Frederick Chopin, as a Man and Musician — Complete

In the postscript of this letter Chopin's light fancy gets the better of his heavy heart; in it all is fun and gaiety. First he tells his friend of a pretty neighbour whose husband is out all day and who often invites him to visit and comfort her. But the blandishments of the fair one were of no avail; he had no taste for adventures, and, moreover, was afraid to be caught and beaten by the said husband. A second love-story is told at greater length. The dramatis personae are Chopin, John Peter Pixis, and Francilla Pixis, a beautiful girl of sixteen, a German orphan whom the pianist-composer, then a man of about forty-three, had adopted, and who afterwards became known as a much-admired singer. Chopin made their acquaintance in Stuttgart, and remarks that Pixis said that he intended to marry her. On his return to Paris Pixis invited Chopin to visit him; the latter, who had by this time forgotten pretty Francilla, was in no hurry to call. What follows must be given in Chopin's own words:—

The letters which Chopin wrote to his parents from Paris passed, after his mother's death, into the hands of his sister, who preserved them till September 19, 1863. On that day the house in which she lived in Warsaw—a shot having been fired and some bombs thrown from an upper story of it when General Berg and his escort were passing—was sacked by Russian soldiers, who burned or otherwise destroyed all they could lay hands on, among the rest Chopin's letters, his portrait by Ary Scheffer, the Buchholtz piano on which he had made his first studies, and other relics. We have now also exhausted, at least very nearly exhausted, Chopin's extant correspondence with his most intimate Polish friends, Matuszynski and Woyciechowski, only two unimportant letters written in 1849 and addressed to the latter remaining yet to be mentioned. That the confidential correspondence begins to fail us at this period (the last letter is of December 25, 1831) is particularly inopportune; a series of letters like those he wrote from Vienna would have furnished us with the materials for a thoroughly trustworthy history of his settlement in Paris, over which now hangs a mythical haze. Karasowski, who saw the lost letters, says they were tinged with melancholy.

Besides the thought of his unhappy country, a thought constantly kept alive by the Polish refugees with whom Paris was swarming, Chopin had another more prosaic but not less potent cause of disquietude and sadness. His pecuniary circumstances were by no means brilliant. Economy cannot fill a slender purse, still less can a badly-attended concert do so, and Chopin was loath to be a burden on his parents who, although in easy circumstances, were not wealthy, and whose income must have been considerably lessened by some of the consequences of the insurrection, such as the closing of schools, general scarcity of money, and so forth. Nor was Paris in 1831, when people were so busy with politics, El Dorado for musicians. Of the latter, Mendelssohn wrote at the time that they did not, like other people, wrangle about politics, but lamented over them. "One has lost his place, another his title, and a third his money, and they say this all proceeds from the 'juste milieu.'" As Chopin saw no prospect of success in Paris he began to think, like others of his countrymen, of going to America. His parents, however, were against this project, and advised him either to stay where he was and wait for better things, or to return to Warsaw. Although he might fear annoyances from the Russian government on account of his not renewing his passport before the expiration of the time for which it was granted, he chose the latter alternative. Destiny, however, had decided the matter otherwise.[FOOTNOTE: Karasowski says that Liszt, Hiller, and Sowinski dissuaded him from leaving Paris. Liszt and Hiller both told me, and so did also Franchomme, that they knew nothing of Chopin having had any such intention; and Sowinski does not mention the circumstance in his Musiciens polonais.] One day, or, as some will have it, on the very day when he was preparing for his departure, Chopin met in the street Prince Valentine Radziwill, and, in the course of the conversation which the latter opened, informed him of his intention of leaving Paris. The Prince, thinking, no doubt, of the responsibility he would incur by doing so, did not attempt to dissuade him, but engaged the artist to go with him in the evening to Rothschild's. Chopin, who of course was asked by the hostess to play something, charmed by his wonderful performance, and no doubt also by his refined manners, the brilliant company assembled there to such a degree that he carried off not only a plentiful harvest of praise and compliments, but also some offers of pupils. Supposing the story to be true, we could easily believe that this soiree was the turning-point in Chopin's career, but nevertheless might hesitate to assert that it changed his position "as if by enchantment." I said "supposing the story to be true," because, although it has been reported that Chopin was fond of alluding to this incident, his best friends seem to know nothing of it: Liszt does not mention it, Hiller and Franchomme told me they never heard of it, and notwithstanding Karasowski's contrary statement there is nothing to be found about it in Sowinski's Musiciens polonais. Still, the story may have a substratum of truth, to arrive at which it has only to be shorn of its poetical accessories and exaggerations, of which, however, there is little in my version.

