The school of Cecilia was not only at the summit of the hill, it was
the only building on the summit; it was isolated, and in its isolation
grand. There were cottages in orchards, vine-gardens, fertile lands,
an ancient church, sprinkled upon the sides, or nestling in the
slopes; but itself looked lonely and consecrated, as in verity it
might be named. A belt of glorious trees, dark and dense as a Druid
grove, surrounded with an older growth the modern superstructure; but
its basis had been a feudal ruin, whose entrance still remained; a
hall, a wide waste of room, of rugged symmetry and almost twilight
atmosphere. A court-yard in front was paved with stone, and here were
carriages and unharnessed horses feeding happily. The doorway of the
hall was free; we entered together, and my companion left me one
moment while he made some arrangements with the porter, who was quite
alone in his corner. Otherwise silence reigned, and also it seemed
with solitude; for no one peered among the strong square pillars that
upheld as rude a gallery,--the approach to which was by a sweeping
staircase of the brightest oak with noble balustrades. Two figures in
bronze looked down from the landing-place on either hand, and as we
passed between them I felt their size, if not their beauty, overawe me
as the shadow of the entrance. They were, strange to say, not
counterparts, though companion forms of the same head, the same face,
the same dun laurel crown; but the one gathered its drapery to its
breast, and stretched its hand beckoningly towards the portal,--the
other with outstretched arm pointed with an expression almost
amounting to menace down the gallery. In niched archways there, one
door after another met the eye, massive and polished, but all closed.
I implicitly trusted in my companion. I felt sure he possessed a charm
to open all those doors, and I followed him as he still lightly, as if
upon grass, stepped from entrance to entrance, not pausing until he
reached the bend of the gallery. Here was a door unlike the
others,--wider, slighter, of cloth and glass; and stealing from within
those media, with a murmur soft as incense, came a mist of choral
sounds, confusing me and captivating me at once, so that I did not
care to stir until the mist dissolved and ceased, and I was yet by my
companion's side without the door.
"We may enter now, I think," he said; for he had waited reverently as
I, and he gently pushed those folds.
They slid back, and we entered a narrow lobby, very dim and
disenchanted looking. Still softly we proceeded to another door
within, which I had not discovered, and he touched that too with an
air of subtile and still authority. I was dazzled the first instant;
but he took my hand directly, and drew me forwards with him to a seat
in some region of enchantment. As I sat by him there I soon recovered
myself to the utmost, and beheld before me a sight which I shall not
easily forget, nor ever cease to hold as it was presented to me on
that occasion.
It was a vast and vaulted room; whether of delicate or decided
architecture I could not possibly declare, such a dream it was of
wreaths and mystic floral arches. Pillars twined with gold-bloomed
lime-branches rose burdened with them to the roof, there mixing into
the long festoons of oak-leaf that hung as if they grew there from the
gray-brown rafters. Everywhere was a drooping odor that had been
oppressive, most unendurably sweet, but for the strong air wafted and
ruffling through the open windows on either hand.
We were sitting quite behind all others, on the loftiest tier of
seats, that were raised step by step so gently upwards to the back,
and beneath us were seats all full, where none turned nor seemed to
talk; for all eyes were surely allured and riveted by the scenery to
the fronting end. It was a lofty, arched recess, spanning the extreme
width of the hall; a window, half a dome, of glass poured down a
condensed light upon two galleries within, which leaned into the form
of the arch itself, and were so thickly interlaced with green that
nothing else was visible except the figures which filled them,
draperied in white, side by side in shining rows,--like angels, so I
thought. Young men and boys above, in flowing robes as choristers,
overhung the maiden forms of the gallery below; and of these last,
every one wore roses on the breast, as well as glistening raiment.
These galleries of greenery were themselves overhanging a platform
covered with dark-green cloth, exquisitely fluted at the sides, and
drawn in front over three or four steps that raised it from the
flooring of the hall. A band in two divisions graced the ground floor.
