Letters of Felix Mendelssohn to Ignaz and Charlotte Moscheles

earlier I shall not be able to come, but I hope I may find time to remain a little afterwards. In the course of next week I will send the last part of the manuscript.

It is not yet settled whether my wife goes with me, but I think she will.

With kindest messages, ever yours,

Felix M. B.

Leipzig, July 28, 1846.

My dear Friend,—Many thanks for your letter of the 18th, giving me the dates of the Festival and of the rehearsals. Your and Mr. Moore’s former letters had not stated these definitely; but now that I know them I can make my plans accordingly, and will be in London on the 17th, in good time for the rehearsal of the 20th. I should be glad if the Solos could be rehearsed at the piano on the 19th.

As the morning performances are to last three hours, the “Elijah,” which according to my calculation takes two hours, will not be enough by itself. But then I hope it can be so arranged that a whole piece, not a selection, can be given in addition to it, in the same way as the “Stabat Mater” stands on the programme for the first day. To be sure, it must rest with the Committee whether they will give one or two pieces before; but, however that may be, don’t let us have a ragout afterwards. If there must be three hours, do pray arrange it so that a single piece of three quarters of an hour’s duration be chosen. Besides, it would be a pity to spoil a programme which, as a whole, has a certain look of distinction about it.

And now I hope and trust we may soon meet again. Best love to all. My Cécile, I am sorry to say, will not be able to accompany me; too many reasons stand in the way of her doing so.

Yours ever,

Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy.

Notwithstanding Moscheles’s efforts, Mendelssohn’s wishes were not complied with. After the performance of the Oratorio, Mario sang an air from Mozart’s “Davide penitente,” Grisi an air by Cimarosa, and the concert ended with a Chorus by Handel.

Leipzig, Aug. 9, 1846.

My dear Friend,—Once more a line (as our letters have crossed) to say that I hope to be in London on the 17th, travelling viâ Ostend and Dover.

All else about Miss Bassano, etc., verbally.

I have just gone through the orchestra parts of the Oratorio, and have corrected a number of faults, whereby I hope to have saved you much time. Good-by,—soon to meet.

Yours ever,

Felix M. B.

On the 18th of August Mendelssohn arrived in London, and on the following day a first rehearsal of the Solos was held at Chester Place. The Oratorio was performed on the 28th of August. On the 29th Moscheles wrote: “Your visit to Birmingham, and the production of your ‘Elijah,’ have opened a new world of art to me; your work has made an impression on my mind that can never be effaced. If I did not tell you so last night, when so many were pressing forward to congratulate you, it was because I fancied I felt more, and had more to say, than they. Besides, I preferred writing, to tell you how deeply impressed I am; for if I do so verbally, you will only give me the obsolete answer that dates from your boyhood,—‘There is much room for improvement; give me your advice,’ etc.,—and that, from you to me, is out of place. Improve, correct, as much as you think right; tell me why and wherefore you make this or that alteration; let me learn from you, and gratefully acknowledge that it is so. You might well put Beethoven’s motto,[55] ‘Man, help thyself!’ on your coat of arms; for God has endowed you with rare gifts, that permit you to approach Him in the true spirit of devotion and reverence.”

Hobart Place, Eaton Square, Aug. 29, 1846.

My dear Friend,—Your letter, which I just receive, makes me truly happy. Let me thank you cordially for the friendly sympathy and for the indulgence with which you have listened to my music. Your kind words of praise are more to me than words from any other quarter, and a great deal more than I deserve, according to my own estimation. Thanks, thanks! that is all I can say just now, although I should like to add so much. But I will wait till we meet in a day or two, or perhaps till we are taking some quiet stroll together round the city walls of Leipzig or elsewhere. Thanks again, and may you ever preserve your friendship and kind indulgence for me.

Yours for ever and a day,

Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy.

Leipzig, Oct. 8, 1846.

