlooked, or at least may not receive the attention which it

deserves--I allude to what Chopin says of having had "a presentiment."

In superstitiousness he is a true child of his country, and all the

enlightenment of France did not succeed in weaning him from his belief

in dreams, presentiments, good and evil days, lucky and unlucky numbers,

&c. This is another romantic feature in the character of the composer;

a dangerous one in the pursuit of science, but advantageous rather than

otherwise in the pursuit of art. Later on I shall have to return to

this subject and relate some anecdotes, here I shall confine myself to

quoting a short passage from one of his early letters.

April 17, 1830.--If you are in Warsaw during the sitting of

the Diet, you will come to my concert--I have something like

a presentiment, and when I also dream it, I shall firmly

believe it.

And now, after these introductory explanations, we will begin the

chapter in right earnest by taking up the thread of the story where we

left it. On his return to Warsaw Chopin was kept in a state of mental

excitement by the criticisms on his Vienna performances that appeared

in German papers. He does not weary of telling his friend about them,

transcribing portions of them, and complaining of Polish papers which

had misrepresented the drift and mistranslated the words of them. I do

not wonder at the incorrectness of the Polish reports, for some of these

criticisms are written in as uncouth, confused, and vague German as I

ever had the misfortune to turn into English. One cannot help thinking,

in reading what Chopin says with regard to these matters, that he showed

far too much concern about the utterances of the press, and far too much

sensitiveness under the infliction of even the slightest strictures.

That, however, the young composer was soon engaged on new works may be

gathered from the passage (Oct. 3, 1829), quoted at the commencement

of this chapter, in which he speaks of the Adagio of a concerto, and

a waltz, written whilst his thoughts were with his ideal. These

compositions were the second movement of the F minor Concerto and the

Waltz, Op. 70, No. 3. But more of this when we come to discuss the works

which Chopin produced in the years 1829 and 1830.

One of the most important of the items which made up our friend's

musical life at this time was the weekly musical meetings at the house

of Kessler, the pianist-composer characterised in Chapter X. There all

the best artists of Warsaw assembled, and the executants had to play

prima vista whatever was placed before them. Of works performed at

two of these Friday evening meetings, we find mentioned Spohr's Octet,

described by Chopin as "a wonderful work"; Ries's Concerto in C sharp

minor (played with quartet accompaniment), Hummel's Trio in E major,

Prince Louis Ferdinand of Prussia's Quartet, and Beethoven's last Trio,

which, Chopin says, he could not but admire for its magnificence and

grandeur. To Brzezina's music-shop he paid a visit every day, without

finding there, however, anything new, except a Concerto by Pixis, which

made no great impression upon him. That Chopin was little satisfied with

his situation may be gathered from the following remarks of his:--

You cannot imagine how sad Warsaw is to me; if I did not feel

happy in my home circle I should not like to live here. Oh,

how bitter it is to have no one with whom one can share joy

and sorrow; oh, how dreadful to feel one's heart oppressed

and to be unable to express one's complaints to any human

soul! You know full well what I mean. How often do I tell my

piano all that I should like to impart to you!

Of course the reader, who is in the secret, knows as well as Titus knew,

to whom the letter was addressed, that Chopin alludes to his love. Let

us mark the words in the concluding sentence about the conversations

with his piano. Chopin was continually occupied with plans for going

abroad. In October, 1829, he writes that, wherever fate may lead him, he

is determined not to spend the winter in Warsaw. Nevertheless, more

than a year passed away before he said farewell to his native city. He

himself wished to go to Vienna, his father seems to have been in favour

of Berlin. Prince Radziwill and his wife had kindly invited him to come

to the Prussian capital, and offered him apartments in their palais. But

Chopin was unable to see what advantages he could derive from a stay in

Berlin. Moreover, unlike his father, he believed that this invitation

was no more than "de belles paroles." By the way, these remarks of

Chopin's furnish a strong proof that the Prince was not his patron and

benefactor, as Liszt and others have maintained. While speaking of his

fixed intention to go somewhere, and of the Prince's invitation,

Chopin suddenly exclaims with truly Chopinesque indecision and

capriciousness:--

But what is the good of it all? Seeing that I have begun so

many new works, perhaps the wisest thing I can do is to stay

here.

Leaving this question undecided, he undertook in October, 1829, a

journey to Posen, starting on the 20th of that month. An invitation from

Prince Radziwill was the inducement that led him to quit the paternal

roof so soon after his return to it. His intention was to remain only a

fortnight from home, and to visit his friends, the Wiesiolowskis, on the

way to Antonin. Chopin enjoyed himself greatly at the latter place. The

wife of the Prince, a courteous and kindly lady, who did not gauge a

man's merits by his descent, found the way to the heart of the composer

by wishing to hear every day and to possess as soon as possible

his Polonaise in F minor (Op. 71, No. 3). The young Princesses, her

daughters, had charms besides those of their beauty. One of them played

the piano with genuine musical feeling.

I have written [reports Chopin to his friend Titus on

November 14, 1829] during my visit at Prince Radziwill's an

Alla Polacca with violoncello. It is nothing more than a

brilliant salon piece, such as pleases ladies. I would like

Princess Wanda to practise it, so that it might be said that

I had taught her. She is only seventeen years old and

beautiful; it would be delightful to have the privilege of

placing her pretty fingers on the keys. But, joking apart,

her soul is endowed with true musical feeling, and one does

not need to tell her whether she is to play crescendo, piano,

or pianissimo.

According to Liszt, Chopin fondly remembered his visits to Antonin, and

told many an anecdote in connection with them.

The Princess Elisa, one of the daughters of Prince Radziwill,

who died in the first bloom of her life, left him [Chopin]

the sweet image of an angel exiled for a short period here

below.

A passage in the letter of Chopin from which I last quoted throws also a

little light on his relation to her.

You wished one of my portraits; if I could only have pilfered

one of Princess Elisa's, I should certainly have sent it; for

she has two portraits of me in her album, and I am told that

these drawings are very good likenesses.