I caught the sight immediately; but upon the platform itself stood a
pianoforte alone, a table covered with dark-green velvet, and about a
dozen dark-green velvet chairs. These last were all filled except one,
and its late occupant had pushed that one chair back while he stood at
the top of the table, with something glittering in his hand, and
other somethings glittering before him upon the dark-green surface. As
we entered, indeed, he was so standing, and I took in all I have
related with one glance, it was, though green, so definite.
"Look well at that gentleman who stands," whispered my guide, most
slowly; "it is he who is dispensing the prizes. He is Monsieur
Milans-Andre, whom you wished to see."
I am blessed with a long sight, and I took a long survey; but lest I
should prejudice the reader, my criticisms shall remain in limbo.
"When we heard the singing it was that he had just dispensed a medal;
and it is so the fellow-competitors hail the successful student. If I
mistake not, there is another advancing; but it is too far for us to
hear his name. Do you see your master at the awful table? But soft! I
think his face is not this way."
"Oh!" I thought, and I laughed in my sleeve, "he is dreaming I am safe
at home, if he dreams about me at all, which is a question." But I was
not looking after him; I took care to watch Milans-Andre, feeling sure
my guide would prefer not to be stared upon in a public place like
that.
The voice that called the candidates was high in key, and not
unrefined; but what best pleased me was to see one advance,--a boy,
all blushing and bowing to receive a golden medal, which Milans-Andre,
his very self, with his own hands, flung round the youngling's neck by
its long blue ribbon; for then the same sweet verse in semi-chorus
sounded from the loftiest gallery, the males alone repeating it for
their brother. I could not distinguish the words, but the style was
quite _alla Tedesca_.
Then another youth approached, and received more airily a silver
token, with the same blue ribbon and songful welcome. Another and
another, and at last the girls were called.
"See!" said my guide, "they have put the ladies last! That shall not
be when I take the reins of the committee. Oh, for the Cecilian
chivalry! what a taunting remembrance I will make it."
He was smiling, but I was surprised at the eagerness of his tones.
"Does it matter, sir?" said I.
"Signify? It signifies so much the more that it is a little thing, a
little token. But it shall not grow; it shall not swell. See, see!
look, Charles! what name was that?"
I had not heard it either, but the impetuosity in his tones was so
peculiar that I was constrained to look up at him. His eye was
dilated; a singular flash of light rather than flush of color glowed
upon his face, as if glory from the noonday sun had poured itself
through the impervious roof. But his gaze forbade my gaze, it was so
fixed and piercing upon something at the end of the hall.
Imperceptibly to myself I followed it. The first maiden who had
approached the chair was now turning to re-pass into her place. She
was clad, like the galleried ones, in white; but her whole aspect was
unlike theirs, for instead of the slow step and lingering blush, her
movement was a sort of flight, as if her feet were sandalled with the
wind, back again among the crowd; and as she fled, you could only
discern some strange gleam of unusual grace in a countenance drooping,
but not bashfully, and veiled with waves, not ringlets, of hair more
dark than pine-trees at midnight; also, it was impossible not to
notice the angry putting back of one gloved hand, which crushed up the
golden medal and an end of the azure ribbon, while the other was
trailing upon the ground.
"She does not like it; she is proud, I suppose!" said I; and I laughed
almost loud. "I thought you knew them all, sir?"
"No, Charles, I was never here before; but as I am to have something
to do with what they do soon, I thought I had a right to come to-day."
"A right!" said I; "who else, if you had not the right, sir? But still
I wonder how we got in so easily,--I mean I; for if you had not
brought me, I could not, I suppose, have come."
"It is this," he answered smiling, and he touched his professor's
cloak, or robe, which was now encircling his shoulders, and waved
about him pliantly. "They all wear the same on entering these walls,
at least who sit at the green table."
The choral welcome, meantime, had pealed from the lower gallery, and
another had advanced and retired from the ranks beneath. My companion
was intently gazing, not at the maiden troop, but at the deep festoons
above us. He seemed to see nothing there though, and the very position
of his hands, resting upon each other and entirely relaxed, bore
witness to the languor of his abstraction. It occurred to me how very
cool they were, both those who distributed, and those who received the
medals; I felt there was an absence of the strict romance, if I may so
name it, I had expected when I entered; for as we sat, and whence we
saw, all was ideal to the sight, and the sense was even lost in the
spiritual appreciation of an exact proportionateness to the occasion.