But to whatever extent, or whether to any extent at all, this or any similar soiree may have served Chopin as a favourable introduction to a wider circle of admirers and patrons, and as a stepping-stone to success, his indebtedness to his countrymen, who from the very first befriended and encouraged him, ought not to be forgotten or passed over in silence for the sake of giving point to a pretty anecdote. The great majority of the Polish refugees then living in Paris would of course rather require than be able to afford help and furtherance, but there was also a not inconsiderable minority of persons of noble birth and great wealth whose patronage and influence could not but be of immense advantage to a struggling artist. According to Liszt, Chopin was on intimate terms with the inmates of the Hotel Lambert, where old Prince Adam Czartoryski and his wife and daughter gathered around them "les debris de la Pologne que la derniere guerre avait jetes au loin." Of the family of Count Plater and other compatriots with whom the composer had friendly intercourse we shall speak farther on. Chopin's friends were not remiss in exerting themselves to procure him pupils and good fees at the same time. They told all inquirers that he gave no lesson for less than twenty francs, although he had expressed his willingness to be at first satisfied with more modest terms. Chopin had neither to wait in vain nor to wait long, for in about a year's time he could boast of a goodly number of pupils.

The reader must have noticed with surprise the absence of any mention of the "Ideal" from Chopin's letters to his friend Titus Woyciechowski, to whom the love-sick artist was wont to write so voluminously on this theme. How is this strange silence to be accounted for? Surely this passionate lover could not have forgotten her beneath whose feet he wished his ashes to be spread after his death? But perhaps in the end of 1831 he had already learnt what was going to happen in the following year. The sad fact has to be told: inconstant Constantia Gladkowska married a merchant of the name of Joseph Grabowski, at Warsaw, in 1832; this at least is the information given in Sowinski's biographical dictionary Les musiciens polonais et slaves.[FOOTNOTE: According to Count Wodzinski she married a country gentleman, and subsequently became blind.] As the circumstances of the case and the motives of the parties are unknown to me, and as a biographer ought not to take the same liberties as a novelist, I shall neither expatiate on the fickleness and mercenariness of woman, nor attempt to describe the feelings of our unfortunate hero robbed of his ideal, but leave the reader to make his own reflections and draw his own moral.

On August 2, 1832, Chopin wrote a letter to Hiller, who had gone in the spring of the year to Germany. What the young Pole thought of this German brother-artist may be gathered from some remarks of his in the letter to Titus Woyciechowski dated December 16, 1831:—

Since then the two had become more intimate, seeing each other almost every day, Chopin, as Osborne relates, being always in good spirits when Hiller was with him. The bearer of the said letter was Mr. Johns, to whom the five Mazurkas, Op. 7, are dedicated, and whom Chopin introduced to Hiller as "a distinguished amateur of New Orleans." After warmly recommending this gentleman, he excuses himself for not having acknowledged the receipt of his friend's letter, which procured him the pleasure of Paul Mendelssohn's acquaintance, and then proceeds:—

CHAPTER XVI.

1832-1834.