The musical Prince would naturally be attracted by, and take an interest

in, the rising genius. What the latter's opinion of his noble friend as

a composer was, he tells Titus Woyciechowski at some length. I may here

say, once for all, that all the letters from which extracts are given in

this chapter are addressed to this latter.

You know how the Prince loves music; he showed me his "Faust"

and I found in it some things that are really beautiful,

indeed, in part even grandly conceived. In confidence, I

should not at all have credited the Namiestnik [governor,

lord-lieutenant] with such music! Among other things I was

struck by a scene in which Mephistopheles allures Margaret to

the window by his singing and guitar-playing, while at the

same time a chorale is heard from the neighbouring church.

This is sure to produce a great effect at a performance. I

mention this only that you may form an idea of his musical

conceptions. He is a great admirer of Gluck. Theatrical music

has, in his opinion, significance only in so far as it

illustrates the situation and emotion; the overture,

therefore, has no close, and leads at once into the

introduction. The orchestra is placed behind the stage and is

always invisible, in order that the attention of the audience

may not be diverted by external, such as the movements of the

conductor and executants.

Chopin enjoyed himself so much at Antonin that if he had consulted only

his pleasure he would have stayed till turned out by his host. But,

although he was asked to prolong his visit, he left this "Paradise" and

the "two Eves" after a sojourn of eight days. It was his occupations,

more especially the F minor Concerto, "impatiently waiting for its

Finale," that induced him to practise this self-denial. When Chopin

had again taken possession of his study, he no doubt made it his first

business, or at least one of the first, to compose the wanting movement,

the Rondo, of his Concerto; as, however, there is an interval of more

than four months in his extant letters, we hear no more about it till

he plays it in public. Before his visit to Antonin (October 20, 1829) he

writes to his friend that he has composed "a study in his own manner,"

and after the visit he mentions having composed "some studies."

Chopin seems to have occasionally played at the Ressource. The reader

will remember the composer's intention of playing there with Fontana his

Rondo for two pianos. On November 14, 1829, Chopin informs his friend

Titus that on the preceding Saturday Kessler performed Hummel's E major

Concerto at the Ressource, and that on the following Saturday he himself

would perhaps play there, and in the case of his doing so choose for his

piece his Variations, Op. 2. Thus composing, playing, and all the time

suffering from a certain loneliness--"You cannot imagine how everywhere

in Warsaw I now find something wanting! I have nobody with whom I can

speak, were it only two words, nobody whom I can really trust"--the day

came when he gave his first concert in his native city. This great event

took place on March 17, 1830, and the programme contained the following

pieces:--

PART I

1. Overture to the Opera "Leszek Bialy," by Elsner.

2. Allegro from the Concerto in F minor, composed and played

by F. Chopin.

3. Divertissement for the French horn, composed and played by

Gorner.

4. Adagio and Rondo from the Concerto in F minor, composed

and played by Chopin.

PART II

1. Overture to the Opera "Cecylja Piaseczynska," by

Kurpinski.

2. Variations by Paer, sung by Madame Meier.

3. Pot-pourri on national airs, composed and played by

Chopin.

Three days before the concert, which took place in the theatre, neither

box nor reserved seat was to be had. But Chopin complains that on the

whole it did not make the impression he expected. Only the Adagio

and Rondo of his Concerto had a decided success. But let us see the

concert-giver's own account of the proceedings.

The first Allegro of the F minor Concerto (not intelligible

to all) received indeed the reward of a "Bravo," but I

believe this was given because the public wished to show that

it understands and knows how to appreciate serious music.

There are people enough in all countries who like to assume

the air of connoisseurs! The Adagio and Rondo produced a very

great effect. After these the applause and the "Bravos" came

really from the heart; but the Pot-pourri on Polish airs

missed its object entirely. There was indeed some applause,

but evidently only to show the player that the audience had

not been bored.

We now hear again the old complaint that Chopin's playing was too

delicate. The opinion of the pit was that he had not played loud enough,

whilst those who sat in the gallery or stood in the orchestra seem to

have been better satisfied. In one paper, where he got high praise, he

was advised to put forth more energy and power in the future; but Chopin

thought he knew where this power was to be found, and for the next

concert got a Vienna instrument instead of his own Warsaw one. Elsner,

too, attributed the indistinctness of the bass passages and the weakness

of tone generally to the instrument. The approval of some of the

musicians compensated Chopin to some extent for the want of appreciation

and intelligence shown by the public at large "Kurpinski thought he

discovered that evening new beauties in my Concerto, and Ernemann was

fully satisfied with it." Edouard Wolff told me that they had no idea in

Warsaw of the real greatness of Chopin. Indeed, how could they? He

was too original to be at once fully understood. There are people who

imagine that the difficulties of Chopin's music arise from its Polish

national characteristics, and that to the Poles themselves it is as

easy as their mother-tongue; this, however, is a mistake. In fact,

other countries had to teach Poland what is due to Chopin. That the

aristocracy of Paris, Polish and native, did not comprehend the whole

Chopin, although it may have appreciated and admired his sweetness,

elegance, and exquisiteness, has been remarked by Liszt, an eye and

ear-witness and an excellent judge. But his testimony is not needed to

convince one of the fact. A subtle poet, be he ever so national, has

thoughts and corresponding language beyond the ken of the vulgar, who

are to be found in all ranks, high and low. Chopin, imbued as he

was with the national spirit, did nevertheless not manifest it in

a popularly intelligible form, for in passing through his mind it

underwent a process of idealisation and individualisation. It has been

repeatedly said that the national predominates over the universal in

Chopin's music; it is a still less disputable truth that the individual

predominates therein over the national. There are artist-natures whose

tendency is to expand and to absorb; others again whose tendency is to

contract and to exclude. Chopin is one of the most typical instances of

the latter; hence, no wonder that he was not at once fully understood by

his countrymen. The great success which Chopin's subsequent concerts in

Warsaw obtained does not invalidate E. Wolff's statement, which indeed

is confirmed by the composer's own remarks on the taste of the public

and its reception of his compositions. Moreover, we shall see that those

pieces pleased most in which, as in the Fantasia and Krakowiak, the

national raw material was merely more or less artistically dressed up,

but not yet digested and assimilated; if the Fantasia left the audience

cold at the first concert, this was no doubt owing to the inadequacy of

the performance.