Yet the silence alternating with the rising and abating voices, the
harmony of the coloring and shadowing, the dim rustle of the green
festoons, the waftures of woody and blossomy fragrance, the indoor
forest feeling, so fresh and wild,--all should have stood me in stead,
perhaps, of the needless enthusiasm I should have looked for in such a
meeting, or have witnessed without surprise. I was not wise enough at
that time to define the precise degree and kind of enthusiasm I should
have required to content me, but perhaps it would be impossible even
now for any degree to content me, or for any kind not to find favor in
my eyes, if natural and spontaneously betrayed. The want I felt,
however, was just a twilight preparation of the faculties for the
scene that followed.
The last silver medal had been carried from the table, the last
white-robed nymph had sought her seat with the ribbon streaking her
drapery, when both the choral forces rose and sang together the
welcome in more exciting fulness. And then they all sat down, and a
murmur of voices and motion began to roll on all sides, as if some new
part were to be played over.
The band arose on either side, and after a short, deferential pause,
as if calling attention to something, commenced with perfect precision
Weber's "Jubel" overture.[15] It was my companion who told me its
name, whispering it into my ear; and I listened eagerly, having heard
of its author in every key of praise.
I did not much care for the effect, though it was as cool as needed to
be after those cool proceedings. I dearly wanted to ask him whether he
loved it; but it was unnecessary, for I could see it was even nothing
to him by his face. He seemed passing judgment proudly, furtively, on
all that chanced around him, and I could not but feel that he
searched all, governed all with his eye from that obscure corner.
Immediately on the conclusion of the overture several professors left
the table and clustered round the pianoforte. One opened it, and then
Milans-Andre approached, and waving his creamy gloves, unclothed his
hands, and stood at the front of the platform. Some boisterous shouts
arose,--they began near his station, and were imitated from the middle
benches; but there was an undemonstrative coldness even in these; they
seemed from the head, not the heart, as one might say. The artist did
not appear distressed,--indeed, he looked too classically self-reliant
to require encouragement.
He was what might be called extremely handsome. There was a largeness
about his features that would have told well in a bust,--they were
perfectly finished; also a Phidias could not have planed another
polish on the most oval nostril, a Canova could not have pumiced
unparted lips to more appropriate curve. His eyes were too far for me
to search, but I did not long to come at their full expression. He
stood elegantly, while the plaudits made their way among the muffling
leaves, and therein went to sleep; the golden flowers of the lindens
hung down withering, smitten by the terror of his presence! My
companion--to my surprise, my bewilderment even--applauded also, but,
as it were, mechanically; he stood beside me on that topmost tier
applauding, but his eyes were still fixed upon the roof. I heard his
voice among the others, and it was just at that instant that some one,
and _that_ some one in a professor's robe, a gentleman of sage
demeanor, started from one of the lower tiers and looked back suddenly
at him; as suddenly fired, flushed, lighted, all over his face, wise
and grave as it was. _He_ saw not, still rapt, still looking upwards;
but I saw and felt,--felt certain of the impressions received. A sort
of whisper crept along the tier,--a portentous thrill; one and
another, all turned, and before I could gather with my glance who had
left them, several seats were voided beneath us.
In a few minutes I heard a long and silver thundering chord. I knew it
was the reveille of the wonderful Milans-Andre; but so many persons
were standing and running that I could not see, and could scarcely
hear. Soon all must have heard less. As the keys continued to flash in
unmitigated splendor, a rushing noise seemed arising also from the
floor to the ceiling; it was, indeed, an earnest of my own pent-up
enthusiasm that could not be repressed, for I found myself shouting,
hurrahing beneath my breath, as all did around me. I was not mistaken;
some one opened the door by which we had entered, gustily, violently,
and drew my companion away. Before I thought of losing him, he was
gone,--I knew not whether led or carried; I knew not whether aroused
or in the midst of his high abstraction.