CHOPIN'S SUCCESS IN SOCIETY AND AS A TEACHER.—VARIOUS CONCERTS AT WHICH HE PLAYED.—A LETTER FROM CHOPIN AND LISZT TO HILLER.—SOME OF HIS FRIENDS.—STRANGE BEHAVIOUR.—A LETTER TO FRANCHOMME.—CHOPIN'S RESERVE.—SOME TRAITS OF THE POLISH CHARACTER.—FIELD.—BERLIOZ.—NEO-ROMANTICISM AND CHOPIN'S RELATION TO IT.—WHAT INFLUENCE HAD LISZT ON CHOPIN'S DEVELOPMENT—PUBLICATION OF WORKS.—THE CRITICS.—INCREASING POPULARITY.—JOURNEY IN THE COMPANY OF HILLER TO AIX-LA-CHAPELLE.—A DAY AT DUSSELDORF WITH MENDELSSOHN.

IN the season 1832-1833 Chopin took his place as one of the acknowledged pianistic luminaries of the French capital, and began his activity as a professor par excellence of the aristocracy. "His distinguished manners, his exquisite politeness, his studied and somewhat affected refinement in all things, made Chopin the model professor of the fashionable nobility." Thus Chopin is described by a contemporary. Now he shall describe himself. An undated letter addressed to his friend Dominic Dziewanowski, which, judging from an allusion to the death of the Princess Vaudemont, [FOOTNOTE: In a necrology contained in the Moniteur of January 6, 1833, she is praised for the justesse de son esprit, and described as naive et vraie comme une femme du peuple, genereuse comme une grande dame. There we find it also recorded that she saved M. de Vitrolles pendant les Cent-jours, et M. de Lavalette sous la Restoration.] must have been written about the second week of January, 1833, gives much interesting information concerning the writer's tastes and manners, the degree of success he had obtained, and the kind of life he was leading. After some jocular remarks on his long silence—remarks in which he alludes to recollections of Szafarnia and the sincerity of their friendship, and which he concludes with the statement that he is so much in demand on all sides as to betorn to pieces—Chopin proceeds thus:—

This letter, and still more the letters which I shall presently transcribe, afford irrefragable evidence of the baselessness of the often-heard statement that Chopin's intercourse was in the first years of his settlement in Paris confined to the Polish salons. The simple unexaggerated truth is that Chopin had always a predilection for, and felt more at home among, his compatriots.

In the winter 1832-1833 Chopin was heard frequently in public. At a concert of Killer's (December 15, 1832) he performed with Liszt and the concert-giver a movement of Bach's Concerto for three pianos, the three artists rendering the piece "avec une intelligence de son caractere et une delicatesse parfaite." Soon after Chopin and Liszt played between the acts of a dramatic performance got up for the benefit of Miss Smithson, the English actress and bankrupt manager, Berlioz's flame, heroine of his "Episode de la vie d'un artiste," and before long his wife. On April 3, 1833, Chopin assisted at a concert given by the brothers Herz, taking part along with them and Liszt in a quartet for eight hands on two pianos. M. Marmontel, in his silhouette of the pianist and critic Amedee de Mereaux, mentions that in 1832 this artist twice played with Chopin a duo of his own on "Le Pre aux Clercs," but leaves us in uncertainty as to whether they performed it at public concerts or private parties. M. Franchomme told me that he remembered something about a concert given by Chopin in 1833 at the house of one of his aristocratic friends, perhaps at Madame la Marechale de Lannes's! In summing up, as it were, Chopin's activity as a virtuoso, I may make use of the words of the Paris correspondent of the "Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung," who reports in April, 1833, that "Chopin and Osborne, as well as the other celebrated masters, delight the public frequently." In short, Chopin was becoming more and more of a favourite, not, however, of the democracy of large concert-halls, but of the aristocracy of select salons.