No sooner was the first concert over than, with his head still full of

it, Chopin set about making preparations for a second, which took place

within a week after the first. The programme was as follows:--

PART I

1. Symphony by Nowakowski.

2. Allegro from the Concerto in F minor, composed and played by Chopin.

3. Air Varie by De Beriot, played by Bielawski.

4. Adagio and Rondo from the Concerto in F minor, composed and played by

Chopin.

PART II

1. Rondo Krakowiak, composed and played by Chopin.

2. Aria from "Elena e Malvina" by Soliva, sung by Madame Meier.

3. Improvisation on national airs.

This time the audience, which Chopin describes as having been more

numerous than at any other concert, was satisfied. There was no end to

the applause, and when he came forward to bow his acknowledgments there

were calls of "Give another concert!" The Krakowiak produced an immense

effect, and was followed by four volleys of applause. His improvisation

on the Polish national air "W miescie dziwne obyczaje" pleased only the

people in the dress-circle, although he did not improvise in the way he

had intended to do, which would not have been suitable for the audience

that was present. From this and another remark, that few of the haute

volee had as yet heard him, it appears that the aristocracy, for the

most part living on their estates, was not largely represented at the

concert. Thinking as he did of the public, he was surprised that the

Adagio had found such general favour, and that he heard everywhere the

most flattering remarks. He was also told that "every note sounded like

a bell," and that he had "played much better on the second than on the

first instrument." But although Elsner held that Chopin could only be

judged after the second concert, and Kurpinski and others expressed

their regret that he did not play on the Viennese instrument at the

first one, he confesses that he would have preferred playing on his

own piano. The success of the concerts may be measured by the

following facts: A travelling virtuoso and former pupil of the Paris

Conservatoire, Dunst by name, offered in his enthusiasm to treat Chopin

with champagne; the day after the second concert a bouquet with a poem

was sent to him; his fellow-student Orlowski wrote mazurkas and waltzes

on the principal theme of the Concerto, and published them in spite of

the horrified composer's request that he should not do so; Brzezina, the

musicseller, asked him for his portrait, but, frightened at the prospect

of seeing his counterfeit used as a wrapper for butter and cheese,

Chopin declined to give it to him; the editor of the "Courier" inserted

in his paper a sonnet addressed to Chopin. Pecuniarily the concerts

were likewise a success, although the concert-giver was of a different

opinion. But then he seems to have had quite prima donna notions about

receipts, for he writes very coolly: "From the two concerts I had,

after deduction of all expenses, not as much as 5,000 florins (about 125

pounds)." Indeed, he treats this part of the business very cavalierly,

and declares that money was no object with him. On the utterances of the

papers, which, of course, had their say, Chopin makes some sensible and

modest comments.

After my concerts there appeared many criticisms; if in them

(especially in the "Kuryer Polski") abundant praise was

awarded to me, it was nevertheless not too extravagant. The

"Official Journal" has also devoted some columns to my

praise; one of its numbers contained, among other things,

such stupidities--well meant, no doubt--that I was quite

desperate till I had read the answer in the "Gazeta Polska,"

which justly takes away what the other papers had in their

exaggeration attributed to me. In this article it is said

that the Poles will one day be as proud of me as the Germans

are of Mozart, which is palpable nonsense. But that is not

all, the critic says further: "That if I had fallen into the

hands of a pedant or a Rossinist (what a stupid expression!)

I could not have become what I am." Now, although I am as yet

nothing, he is right in so far that my performance would be

still less than it actually is if I had not studied under

Elsner.

Gratifying as the praise of the press no doubt was to Chopin, it became

a matter of small account when he thought of his friend's approving

sympathy. "One look from you after the concert would have been worth

more to me than all the laudations of the critics here." The concerts,

however, brought with them annoyances as well as pleasures. While one

paper pointed out Chopin's strongly-marked originality, another advised

him to hear Rossini, but not to imitate him. Dobrzynski, who expected

that his Symphony would be placed on one of the programmes, was angry

with Chopin for not doing so; a lady acquaintance took it amiss that a

box had not been reserved for her, and so on. What troubled our friend

most of all, and put him quite out of spirits, was the publication of

the sonnet and of the mazurkas; he was afraid that his enemies would

not let this opportunity pass, and attack and ridicule him. "I will no

longer read what people may now write about me," he bursts out in a fit

of lachrymose querulousness. Although pressed from many sides to give

a third concert, Chopin decided to postpone it till shortly before

his departure, which, however, was farther off than he imagined.

Nevertheless, he had already made up his mind what to play--namely,

the new Concerto (some parts of which had yet to be composed) and, by

desire, the Fantasia and the Variations.

CHAPTER X.

1829-1830.

MUSIC IN THE WARSAW SALONS.--MORE ABOUT CHOPIN'S CAUTION.--MUSICAL

VISITORS TO THE POLISH CAPITAL: WORLITZER, MDLLE. DE BELLEVILLE, MDLLE.

SONTAG, &c.--SOME OF CHOPIN'S ARTISTIC AND OTHER DOINGS; VISIT

TO POTURZYN.--HIS LOVE FOR CONSTANTIA GLADKOWSKA.--INTENDED AND

FREQUENTLY-POSTPONED DEPARTURE FOR ABROAD; IRRESOLUTION.--THE E MINOR

CONCERTO AND HIS THIRD CONCERT IN WARSAW.--DEPARTS AT LAST.