My dear Friend,—I hasten to answer your kind steamer letter, and to say that I ordered the rooms in the “Blumenberg” a few days after my return, according to the memorandum in my pocket-book, which your wife dictated. I called once more at the hotel, on receiving your letter, and made sure that all was prepared for your arrival on the 21st. The maid with the requisite capacity for sewing is engaged, and we have been offered two most eligible suites of rooms for you, which are now anxiously awaiting your arrival.

The main point, however, I want to answer, my dear Moscheles, is that referring to your best mode of travelling. I must decidedly advise you to take Extrapost, not only because it is far more convenient when you are a party of five going so long a distance, but because I believe it to be no more expensive, in fact rather less so, than the Schnellpost, Courier, or any other means of conveyance, all necessitating your travelling day and night. The only difficulty might be your not having a carriage of your own,—that is, if, as I believe, you have not taken one with you. But it just happens that my mother-in-law, who is here, intends returning to Frankfurt towards the end of the month or early in November, and wishes to take Extrapost. Now, if you could hire a carriage, you would have the use of it one way, and my mother-in-law would be glad to take it for the return journey. Thus the only difficulty is overcome, and you would be obliging her into the bargain. I have not the slightest doubt this mode of travelling would be far the most convenient and agreeable for all of you, and therefore most decidedly advise it in preference to any other. You know that if you want to travel as quickly in Germany as you do in England, you must not take Extrapost, but Courier-horses, which is expensive, although not as compared to England. If however you do not care for such extra speed, you give the postilion a tip of ten or twelve groschen, and you will do the German mile in about three quarters of an hour. Leaving at seven o’clock in the morning, you will be the first evening in Butlar, the second in Weimar, where you will find very good accommodation in the Erbprinz. Please let me know when you start, and about what time you expect to be here, so that we may meet and welcome you on your arrival.

Everybody here is rejoicing at the prospect of your coming, especially the musicians, more especially those of the Conservatorio; but far ahead of any of them,

Yours,

Felix M. B.

Moscheles writes that he expects to arrive on the 21st of October, and adds: “I go to Leipzig hopeful of the future, and filled with the most pleasant expectations. On the one hand I look back to England and its art-aspiring people with the warmest appreciation. On the other I rejoice at the prospect of living amongst the cultivated and art-loving citizens of Leipzig.” He arrived on the day fixed, when, as his diary says, Mendelssohn received him with the affection of a brother, and rendered him the services of a practised courier. The long-cherished plan was realized, and Moscheles soon entered on his new duties at the Conservatorio.

Moscheles was soon comfortably settled in his new quarters in Gerhard’s Garten,—a spot of historical interest. There the Battle of Leipzig was once fiercely contested; now, however, it was peaceful and pleasant enough to make an exceptionally charming place of abode.

At the Conservatorio Moscheles entered on his new duties, which proved as congenial to his taste as he had expected. The pleasures, too, of daily musical and friendly intercourse with Mendelssohn he now enjoyed to the fullest extent.

On the 6th of January Moscheles writes: “It was a pleasant evening we spent at the Mendelssohns’. Our Felix was invited too, and was privileged to enjoy such music as usually falls to the lot of the initiated only. Joachim, our favorite, was there also. Mendelssohn played us some parts of his yet unpublished ‘Elijah,’ in which, since its performance in Birmingham, he has made sundry alterations, to which he attaches much importance; for instance, in those passages where the widow seeks help of Elijah he has given much more prominence to the part of the prophet.”

January 24.—“With David at Mendelssohn’s, who played and sang parts of his ‘Elijah’ to us. Among the changes and additions he has made, I was particularly struck by a Terzet in D major for two sopranos and one alto. All seems now to combine to make this work as varied as it is great.”

January 28.—“Mozart’s G minor Symphony at the Gewandhaus. Mendelssohn took the time of the last movement more moderately than is usually done, all chromatic modulations thus being brought out much more clearly than I have been accustomed to hear them.”