The following letter addressed to Hiller, written by Chopin and Liszt, and signed by them and Franchomme, brings together Chopin's most intimate artist friends, and spreads out before us a vivid picture of their good fellowship and the society in which they moved. I have put the portions written by Liszt within brackets [within parentheses in this e-text]. Thus the reader will see what belongs to each of the two writers, and how they took the pen out of each other's hand in the middle of a phrase and even of a word. With regard to this letter I have further to remark that Hiller, who was again in Germany, had lately lost his father:—

Some of the names that appear in this letter will give occasion for comment. Chopin, as Hiller informed me, went frequently to the ambassadors Appony and Von Kilmannsegge, and still more frequently to his compatriots, the Platers. At the house of the latter much good music was performed, for the countess, the Pani Kasztelanowa (the wife of the castellan), to whom Liszt devotes an eloquent encomium, "knew how to welcome so as to encourage all the talents that then promised to take their upward flight and form une lumineuse pleiade," being

It was she who said one day to Chopin: "Si j'etais jeune et jolie, mon petit Chopin, je te prendrais pour mari, Hiller pour ami, et Liszt pour amant." And it was at her house that the interesting contention of Chopin with Liszt and Hiller took place. The Hungarian and the German having denied the assertion of the Pole that only he who was born and bred in Poland, only he who had breathed the perfume of her fields and woods, could fully comprehend with heart and mind Polish national music, the three agreed to play in turn, by way of experiment, the mazurka "Poland is not lost yet." Liszt began, Hiller followed, and Chopin came last and carried off the palm, his rivals admitting that they had not seized the true spirit of the music as he had done. Another anecdote, told me by Hiller, shows how intimate the Polish artist was with this family of compatriots, the Platers, and what strange whims he sometimes gave way to. One day Chopin came into the salon acting the part of Pierrot, and, after jumping and dancing about for an hour, left without having spoken a single word.

Abbe Bardin was a great musical amateur, at whose weekly afternoon gatherings the best artists might be seen and heard, Mendelssohn among the rest when he was in Paris in 1832-1833. In one of the many obituary notices of Chopin which appeared in French and other papers, and which are in no wise distinguished by their trustworthiness, I found the remark that the Abbe Bardin and M.M. Tilmant freres were the first to recognise Chopin's genius. The notice in question is to be found in the Chronique Musicale of November 3, 1849.

In Franck, whose lodgings Chopin had taken, the reader will recognise the "clever [geistreiche], musical Dr. Hermann Franck," the friend of many musical and other celebrities, the same with whom Mendelssohn used to play at chess during his stay in Paris. From Hiller I learned that Franck was very musical, and that his attainments in the natural sciences were considerable; but that being well-to-do he was without a profession. In the fifth decade of this century he edited for a year Brockhaus's Deutsche allgemeine Zeitung.

In the following letter which Chopin wrote to Franchomme—the latter thinks in the autumn of 1833—we meet with some new names. Dr. Hoffmann was a good friend of the composer's, and was frequently found at his rooms smoking. I take him to have been the well-known litterateur Charles Alexander Hoffmann, [Footnote: This is the usual German, French, and English spelling. The correct Polish spelling is Hofman. The forms Hoffman and Hofmann occur likewise.] the husband of Clementina Tanska, a Polish refugee who came to Paris in 1832 and continued to reside there till 1848. Maurice is of course Schlesinger the publisher. Of Smitkowski I know only that he was one of Chopin's Polish friends, whose list is pretty long and comprised among others Prince Casimir Lubomirski, Grzymala, Fontana, and Orda.

[Footnote: Of Grzymala and Fontana more will be heard in the sequel. Prince Casimir Lubomirski was a passionate lover of music, and published various compositions. Liszt writes that Orda, "who seemed to command a future," was killed at the age of twenty in Algiers. Karasowski gives the same information, omitting, however, the age. My inquiries about Orda among French musicians and Poles have had no result. Although the data do not tally with those of Liszt and Karasowski, one is tempted to identify Chopin's friend with the Napoleon Orda mentioned in Sowinski's Musiciens polonais et slaves—"A pianist-composer who had made himself known since the events of 1831. One owes to him the publication of a Polish Album devoted to the composers of this nation, published at Paris in 1838. M. Orda is the author of several elegantly-written pianoforte works." In a memoir prefixed to an edition of Chopin's mazurkas and waltzes (Boosey & Co.), J.W. Davison mentions a M. Orda (the "M." stands, I suppose, for Monsieur) and Charles Filtsch as pupils of Chopin.]