After the turmoil and agitation of the concerts, Chopin resumed the even

tenor of his Warsaw life, that is to say, played, composed, and went

to parties. Of the latter we get some glimpses in his letters, and they

raise in us the suspicion that the salons of Warsaw were not overzealous

in the cultivation of the classics. First we have a grand musical

soiree at the house of General Filipeus, [F-ootnote: Or Philippeus] the

intendant of the Court of the Grand Duke Constantine. There the Swan

of Pesaro was evidently in the ascendant, at any rate, a duet from

"Semiramide" and a buffo duet from "Il Turco in Italia" (in this Soliva

took a part and Chopin accompanied) were the only items of the musical

menu thought worth mentioning by the reporter. A soiree at Lewicki's

offers matter of more interest. Chopin, who had drawn up the programme,

played Hummel's "La Sentinelle" and his Op. 3, the Polonaise for

piano and violoncello composed at Antonin with a subsequently-added

introduction; and Prince Galitzin was one of the executants of a quartet

of Rode's. Occasionally, however, better works were performed. Some

months later, for instance, at the celebration of a gentleman's

name-day, Spohr's Quintet for piano, flute, clarinet, horn, and bassoon

was played. Chopin's criticism on this work is as usual short:--

Wonderfully beautiful, but not quite suitable for the piano.

Everything Spohr has written for the piano is very difficult,

indeed, sometimes it is impossible to find any fingering for

his passages.

On Easter-day, the great feasting day of the Poles, Chopin was invited

to breakfast by the poet Minasowicz. On this occasion he expected to

meet Kurpinski; and as in the articles which had appeared in the papers

a propos of his concerts the latter and Elsner had been pitted against

each other, he wondered what would be the demeanour of his elder

fellow-countryman and fellow-composer towards him. Remembering Chopin's

repeated injunctions to his parents not to mention to others his remarks

on musicians, we may be sure that in this as in every other case

Chopin proceeded warily. Here is another striking example of this

characteristic and highly-developed cautiousness. After hearing the

young pianist Leskiewicz play at a concert he writes:--

It seems to me that he will become a better player than

Krogulski; but I have not yet dared to express this opinion,

although I have been often asked to do so.

In the first half of April, 1830, Chopin was so intent on finishing the

compositions he had begun that, greatly as he wished to pay his friend

Titus Woyciechowski a visit at his country-seat Poturzyn, he determined

to stick to his work. The Diet, which had not been convoked for five

years, was to meet on the 28th of May. That there would be a great

concourse of lords and lordlings and their families and retinues

followed as a matter of course. Here, then, was an excellent opportunity

for giving a concert. Chopin, who remembered that the haute voice had

not yet heard him, did not overlook it. But be it that the Concerto was

not finished in time, or that the circumstances proved less favourable

than he had expected, he did not carry out his plan. Perhaps the

virtuosos poured in too plentifully. In those days the age of artistic

vagrancy had not yet come to an end, and virtuosity concerts were still

flourishing most vigorously. Blahetka of Vienna, too, had a notion of

coming with his daughter to Warsaw and giving some concerts there during

the sitting of the Diet. He wrote to Chopin to this effect, and asked

his advice. The latter told him that many musicians and amateurs had

indeed often expressed a desire to hear Miss Blahetka, but that the

expenses of a concert and the many distinguished artists who had arrived

or were about to arrive made the enterprise rather hazardous.

Now [says Chopin, the cautious, to his friend] he [Blahetka]

cannot say that I have not sufficiently informed him of the

state of things here! It is not unlikely that he will come. I

should be glad to see them, and would do what I could to

procure a full house for his daughter. I should most

willingly play with her on two pianos, for you cannot imagine

how kindly an interest this German [Mr. Blahetka] took in me

at Vienna.

Among the artists who came to Warsaw were: the youthful Worlitzer, who,

although only sixteen years of age, was already pianist to the King of

Prussia; the clever pianist Mdlle. de Belleville, who afterwards became

Madame Oury; the great violinist Lipinski, the Polish Paganini; and the

celebrated Henrietta Sontag, one of the brightest stars of the time.

Chopin's intercourse with these artists and his remarks on them are

worth noting: they throw light on his character as a musician and man

as well as on theirs. He relates that Worlitzer, a youth of Jewish

extraction, and consequently by nature very talented, had called on him

and played to him several things famously, especially Moscheles'

"Marche d'Alexandre variee." Notwithstanding the admitted excellence of

Worlitzer's playing, Chopin adds--not, however, without a "this remains

between us two"--that he as yet lacks much to deserve the title of

Kammer-Virtuos. Chopin thought more highly of Mdlle. de Belleville, who,

he says, "plays the piano beautifully; very airily, very elegantly,

and ten times better than Worlitzer." What, we may be sure, in no wise

diminished his good opinion of the lady was that she had performed his

Variations in Vienna, and could play one of them by heart. To picture

the object of Chopin's artistic admiration a little more clearly, let me

recall to the reader's memory Schumann's characterisation of Mdlle. de

Belleville and Clara Wieck.

They should not be compared. They are different mistresses of

different schools. The playing of the Belleville is

technically the finer of the two; Clara's is more

impassioned. The tone of the Belleville caresses, but does

not penetrate beyond the ear; that of Clara reaches the

heart. The one is a poetess; the other is poetry itself.