I pressed downwards, climbing over the benches, driving my way among
those who stood, that I might see all as well as feel; but at length I
stood upon a seat and beheld what was worth beholding, is bright to
remember; but oh, how hopeless to record! Just so might a painter
dream to pour upon his canvas an extreme effect of sunset,--those
gorgeous effusions of golden flame and blinding roses that are dashed
into dazzling mist before our hearts have gathered them to us, have
made them, in beauty so blazingly serene, our own.
The sound of the keys, so brilliant, grew dulled as by a tempest voice
in distance; not alone the hurrahs, the vivas, but the stir, the crash
of the dividing multitude. And before almost I could believe it, I
beheld moving through the cloven crowd that slight and unembarrassed
form; but he seemed alone to move as if urged by some potent
necessity, for his head was carried loftily, and there was not the
shadow of a smile upon his face.
It was evident that the people, between pressing and thronging, were
determined to conduct him to the platform; and it struck me, from his
hasty step and slightly troubled air, that he longed to reach it, for
calm to be restored. Milans-Andre, meantime,--will it be
believed?--continued playing, and scarcely raised his eyes as my
conductor at length mounted the steps, and seemed to my sight to
shrink among those who now stood about him. But it was hopeless to
restore the calm. I knew that from the first. He had no sooner trodden
the elevation than a burst of joyous welcome that drowned the keys,
that drenched the very ear, forced the pianist to quit his place. No
one looked at him of young or old, except those who had confronted him
at the table. They surrounded him, some with smiles and eager
questions; some with provoking gravity. The other was left alone to
stem, as it were, that tide of deafening acclaim; he slightly
compressed his lip, made a slight motion forwards; he lifted his hand
with the slight deprecation that modesty or pride might have suggested
alike,--still hopelessly. The arrears of enthusiasm demanded to be
paid with interest; the trampings, the shower-like claps, the shouts,
only deepened, widened tenfold: the multitude became a mob, and
frantic,--but with a glorious zeal! Some tore handfuls of the green
adorning the pillars, and passing it forward, it was strewn on the
steps. From the galleries hung the excited children, girls and boys,
and dividing their bouquets, rained the roses upon his head, that
floated, crimson and pink and pearly, to the green floor beneath his
feet. With a sort of delicate desperation he shook his hair from those
dropped flowers, and for one instant hid his face; the next, flung
down his hands, and smiled a flashing smile,--so that, from lip to
brow, it was as if some sunbeam fluttered in the cage of a rosy cloud,
smiling above, below, and everywhere it seemed,--ran round the group
of professors to the piano, and without seating himself, without
prelude, began a low and hymn-like melody.
Oh! that you had heard the lull, like a dream dying, dissolving from
the awakening brain,--the deep and tremendous, yet living and
breathing stillness,--that sank upon each pulse of that enthusiasm
raised and fanned by him, and by him absorbed and hidden to brood and
be at rest!
I know not which I felt the most, the passion of that almost bursting
heart of silence, as it were, rolled together into a purple bud from
its noon-day efflorescence by the power that had alone been able to
unsheathe its glories,--or that stealing, creeping People's Song, that
in few and simple chords, beneath one slender, tender pair of hands,
held bound, as it were, and condensed in one voice the voice of
myriads. For myself, I writhed with bliss, I was petrified into
desolation by delight; but I was not singular on that occasion, for
those around me seemed alone to live, to breathe, that they might
receive and retain those few precious golden notes, and learn those
glorious lineaments, so pale, so radiant with the suddenly starting
hectic, as his hands still stirred the keys to a fiercer inward
harmony than that they veiled by touch.
It was not long, that holy People's Song; I scarcely think it lasted
five minutes,--certainly not more; but the effect may be better
conceived, and the power of the player appreciated, when I say not
one note was lost: each sounded, rang almost hollow, in the intense
pervading silence.