It was well for Chopin that he was so abundantly provided with friends, for, as Hiller told me, he could not do without company. But here is Chopin's letter to Franchomme:—

The last-quoted letter adds a few more touches to the portraiture of Chopin which has been in progress in the preceding pages. The insinuating affectionateness and winning playfulness had hitherto not been brought out so distinctly. There was then, and there remained to the end of his life, something of a woman and of a boy in this man. The sentimental element is almost wholly absent from Chopin's letters to his non-Polish friends. Even to Franchomme, the most intimate among these, he shows not only less of his inmost feelings and thoughts than to Titus Woyciechowski and John Matuszyriski, the friends of his youth, but also less than to others of his countrymen whose acquaintance he made later in life, and of whom Grzymala may be instanced. Ready to give everything, says Liszt, Chopin did not give himself—

Indeed, you could as little get hold of Chopin as, to use L. Enault's expression, of the scaly back of a siren. Only after reading his letters to the few confidants to whom he freely gave his whole self do we know how little of himself he gave to the generality of his friends, whom he pays off with affectionateness and playfulness, and who, perhaps, never suspected, or only suspected, what lay beneath that smooth surface. This kind of reserve is a feature of the Slavonic character, which in Chopin's individuality was unusually developed.

Liszt makes some very interesting remarks on this point, and as they throw much light on the character of the race, and on that of the individual with whom we are especially concerned in this book, I shall quote them:—

And now we will turn our attention once more to musical matters. In the letter to Hiller (August 2, 1832) Chopin mentioned the coming of Field and Moscheles, to which, no doubt, he looked forward with curiosity. They were the only eminent pianists whom he had not yet heard. Moscheles, however, seems not to have gone this winter to Paris; at any rate, his personal acquaintance with the Polish artist did not begin till 1839. Chopin, whose playing had so often reminded people of Field's, and who had again and again been called a pupil of his, would naturally take a particular interest in this pianist. Moreover, he esteemed him very highly as a composer. Mikuli tells us that Field's A flat Concerto and nocturnes were among those compositions which he delighted in playing (spielte mit Vorliebe). Kalkbrenner is reported [FOOTNOTE: In the Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung of April 3, 1833.] to have characterised Field's performances as quite novel and incredible; and Fetis, who speaks of them in the highest terms, relates that on hearing the pianist play a concerto of his own composition, the public manifested an indescribable enthusiasm, a real delirium. Not all accounts, however, are equally favourable.

[FOOTNOTE: In the Revue musicale of December 29, 1832. The criticism is worth reproducing:—"Quiconque n'a point entendu ce grand pianiste ne peut se faire d'idee du mecanisme admirable de ses doigts, mecanisme tel que les plus grandes difficultes semblent etre des choses fort simples, et que sa main n'a point l'air de se mouvoir. Il n'est d'ailleurs pas mains etonnant dans l'art d'attaquer la note et de varier a l'infini les diverses nuances de force, de douceur et d'accent. Un enthousiasme impossible a decrire, un veritable delire s'est manifeste dans le public a l'audition de ce concerto plein de charme rendu avec une perfection de fini, de precision, de nettete et d'expression qu'il serait impossible de surpasser et que bien peu de pianistes pourraient egaler." Of a MS. concerto played by Field at his second concert, given on February 3, 1833, Fetis says that it is "diffus, peu riche en motifs heureux, peu digne, en un mot, de la renommee de son auteur," but "la delicieuse execution de M. Field nous a tres-heureusement servi de compensation"]