During a choir rehearsal of the “Elijah” in the Gewandhaus, Moscheles took notes of some of Mendelssohn’s directions:—

“‘Out with the vowels! The hea-thens. Who made the heavens and the wa-ters.’

“No. 5. ‘Rather err on the side of vigor than on the side of drowsiness.’

“No. 8. ‘From the very beginning the music must sound fresh—not only towards the end.’

“No. 20. ‘I want to hear Tone,—what one might call Music.’”

Mendelssohn’s last birthday, the 3d of February, 1847, was celebrated by his friends in Gerhard’s Garten. Old and young had made festive preparations for the occasion; in the Moscheleses’ drawing-room a stage had been erected, and every scrap of domestic talent was enlisted to entertain the hero of the day. Cécile Mendelssohn and her sister, Mrs. Schunck, opened the proceedings with a comic dialogue between two lady’s-maids, spoken in the Frankfurt dialect. Then the word “Ge-wand-haus” was enacted as a charade. Joachim, adorned with an eccentric wig, appeared as Paganini, and executed a brilliant improvisation on the G-string (in German, Ge-Saite). The scene between Pyramus and Thisbe in the “Midsummer Night’s Dream” followed and stood for Wand (wall). To illustrate the syllable Haus (house), Mrs. Moscheles had written a little domestic scene; and when, in the course of this, Moscheles, dressed as a cook, made his appearance, Mendelssohn burst into a truly Homeric fit of laughter. He was sitting in a large wicker-work arm-chair; and as, in the fulness of his enjoyment, he rocked to and fro, the chair joined in, bending and creaking in sympathetic rhythms. It was not till after a long interval that the cook could get a hearing. As a finale, the whole word was represented by the combined juvenile forces of the two families, each of the children being provided with some instrument, and Felix Moscheles wielding the conductor’s baton. Joachim led with a toy-violin. Of however doubtful a nature this musical treat may have been to Mendelssohn, he certainly entered most fully into the spirit of the thing, and appreciated every allusion to the real Gewandhaus; especially when Joachim made certain remarks in imitation of the master himself, Mendelssohn started off again, and the endurance of the sympathetic arm-chair was put to the utmost test.

After the performance, actors and public adjourned to the first floor, occupied by the Schuncks. In the centre of the supper-table stood the birthday cake, around which burned thirty-seven candles. At the foot of each, Mrs. Moscheles had written a few words descriptive of the year it represented,—from the cradle to the piano and the conductor’s desk; from his first attempt at composition to “Saint Paul,” “Elijah,” and the “Opera in spe.” In the centre stood the “Light of Life,” that was so soon to fail!

In the month of April of this year Mendelssohn visited England for the last time. He conducted three performances of “Elijah” in Exeter Hall, and was again active at the Philharmonic Concerts. On his return from England, the news reached him of the death of his sister Fanny Hensel. To her he had been linked throughout life by the closest musical sympathy and affinity, and it was thought he never quite recovered from the shock caused by her sudden death, rendered doubly painful by its occurring during his absence from Berlin, and at one of her own musical matinées.

At this time Moscheles and his wife, who were making a short visit in England, received the following letter from Mendelssohn:—

Baden-Baden, June 9, 1847.

My dear Mrs. Moscheles,—When I received your very kind letter, but could not answer it at once in the hurry of the last London days, I pictured to myself the pleasure of writing to you in a cheerful, pleasant tone, from some favorite spot in Switzerland, perhaps with illustrations or something of the sort. Now all that is changed. You know the heavy affliction which has befallen us, and how our inward and outward life has been shaken to its innermost depths, for a long, long time to come, perhaps forever. I am sure you sympathized with us in our irreparable loss, although you and Moscheles knew my sister but little. You can fancy, however, what I feel,—I, to whom she seemed present at all times, in every piece of music, and on all occasions, whether of happiness or of sorrow. Indeed, such is the case with us all; words are nothing at such a time; and yet I cannot speak of anything else. Forgive me, then, if these lines contain little else than hearty thanks for the letter above mentioned, which was another kindness added to the many which followed every step of my last visit to London.