Chopin's warmest admiration and longest comments were, however, reserved

for Mdlle. Sontag. Having a little more than a year before her visit

to Warsaw secretly married Count Rossi, she made at the time we are

speaking of her last artistic tour before retiring, at the zenith of her

fame and power, into private life. At least, she thought then it was her

last tour; but pecuniary losses and tempting offers induced her in 1849

to reappear in public. In Warsaw she gave a first series of five or six

concerts in the course of a week, went then by invitation of the King

of Prussia to Fischbach, and from there returned to Warsaw. Her concerts

were remarkable for their brevity. She usually sang at them four times,

and between her performances the orchestra played some pieces. She

dispensed altogether with the assistance of other virtuosos. But Chopin

remarks that so great was the impression she made as a vocalist and the

interest she inspired as an artist that one required some rest after her

singing. Here is what the composer writes to his friend about her (June

5, 1830):--

...It is impossible for me to describe to you how great a pleasure the

acquaintance with this "God-sent one" (as some

enthusiasts justly call her) has given me. Prince Radziwitt

introduced me to her, for which I feel greatly obliged to

him. Unfortunately, I profited little by her eight days' stay

with us, and I saw how she was bored by dull visits from

senators, woyewods, castellans, ministers, generals, and

adjutants, who only sat and stared at her while they were

talking about quite indifferent things. She receives them all

very kindly, for she is so very good-natured that she cannot

be unamiable to anyone. Yesterday, when she was going to put

on her bonnet previously to going to the rehearsal, she was

obliged to lock the door of her room, because the servant in

the ante-room could not keep back the large number of

callers. I should not have one to her if she had not sent for

me, Radziwill having asked me to write out a song which he

has arranged for her. This is an Ukraine popular song

("Dumka") with variations. The theme and finale are

beautiful, but the middle section does not please me (and it

pleases Mdlle. Sontag even less than me). I have indeed made

some alterations, but it is still good for nothing. I am glad

she leaves after to-day's concert, because I shall pet rid of

this business, and when Radziwill comes at the close of the

Diet he may perhaps relinquish his variations.

Mdlle. Sontag is not beautiful, but in the highest degree

captivating; she enchants all with her voice, which indeed is

not very powerful, but magnificently cultivated. Her

diminuendo is the non plus ultra that can be heard; her

portamento wonderfully fine; her chromatic scales, especially

toward the upper part of her voice, unrivalled. She sang us

an aria by Mercadante, very, very beautifully; the variations

by Rode, especially the last roulades, more than excellently.

The variations on the Swiss theme pleased so much that, after

having several times bowed her acknowledgments for the

applause, she had to sing them da capo. The same thing

happened to her yesterday with the last of Rode's variations.

She has, moreover, performed the cavatina from "Il Barbiere",

as well as several arias from "La Gazza ladra" and from "Der

Freischutz". Well, you will hear for yourself what a

difference there is between her erformances and those we have

hitherto heard here. On one occasion was with her when Soliva

came with the Misses Gladkowska [the idea!] and Wolkaw, who

had to sing to her his duet which concludes with the words

"barbara sorte"--you may perhaps remember it. Miss Sontag

remarked to me, in confidence, that both voices were really

beautiful, but already somewhat worn, and that these ladies

must change their method of singing entirely if they did not

wish to run the risk of losing their voices within two years.

She said, in my presence, to Miss Wolkow that she possessed

much facility and taste, but had une voix trop aigue. She

invited both ladies in the most friendly manner to visit her

more frequently, promising to do all in her power to show and

teach them her own manner of singing. Is this not a quite

unusual politeness? Nay, I even believe it is coquetry so

great that it made upon me the impression of naturalness and

a certain naivete; for it is hardly to be believed that a

human being can be so natural unless it knows all the

resources of coquetry. In her neglige Miss Sontag is a

hundred times more beautiful and pleasing than in full

evening-dress. Nevertheless, those who have not seen her in

the morning are charmed with her appearance at the concert.

On her return she will give concerts up to the 22nd of the

month; then, as she herself told me, she intends to go to St.

Petersburg. Therefore, be quick, dear friend, and come at

once, so that you may not miss more than the five concerts

she has already given.

From the concluding sentence it would appear that Chopin had talked

himself out on the subject; this, however, is not the case, for after

imparting some other news he resumes thus:--

But I have not yet told you all about Miss Sontag. She has in

her rendering some entirely new broderies, with which she

produces great effect, but not in the same way as Paganini.

Perhaps the cause lies in this, that hers is a smaller genre.

She seems to exhale the perfume of a fresh bouquet of flowers

over the parterre, and, now caresses, now plays with her

voice; but she rarely moves to tears. Radziwill, on the other

hand, thinks that she sings and acts the last scene of

Desdemona in Othello in such a manner that nobody can refrain

from weeping. To-day I asked her if she would sing us

sometime this scene in costume (she is said to be an

excellent actress); she answered me that it was true that she

had often seen tears in the eyes of the audience, but that

acting excited her too much, and she had resolved to appear

as rarely as possible on the stage. You have but to come here

if you wish to rest from your rustic cares. Miss Sontag will

sing you something, and you will awake to life again and will

gather new strength for your labours.

Mdlle. Sontag was indeed a unique artist. In power and fulness of voice,

in impassioned expression, in dazzling virtuosity, and in grandeur of

style, she might be inferior to Malibran, Catalani, and Pasta; but in

clearness and sweetness of voice, in purity of intonation, in airiness,

neatness, and elegance of execution, and in exquisiteness of taste, she

was unsurpassed. Now, these were qualities particularly congenial to

Chopin; he admired them enthusiastically in the eminent vocalist,

and appreciated similar qualities in the pleasing pianist Mdlle. de

Belleville. Indeed, we shall see in the sequel that unless an artist

possessed these qualities Chopin had but little sympathy to bestow upon

him. He was, however, not slow to discover in these distinguished lady

artists a shortcoming in a direction where he himself was exceedingly

strong--namely, in subtlety and intensity of feeling. Chopin's

opinion of Mdlle. Sontag coincides on the whole with those of other

contemporaries; nevertheless, his account contributes some details which

add a page to her biography, and a few touches to her portraiture. It

is to be regretted that the arrival of Titus Woyciechowski in Warsaw

put for a time an end to Chopin's correspondence with him, otherwise we

should, no doubt, have got some more information about Mdlle. Sontag and

other artists.

While so many stars were shining, Chopin's light seems to have been

under an eclipse. Not only did he not give a concert, but he was even

passed over on the occasion of a soiree musicale at court to which

all the most distinguished artists then assembled at Warsaw were

invited--Mdlle. Sontag, Mdlle. de Belleville, Worlitzer, Kurpinski, &c.