Indeed, the contradictory criticisms to be met with in books and newspapers leave on the reader the impression that Field disappointed the expectations raised by his fame. The fact that the second concert he gave was less well attended than the first cannot but confirm this impression. He was probably no longer what he had been; and the reigning pianoforte style and musical taste were certainly no longer what they had been. "His elegant playing and beautiful manner of singing on the piano made people admire his talent," wrote Fetis at a later period (in his "Biographie universelle des Musiciens"), "although his execution had not the power of the pianists of the modern school." It is not at all surprising that the general public and the younger generation of artists, more especially the romanticists, were not unanimously moved to unbounded enthusiasm by "the clear limpid flow" and "almost somnolent tranquillity" of Field's playing, "the placid tenderness, graceful candour, and charming ingenuousness of his melodious reveries." This characterisation of Field's style is taken from Liszt's preface to the nocturnes. Moscheles, with whom Field dined in London shortly before the latter's visit to Paris, gives in his diary a by no means flattering account of him. Of the man, the diarist says that he is good-natured but not educated and rather droll, and that there cannot be a more glaring contrast than that between Field's nocturnes and Field's manners, which were often cynical. Of the artist, Moscheles remarks that while his touch was admirable and his legato entrancing, his playing lacked spirit and accent, light and shadow, and depth of feeling. M. Marmontel was not far wrong when, before having heard Field, he regarded him as the forerunner of Chopin, as a Chopin without his passion, sombre reveries, heart-throes, and morbidity. The opinions which the two artists had of each other and the degree of their mutual sympathy and antipathy may be easily guessed. We are, however, not put to the trouble of guessing all. Whoever has read anything about Chopin knows of course Field's criticism of him—namely, that he was "un talent de chambre de malade," which, by the by, reminds one of a remark of Auber's, who said that Chopin was dying all his life (il se meurt tonte sa vie). It is a pity that we have not, as a pendant to Field's criticism on Chopin, one of Chopin on Field. But whatever impression Chopin may have received from the artist, he cannot but have been repelled by the man. And yet the older artist's natural disposition was congenial to that of the younger one, only intemperate habits had vitiated it. Spohr saw Field in 1802-1803, and describes him as a pale, overgrown youth, whose dreamy, melancholy playing made people forget his awkward bearing and badly-fitting clothes. One who knew Field at the time of his first successes portrays him as a young man with blonde hair, blue eyes, fair complexion, and pleasing features, expressive of the mood of the moment—of child-like ingenuousness, modest good-nature, gentle roguishness, and artistic aspiration. M. Marmontel, who made his acquaintance in 1832, represents him as a worn-out, vulgar-looking man of fifty, whose outward appearance contrasted painfully with his artistic performances, and whose heavy, thick-set form in conjunction with the delicacy and dreaminess of his musical thoughts and execution called to mind Rossini's saying of a celebrated singer, "Elle a l'air d'un elephant qui aurait avale un rossignol." One can easily imagine the surprise and disillusion of the four pupils of Zimmermann—MM. Marmontel, Prudent, A. Petit, and Chollet—who, provided with a letter of introduction by their master, called on Field soon after his arrival in Paris and beheld the great pianist—

Notwithstanding his tipsiness, he received the young gentlemen kindly, and played to them two studies by Cramer and Clementi "with rare perfection, admirable finish, marvellous agility, and exquisiteness of touch." Many anecdotes might be told of Field's indolence and nonchalance; for instance, how he often fell asleep while giving his lessons, and on one occasion was asked whether he thought he was paid twenty roubles for allowing himself to be played to sleep; or, how, when his walking-stick had slipped out of his hand, he waited till some one came and picked it up; or, how, on finding his dress-boots rather tight, he put on slippers, and thus appeared in one of the first salons of Paris and was led by the mistress of the house, the Duchess Decazes, to the piano—but I have said enough of the artist who is so often named in connection with Chopin.

From placid Field to volcanic Berlioz is an enormous distance, which, however, we will clear at one leap, and do it too without hesitation or difficulty. For is not leaping the mind's natural mode of locomotion, and walking an artificially-acquired and rare accomplishment? Proceeding step by step we move only with more or less awkwardness, but aided by ever so slight an association of ideas we bound with the greatest ease from any point to any other point of infinitude. Berlioz returned to Paris in the latter part of 1832, and on the ninth of December of that year gave a concert at which he produced among other works his "Episode de la vie d'un artiste" (Part I.—"Symphonic fantastique," for the second time; Part II—"Lelio, ou le retour a la vie," for the first time), the subject of which is the history of his love for Miss Smithson. Chopin, no doubt, made Berlioz's acquaintance through Liszt, whose friendship with the great French symphonic composer dated from before the latter's departure for Italy. The characters of Chopin and Berlioz differed too much for a deep sympathy to exist between them; their connection was indeed hardly more than a pleasant social companionship. Liszt tells us that the constant intercourse with Berlioz, Hiller, and other celebrities who were in the habit of saying smart things, developed Chopin's natural talent for incisive remarks, ironical answers, and ambiguous speeches. Berlioz. I think, had more affection for Chopin than the latter for Berlioz.