"It is over," I thought, as he raised those slender hands, after a
rich reverberating pause on the final chord, swelling with dim
arpeggios on the harmony as into the extreme of vaulting
distance,--"it is over; and they will make that dreadful noise unless
he plays again." Never have I been so mistaken: but how could I
anticipate aught of him? For as he moved he fixed his eyes upon the
audience, so that each individual must have felt the glance within his
soul,--so seemed to feel it; for it expressed a command sheathed in a
supplication, unearthly, irresistible, that the applause should not be
renewed.
There was perfect stillness, and he turned to Milans-Andre and spoke.
Every one beneath the roof must have heard his words, for they were
distinct as authoritatively serene. "Will you be so good as to resume
your seat?" And as if swayed by some angel power,--such as drove the
ass of Balaam to the wall,--the imperial pianist sat down, flushed and
rather ruffled, but with a certain pomp it was trying to me to
witness, and re-commenced the concerto which had been so opportunely
interrupted. Attention seemed restored, so far as the ear of the
multitude was concerned; but every eye wandered to him who now stood
behind the player and turned the leaves of the composition under
present interpretation. _He_ seemed attentive enough,--not the
slightest motion of his features betrayed an unsettled thought. His
eyes were bent proudly, but calmly, upon the page; the rose light had
faded from his cheek as the sunset flows from heaven into
eternity,--but how did he feel? Hopeless to record, because hopeless
to imagine. Perhaps nothing; the triumph so short but bright had no
doubt become such phantasm as an unnoticeable yesterday to one whose
future is fraught with expectation.
The concerto was long and elaborately handled. I felt I really should
have admired it, have been thereby instructed, had not _he_ been
there. But there is something grotesque in talent when genius, even in
repose, is by. It is as the splendor of a festive illumination when
the sun is rising upon the city; that brightness of the night turns
pale and sick, while the celestial darkness is passing away into day.
There was an oppression upon all that I heard, for something different
had unprepared me for anything, everything, except something else like
itself. The committee were again at the table, and when I grew weary
of the second movement, I looked for my master, and found him exactly
opposite, but certainly not conscious of me. His beard was
delightfully trimmed, and his ink-black eyebrows were just as usual;
but I had never seen such an expression as that with which he regarded
the _one_. It was as if a stone had rolled from his heart, and it had
begun to beat like a child's; it was as if his youth were renewed,
like the eagle's; it was as if he were drinking, silently but deeply,
celestial knowledge from those younger heavenly eyes. "Does he love
him so well, then?" thought I. Oh that I had known it, Aronach, for
then I should have loved you, have found you out! But of course you
don't think we are worthy to partake such feeling, and I don't know
but that you are right to keep it from us. "Would that concerto never
be over?" was my next surmise,--it was about the longest process of
exhaustion to which I had ever been subjected. As for me, I yawned
until I was dreadfully ashamed; but when I bethought myself to look
round, lo! there were five or six just out of yawns as well, and a few
who had passed that stage and closed their eyes. It never struck me as
unconscionable that we should tire, when we might gaze upon the face
of him who had shown himself ready to control us all; indeed, I do
believe that had there been nothing going on, no concerto, no
Milans-Andre, but that he had stood there silent, just as calm and
still,--we should never have wearied the whole day long of feeding
upon the voiceless presence, the harmony unresolved. But do you not
know, oh, reader! the depression, the protracted suffering occasioned
by the contemplation of any work of art--in music, in verse, in color,
or in form--that is presented to us as model, that we coaxed to admire
and enticed to appreciate, after we have accidentally but immediately
beforehand experienced one of those ideal sensations that, whether
awakened by Nature, by Genius, or by Passion suddenly elated, claim
and condense our enthusiasm, so that we are not aware of its existence
except on a renewal of that same sensation so suddenly dashed away
from us as our sober self returns, and our world becomes again to-day,
instead of that eternal something,--new, not vague, and hidden, but
not lost?
FOOTNOTE:
[15] The Jubilee Overture, written in 1818 for the accession day of
the King of Prussia.