"Many were astonished," writes Chopin, "that I was not invited to play,

but _I_ was not astonished." When the sittings of the Diet and the

entertainments that accompanied them came to a close Chopin paid a visit

to his friend Titus at Poturzyn, and on his return thence proceeded

with his parents to Zelazowa Wola to stay for some time at the Count

of Skarbek's. After leaving Poturzyn the picture of his friend's quiet

rural life continually rose up in Chopin's mind. A passage in one of his

letters which refers to his sojourn there seems to me characteristic of

the writer, suggestive of moods consonant with his nocturnes and many

cantilene in his other works:--

I must confess that I look back to it with great pleasure; I

feel always a certain longing for your beautiful country-

seat. The weeping-willow is always present to my mind; that

arbaleta! oh, I remember it so fondly! Well, you have teased

me so much about it that I am punished thereby for all my

sins.

And has he forgotten his ideal? Oh, no! On the contrary, his passion

grows stronger every day. This is proved by his frequent allusions to

her whom he never names, and by those words of restless yearning and

heart-rending despair that cannot be read without exciting a pitiful

sympathy. As before long we shall get better acquainted with the lady

and hear more of her--she being on the point of leaving the comparative

privacy of the Conservatorium for the boards that represent the

world--it may be as well to study the symptoms of our friend's

interesting malady.

The first mention of the ideal we find in the letter dated October 3,

1829, wherein he says that he has been dreaming of her every night for

the past six months, and nevertheless has not yet spoken to her. In

these circumstances he stood in need of one to whom he might confide his

joys and sorrows, and as no friend of flesh and blood was at hand, he

often addressed himself to the piano. And now let us proceed with our

investigation.

March 27, 1830.--At no time have I missed you so much as now.

I have nobody to whom I can open my heart.

April 17, 1830.--In my unbearable longing I feel better as

soon as I receive a letter from you. To-day this comfort was

more necessary than ever. I should like to chase away the

thoughts that poison my joyousness; but, in spite of all, it

is pleasant to play with them. I don't know myself what I

want; perhaps I shall be calmer after writing this letter.

Farther on in the same letter he says:--

How often do I take the night for the day, and the day for

the night! How often do I live in a dream and sleep during

the day, worse than if I slept, for I feel always the same;

and instead of finding refreshment in this stupor, as in

sleep, I vex and torment myself so that I cannot gain

strength.

It may be easily imagined with what interest one so far gone in love

watched the debut of Miss Gladkowska as Agnese in Paer's opera of the

same name. Of course he sends a full account of the event to his friend.

She looked better on the stage than in the salon; left nothing to be

desired in her tragic acting; managed her voice excellently up to the

high j sharp and g; shaded in a wonderful manner, and charmed her slave

when she sang an aria with harp accompaniment. The success of the lady,

however, was not merely in her lover's imagination, it was real; for at

the close of the opera the audience overwhelmed her with never-ending

applause. Another pupil of the Conservatorium, Miss Wolkow, made her

debut about the same time, discussions of the comparative merits of

the two ladies, on the choice of the parts in which they were going to

appear next, on the intrigues which had been set on foot for or against

them, &c., were the order of the day. Chopin discusses all these matters

with great earnestness and at considerable length; and, while not at

all stingy in his praise of Miss Wolkow, he takes good care that Miss

Gladkowska does not come off a loser:--

Ernemann is of our opinion [writes Chopin] that no singer can

easily be compared to Miss Gladkowska, especially as regards

just intonation and genuine warmth of feeling, which

manifests itself fully only on the stage, and carries away

the audience. Miss Wolkow made several times slight mistakes,

whereas Miss Gladkowska, although she has only been heard

twice in Agnese, did not allow the least doubtful note to

pass her lips.

The warmer applause given to Miss Wolkow did not disturb so staunch a

partisan; he put it to the account of Rossini's music which she sang.

When Chopin comes to the end of his account of Miss Gladkowska's first

appearance on the stage, he abruptly asks the question: "And what shall

I do now?" and answers forthwith: "I will leave next month; first,

however, I must rehearse my Concerto, for the Rondo is now finished."

But this resolve is a mere flash of energy, and before we have proceeded

far we shall come on words which contrast strangely with what we have

read just now. Chopin has been talking about his going abroad ever

so long, more especially since his return from Vienna, and will go on

talking about it for a long time yet. First he intends to leave Warsaw

in the winter of 1829-1830; next he makes up his mind to start in the

summer of 1830, the question being only whether he shall go to Berlin or

Vienna; then in May, 1830, Berlin is already given up, but the time of

his departure remains still to be fixed. After this he is induced by

the consideration that the Italian Opera season at Vienna does not begin

till September to stay at home during the hot summer months. How he

continues to put off the evil day of parting from home and friends we

shall see as we go on. I called Chopin's vigorously-expressed resolve a

flash of energy. Here is what he wrote not much more than a week after

(on August 31, 1830):--

I am still here; indeed, I do not feel inclined to go abroad.

Next month, however, I shall certainly go. Of course, only to

follow my vocation and reason, which latter would be in a

sorry plight if it were not strong enough to master every

other thing in my head.

But that his reason was in a sorry plight may be gathered from a letter

dated September 4, 1830, which, moreover, is noteworthy, as in the

confessions which it contains are discoverable the key-notes of the

principal parts that make up the symphony of his character.

I tell you my ideas become madder and madder every day. I am

still sitting here, and cannot make up my mind to fix

definitively the day of my departure. I have always a

presentiment that I shall leave Warsaw never to return to it;

I am convinced that I shall say farewell to my home for ever.