But it is much more the artistic than the social attitude taken up by Chopin towards Berlioz and romanticism which interests us. Has Liszt correctly represented it? Let us see. It may be accepted as in the main true that the nocturnes of Field, [Footnote: In connection with this, however, Mikuli's remark has to be remembered.] the sonatas of Dussek, and the "noisy virtuosities and decorative expressivities" of Kalkbrenner were either insufficient for or antipathetic to Chopin; and it is plainly evident that he was one of those who most perseveringly endeavoured to free themselves from the servile formulas of the conventional style and repudiated the charlatanisms that only replace old abuses by new ones. On the other hand, it cannot be said that he joined unreservedly those who, seeing the fire of talent devour imperceptibly the old worm-eaten scaffolding, attached themselves to the school of which Berlioz was the most gifted, valiant, and daring representative, nor that, as long as the campaign of romanticism lasted, he remained invariable in his predilections and repugnances. The promptings of his genius taught Chopin that the practice of any one author or set of authors, whatever their excellence might be, ought not to be an obligatory rule for their successors. But while his individual requirements led him to disregard use and wont, his individual taste set up a very exclusive standard of his own. He adopted the maxims of the romanticists, but disapproved of almost all the works of art in which they were embodied. Or rather, he adopted their negative teaching, and like them broke and threw off the trammels of dead formulas; but at the same time he rejected their positive teaching, and walked apart from them. Chopin's repugnance was not confined only to the frantic side and the delirious excesses of romanticism as Liszt thinks. He presents to us the strange spectacle of a thoroughly romantic and emphatically unclassical composer who has no sympathy either with Berlioz and Liszt, or with Schumann and other leaders of romanticism, and the object of whose constant and ardent love and admiration was Mozart, the purest type of classicism. But the romantic, which Jean Paul Richter defined as "the beautiful without limitation, or the beautiful infinite" [das Schone ohne Begrenzung, oder das schone Unendliche], affords more scope for wide divergence, and allows greater freedom in the display of individual and national differences, than the classical.

Chopin's and Berlioz's relative positions may be compared to those of V. Hugo and Alfred de Musset, both of whom were undeniably romanticists, and yet as unlike as two authors can be. For a time Chopin was carried away by Liszt's and Killer's enthusiasm for Berlioz, but he soon retired from his championship, as Musset from the Cenacle. Franchomme thought this took place in 1833, but perhaps he antedated this change of opinion. At any rate, Chopin told him that he had expected better things from Berlioz, and declared that the latter's music justified any man in breaking off all friendship with him. Some years afterwards, when conversing with his pupil Gutmann about Berlioz, Chopin took up a pen, bent back the point of it, and then let it rebound, saying: "This is the way Berlioz composes—he sputters the ink over the pages of ruled paper, and the result is as chance wills it." Chopin did not like the works of Victor Hugo, because he felt them to be too coarse and violent. And this may also have been his opinion of Berlioz's works. No doubt he spurned Voltaire's maxim, "Le gout n'est autre chose pour la poesie que ce qu'il est pour les ajustements des femmes," and embraced V. Hugo's countermaxim, "Le gout c'est la raison du genie"; but his delicate, beauty-loving nature could feel nothing but disgust at what has been called the rehabilitation of the ugly, at such creations, for instance, as Le Roi s'amuse and Lucrece Borgia, of which, according to their author's own declaration, this is the essence:—