We shall not go to Switzerland under the circumstances; for we could not now derive any real pleasure from the journey, and probably I shall return to the North sooner than I intended. I often feel irresistibly drawn to Berlin, where my youngest sister is now all alone. My brother has been here for the last week; and certainly nothing can do us so much good as our walks in the woods, the secluded and regular life we are leading here, and, above all, the hours we spend with the children. My brother has brought his contingent of young people; and they, as well as mine, are in excellent health and spirits, and delight everybody who sees them. Cécile too is quite well, thank Heaven; however, deeply afflicted.

I hope to hear a favorable account of your visit to England, and trust you will not remain too long; so that the Leipzigers, and, above all, those pianoforte pupils of yours, may get their full share of that instruction which they are thirsting for. The Londoners will, to be sure, say the same thing; but you have spent so many years amongst them that you must now do something for the German cockneys, or country cousins, or whatever you may choose to call them, whose faults I know as well as anybody, but who have also their good and admirable qualities, provided one can get over their cockneyism and old-fashioned ways. But that requires time, and it is for this reason I want you to come soon. What! I hear you say, that I may lose no time in getting used to the manners and customs of the natives? No, I answer; but to help us wage war on the pigtail.

Remember me kindly to all our dear English friends. I need not say that this letter is meant for Moscheles as well. Heaven grant health to you and yours! and remember kindly your

Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy.

Of the numerous notes exchanged after Mendelssohn’s return we transcribe only the following:

Leipzig, Oct. 7, 1847.

My dear Friend,—As you kindly promised me your visit for to-morrow afternoon, could you not make it convenient to stay and spend the evening with us? And would not your wife, Mr. and Mrs. Roche, Serena, Felix, and Clara join you then, and take tea with us? That arrangement would give great pleasure to Cécile and the children.

Now, I hope you all think as they do, and will say yes, and delight

Yours (in the singular and plural),

Felix M. B.

This was the last note from the hand of Mendelssohn that Moscheles received. The days that the two friends should spend together on earth were numbered, but nothing foreboded the hour of separation that was so soon to strike. In Moscheles’s diary we find daily memoranda of the usual friendly intercourse with Mendelssohn.

So on the 3d of October:—“In the afternoon we treated ourselves to some Fugues and Gigues of Bach’s, and I was struck by Mendelssohn’s intimate acquaintance with them. Then he gave us an imitation on the piano of a certain Polka which had been inflicted on him daily by a band of street musicians in Frankfurt. The trivial as well as the serious is food to his mind, and his impressions on all sides are turned to account in his compositions.”

October 5.—“I spent the whole afternoon with Mendelssohn. He was pleased to see me, and we chatted confidentially on art and artists and Leipzig affairs generally. He played me a manuscript Quartet for string instruments in F minor, the four pieces of which are all in that sombre key. The impassioned character of the whole seems to me in keeping with his present frame of mind, shaken as he is to the heart’s core by the loss of his sister.”

October 7.—“Mendelssohn called to fetch me for a walk. In spite of the falling rain, we went to the Rosenthal, and time flew amid the most interesting conversations.”

October 8.—“Examination of pupils for reception at the Conservatorio. Mendelssohn, who took an active part in the proceedings, tested them in thoroughbass and wrote out examples on the blackboard. Whilst they were at work, he sketched the most delightful landscapes—ever a creative genius!... Passed a most interesting afternoon and evening with Mendelssohn. He played his Violoncello Sonata in D major with Rietz, and the two Beethoven Sonatas, Op. 102; then my Sonate Symphonique with me.”