Oh, how sad it must be to die in any other place but where

one was born! What a great trial it would be to me to see

beside my death-bed an unconcerned physician and paid servant

instead of the dear faces of my relatives! Believe me, Titus,

I many a time should like to go to you and seek rest for my

oppressed heart; but as this is not possible, I often hurry,

without knowing why, into the street. But there also nothing

allays or diverts my longing. I return home to... long again

indescribably... I have not yet rehearsed my Concerto; in any

case I shall leave all my treasures behind me by Michaelmas.

In Vienna I shall be condemned to sigh and groan! This is the

consequence of having no longer a free heart! You who know

this indescribable power so well, explain to me the strange

feeling which makes men always expect from the following day

something better than the preceding day has bestowed upon

them? "Do not be so foolish!" That is all the answer I can

give myself; if you know a better, tell me, pray, pray....

After saying that his plan for the winter is to stay two months in

Vienna and pass the rest of the season in Milan, "if it cannot be

helped," he makes some remarks of no particular interest, and then comes

back to the old and ever new subject, the cud that humanity has been

chewing from the time of Adam and Eve, and will have to chew till the

extinction of the race, whether pessimism or optimism be the favoured

philosophy.

Since my return I have not yet visited her, and must tell you

openly that I often attribute the cause of my distress to

her; it seems to me as if people shared this view, and that

affords me a certain satisfaction. My father smiles at it;

but if he knew all, he would perhaps weep. Indeed, I am

seemingly quite contented, whilst my heart....

This is one of the occasions, which occur so frequently in Chopin's

letters, where he breaks suddenly off in the course of his emotional

outpourings, and subsides into effective silence. On such occasions one

would like to see him go to the piano and hear him finish the sentence

there. "All I can write to you now is indeed stupid stuff; only the

thought of leaving Warsaw..." Another musical opportunity! Where words

fail, there music begins.

Only wait, the day will come when you will not fare any

better. Man is not always happy; sometimes only a few moments

of happiness are granted to him in this life; therefore why

should we shun this rapture which cannot last long?

After this the darkness of sadness shades gradually into brighter

hues:--

As on the one hand I consider intercourse with the outer

world a sacred duty, so, on the other hand, I regard it as a

devilish invention, and it would be better if men... but I

have said enough!...

The reader knows already the rest of the letter; it is the passage in

which Chopin's love of fun gets the better of his melancholy, his joyous

spirits of his sad heart, and where he warns his friend, as it were with

a bright twinkle in his tearful eyes and a smile on his face, not to

kiss him at that moment, as he must wash himself. This joking about

his friend's dislike to osculation is not without an undercurrent of

seriousness; indeed, it is virtually a reproach, but a reproach cast in

the most delicate form and attired in feminine coquetry.

On September 18, 1830, Chopin is still in Warsaw. Why he is still there

he does not know; but he feels unspeakably happy where he is, and his

parents make no objections to this procrastination.

To-morrow I shall hold a rehearsal [of the E minor Concerto]

with quartet, and then drive to--whither? Indeed, I do not

feel inclined to go anywhere; but I shall on no account stay

in Warsaw. If you have, perhaps, a suspicion that something

dear to me retains me here, you are mistaken, like many

others. I assure you I should be ready to make any sacrifice

if only my own self were concerned, and I--although I am in

love--had yet to keep my unfortunate feelings concealed in my

bosom for some years to come.

Is it possible to imagine anything more inconsistent and self-delusive

than these ravings of our friend? Farther on in this very lengthy

epistle we come first of all once more to the pending question.

I was to start with the Cracow post for Vienna as early as

this day week, but finally I have given up that idea--you

will understand why. You may be quite sure that I am no

egoist, but, as I love you, am also willing to sacrifice

anything for the sake of others. For the sake of others, I

say, but not for the sake of outward appearance. For public

opinion, which is in high esteem among us, but which, you may

be sure, does not influence me, goes even so far as to call

it a misfortune if one wears a torn coat, a shabby hat, and

the like. If I should fail in my career, and have some day

nothing to eat, you must appoint me as clerk at Poturzyn.

There, in a room above the stables, I shall be as happy as I

was last summer in your castle. As long as I am in vigour and

health I shall willingly continue to work all my life. I have

often considered the question, whether I am really lazy or

whether I could work more without overexerting my strength.

Joking apart, I have convinced myself that I am not the worst

idler, and that I am able to work twice as much if necessity

demands it.

It often happens that he who wishes to better the opinion

which others have formed of him makes it worse; but, I think,

as regards you, I can make it neither better nor worse, even

if I occasionally praise myself. The sympathy which I have

for you forces your heart to have the same sympathetic

feelings for me. You are not master of your thoughts, but I

command mine; when I have once taken one into my head I do

not let it be taken from me, just as the trees do not let

themselves be robbed of their green garment which gives them

the charm of youth. With me it will be green in winter also,

that is, only in the head, but--God help me--in the heart the

greatest ardour, therefore, no one need wonder that the

vegetation is so luxuriant. Enough...yours for ever...Only

now I notice that I have talked too much nonsense. You see

yesterday's impression [he refers to the name-day festivity

already mentioned] has not yet quite passed away, I am still

sleepy and tired, because I danced too many mazurkas.

Around your letters I twine a little ribbon which my ideal

once gave me. I am glad the two lifeless things, the letters

and the ribbon, agree so well together, probably because,

although they do not know each other, they yet feel that they

both come from a hand dear to me.

Even the most courteous of mortals, unless he be wholly destitute of

veracity, will hesitate to deny the truth of Chopin's confession that

he has been talking nonsense. But apart from the vagueness and

illogicalness of several of the statements, the foregoing effusion is

curious as a whole: the thoughts turn up one does not know where, how,

or why--their course is quite unaccountable; and if they passed through

his mind in an unbroken connection, he fails to give the slightest

indication of it. Still, although Chopin's philosophy of life, poetical

rhapsodies, and meditations on love and friendship, may not afford us

much light, edification, or pleasure, they help us substantially to

realise their author's character, and particularly his temporary mood.