On the following day, the 9th, another walk in the Rosenthal is recorded in the diary. It was a day not to be forgotten. Mendelssohn had much to tell of his last stay in England. He related the charming incidents of his visit to Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, and spoke of many mutual friends. At one o’clock he parted from the Moscheleses in the most cheerful mood; but it was only a few hours later that he was attacked by the illness from which he never recovered; and now followed days of anxiety and suspense, broken only by hopes that were not to be realized.

November 3.—“Mendelssohn better in the morning. In the afternoon another apoplectic stroke, depriving him of all consciousness. In the evening Charlotte and I, Madame Frege, David, and Schleinitz remained in the house till eleven o’clock.”

“Thursday, November 4.—Before the day dawned my Felix had been to inquire, but could only bring us the most disheartening news.”

The end was approaching. Moscheles’s own words best describe the incidents of this, Mendelssohn’s last day. In the anteroom of the death-chamber he wrote:[56]—

“Nature! demandest thou thy rights? Angels above, in heavenly spheres, do ye claim your brother whom ye regard as your own, as one too high for intercourse with us ordinary mortals? We still possess him, we still cling to him; we hope, by God’s grace, to keep still longer amongst us one who has ever shone upon us, a pattern of all that is noble and beautiful, the glory of our century! To thee, O Creator, it is known why Thou hast lodged those treasures of heart and soul in so frail a tenement, that now threatens to dissolve! Can our prayers win from Thee the life of our brother? What a glorious work hast Thou accomplished in him! Thou hast shown us how high he may soar heavenwards, how near he may approach Thee! Oh, suffer him to enjoy his earthly reward,—the blessings of a husband and father, the ties of friendship, the homage of the world!”

“Noon.—The doctors Hammer, Clarus, and Walther watch in turn by his bedside. Schleinitz writes out a bulletin that gives no hope. Dr. Frege and his wife and I are waiting anxiously near the sick-room. The doctors say that if no fresh attack on the nerves or lungs supervenes, the apparent calm may lead to a happy turn....

“Midnight.—From two o’clock in the afternoon, at the hour when another paralytic stroke was dreaded, he gradually began to sink; he lay perfectly quiet, breathing heavily. In the evening we were all by turns assembled around his bed, contemplating the peaceful, seraphic expression on his countenance. The memory of that scene sank deeply into our hearts. Cécile bore up with fortitude under the crushing weight of her sorrow; she never wavered, never betrayed her struggle by a word. The children had been sent to bed at nine o’clock. Paul Mendelssohn stood transfixed with grief at the bedside of his dying brother. Madame Dirichlet and the Schuncks were expected in vain,—Dr. Härtel had travelled to Berlin to fetch them and Dr. Schönlein, but they could not arrive in time to witness the closing scene.

“From nine o’clock in the evening we expected every moment would be the last; a light seemed to hover over his features, but the struggle for life became feebler and fainter. Cécile, in floods of tears, kneeled at his pillow; Paul Mendelssohn, David, Schleinitz, and I, in deep and silent prayer, surrounded his death-bed. As his breathing gradually became slower and slower, my mind involuntarily recurred to Beethoven’s Funeral March, in the ‘Eroica Symphony,’—to that passage where he seems to depict the hero, as he lies breathing his last, the sands of life gradually running out:

“The suppressed sobs of the bystanders and my own hot tears recalled me to the dread reality.... At twenty-four minutes past nine he expired with a deep sigh. The doctor persuaded the widowed Cécile to leave the room. I knelt down at the bedside, my prayers followed heavenwards the soul of the departed, and I pressed one last kiss on that noble forehead before it grew cold in the damp dew of death.”

Moscheles remained in Leipzig, henceforth looking upon the Music School as on a precious heirloom, bequeathed to him by its founder; and during a period of twenty-three years—that is, until but a few days before his death in March, 1870—he labored with untiring energy and devotion to instruct the rising generation of musicians, and to instil into their minds those artistic convictions and principles that had always been dear to him and to Mendelssohn.

INDEX.

A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, T, U, V, W, Z