Great as was the magnetic power of the ideal over Chopin, great as was

the irresolution of the latter, the long delay of his departure must

not be attributed solely to these causes. The disturbed state of Europe

after the outbreak of the July revolution in Paris had also something to

do with this interminable procrastination. Passports could only be had

for Prussia and Austria, and even for these countries not by everyone.

In France the excitement had not yet subsided, in Italy it was nearing

the boiling point. Nor were Vienna, whither Chopin intended to go first,

and the Tyrol, through which he would have to pass on his way to Milan,

altogether quiet. Chopin's father himself, therefore, wished the journey

to be postponed for a short time. Nevertheless, our friend writes

on September 22 that he will start in a few weeks: his first goal is

Vienna, where, he says, they still remember him, and where he will forge

the iron as long as it is hot. But now to the climax of Chopin's amorous

fever.

I regret very much [he writes on September 22, 1830] that I

must write to you when, as to-day, I am unable to collect my

thoughts. When I reflect on myself I get into a sad mood, and

am in danger of losing my reason. When I am lost in my

thoughts--which is often the case with me--horses could

trample upon me, and yesterday this nearly happened in the

street without my noticing it. Struck in the church by a

glance of my ideal, I ran in a moment of pleasant stupor into

the street, and it was not till about a quarter of an hour

afterwards that I regained my full consciousness; I am

sometimes so mad that I am frightened at myself.

The melancholy cast of the letters cited in this chapter must not lead

us to think that despondence was the invariable state of Chopin's mind.

It is more probable that when his heart was saddest he was most disposed

to write to his friend his confessions and complaints, as by this means

he was enabled to relieve himself to some extent of the burden that

oppressed him. At any rate, the agitations of love did not prevent him

from cultivating his art, for even at the time when he felt the

tyranny of the passion most potently, he mentions having composed "some

insignificant pieces," as he modestly expresses himself, meaning, no

doubt, "short pieces." Meanwhile Chopin had also finished a

composition which by no means belongs to the category of "insignificant

pieces"--namely, the Concerto in E minor, the completion of which he

announces on August 21, 1830. A critical examination of this and other

works will be found in a special chapter, at present I shall speak only

of its performance and the circumstances connected with it.

On September 18, 1830, Chopin writes that a few days previously he

rehearsed the Concerto with quartet accompaniment, but that it does not

quite satisfy him:--

Those who were present at the rehearsal say that the Finale

is the most successful movement (probably because it is

easily intelligible). How it will sound with the orchestra I

cannot tell you till next Wednesday, when I shall play the

Concerto for the first time in this guise. To-morrow I shall

have another rehearsal with quartet.

To a rehearsal with full orchestra, except trumpets and drums (on

September 22, 1830), he invited Kurpinski, Soliva, and the select

musical world of Warsaw, in whose judgment, however, he professes to

have little confidence. Still, he is curious to know how--

the Capellmeister [Kurpinski] will look at the Italian

[Soliva], Czapek at Kessler, Filipeus at Dobrzynski, Molsdorf

at Kaczynski, Ledoux at Count Sohyk, and Mr. P. at us all. It

has never before occurred that all these gentlemen have been

assembled in one place; I alone shall succeed in this, and I

do it only out of curiosity!

The musicians in this company, among whom are Poles, Czechs, Germans,

Italians, &c., give us a good idea of the mixed character of the musical

world of Warsaw, which was not unlike what the musical world of London

is still in our day. From the above remark we see that Chopin had

neither much respect nor affection for his fellow-musicians; indeed,

there is not the slightest sign in his letters that an intimacy existed

between him and any one of them. The rehearsals of the Concerto keep

Chopin pretty busy, and his head is full of the composition. In the same

letter from which I quoted last we find the following passage:--

I heartily beg your pardon for my hasty letter of to-day; I

have still to run quickly to Elsner in order to make sure

that he will come to the rehearsal. Then I have also to

provide the desks and mutes, which I had yesterday totally

forgotten; without the latter the Adagio would be wholly

insignificant, and its success doubtful. The Rondo is

effective, the first Allegro vigorous. Cursed self-love! And

if it is anyone's fault that I am conceited it is yours,

egoist; he who associates with such a person becomes like

him. But in one point I am as yet unlike you. I can never

make up my mind quickly. But I have the firm will and the

secret intention actually to depart on Saturday week, without

pardon, and in spite of lamentations, tears, and complaints.

My music in the trunk, a certain ribbon on my heart, my soul

full of anxiety: thus into the post-chaise. To be sure,

everywhere in the town tears will flow in streams: from

Copernicus to the fountain, from the bank to the column of

King Sigismund; but I shall be cold and unfeeling as a stone,

and laugh at all those who wish to take such a heart-rending

farewell of me!

After the rehearsal of the Concerto with orchestra, which evidently made

a good impression upon the much-despised musical world of Warsaw, Chopin

resolved to give, or rather his friends resolved for him that he should

give, a concert in the theatre on October 11, 1830. Although he is

anxious to know what effect his Concerto will produce on the public,

he seems little disposed to play at any concert, which may be easily

understood if we remember the state of mind he is in.

You can hardly imagine [he writes] how everything here makes

me impatient, and bores me, in consequence of the commotion

within me against which I cannot struggle.

The third and last of his Warsaw concerts was to be of a more perfect

type than the two preceding ones; it was to be one "without those

unlucky clarinet and bassoon solos," at that time still so much in

vogue. To make up for this quantitative loss Chopin requested the Misses

Gladkowska and Wolkow to sing some arias, and obtained, not without much

trouble, the requisite permission for them from their master, Soliva,

and the Minister of Public Instruction, Mostowski. It was necessary to

ask the latter's permission, because the two young ladies were educated

as singers at the expense of the State.

The programme of the concert was as follows:--

PART I

1. Symphony by Gorner.

2. First Allegro from the Concerto in E minor, composed and

played by Chopin.

3. Aria with Chorus by Soliva, sung by Miss Wolkow.

4. Adagio and Rondo from the Concerto in E minor, composed

and played by Chopin.