PART II

Quartet for Voice, Harp, Piano Forte, and Violin, Miss STEPHENS, Mr. LABARRE, Master LISZT, and Mr. MORI _Moscheles and Mayseder_

Aria, Miss FANNY AYTON, "Una voce poco fa" _Rossini_

Solo, Guitar, Mr. HUERTA _Huerta_

Duet, Miss Stephens and Mr. BRAHAM.

Song, Miss LOVE, "Had I a heart."

Fantasia, Flute, Master MINASI _Master Minasi_

Song, Miss GRANT, "The Nightingale" _Crivelli_

Brilliant Variations on "Rule Britannia," Master LISZT _Master Liszt_

Leader, MR. MORI Conductor, Mr. Schuncke

THE CONCERT WILL COMMENCE AT HALF-PAST ONE O'CLOCK PRECISELY

Tickets, Half-a-Guinea each, to be had of Mr. LISZT, 46, Great Marlborough Street, and at all the principal Music Shops.

"Thirteen years elapsed before Liszt again favoured us with his presence. He had in the meantime passed from boyhood to manhood, from having been a prodigy to becoming a mature artist. The year was 1840--an important one, as we shall presently see. He appeared, for the first time, at the Philharmonic Concert of May 11, 1840, which was conducted by Sir Henry Bishop. Liszt played his own version of Weber's Concertstück in which, according to a contemporary account, 'passages were doubled, tripled, inverted, and _transmogrified_ in all sorts of ways.' Be this as it may, the Philharmonic Directors showed their appreciation of his performance by a presentation, an account of which appeared in a snappy and short-lived paper called the _Musical Journal_. Here is the extract:

"'Liszt has been presented by the Philharmonic Society with an elegant silver breakfast service, for doing that which would cause every young student to receive a severe reprimand--viz., thumping and partially destroying two very fine pianofortes. The Society has given this to Mr. Liszt as a _compliment_ for performing at two of its concerts _gratuitously_! Whenever did they present an Englishman with a _silver breakfast service_ for gratuitous performances?'

"The foregoing is written in the strain which characterised the attitude of a section of the musical press towards the great pianist. His use of the word 'Recitals' appears to have been as a red rag to those roaring bulls. The familiar term owes its origin to Liszt's performances. The late Willert Beale records that his father, Frederick Beale, invented the designation, and that it was much discussed before being finally adopted. The advertisement reads thus:

"'LISZT'S PIANOFORTE RECITALS

"'M. Liszt will give at Two o'clock on Tuesday morning, June 9, 1840, RECITALS on the PIANOFORTE of the following works:--No. 1. Scherzo and Finale from Beethoven's Pastorale Symphony. No. 2. Serenade, by Schubert. No. 3. Ave Maria, by Schubert. No. 4. Hexameron. No. 5. Neapolitan Tarentelles. No. 6. Grand Galop Chromatique. Tickets 10s. 6d. each; reserved seats, near the Pianoforte, 21s.'

"The 'Recitals'--the plural form of the term will be noticed--took place at the Hanover Square Rooms, and the piece entitled Hexameron (a set of variations on the grand march in I Puritani) was the composition of the following sextet of pianists: Thalberg, Chopin, Herz, Czerny, Pixis, and Liszt, not exactly 'a _singular_ production,' as the _Musical World_ remarked, but 'an uncommon one.' In connection with the 'Recitals,' Mr. Salaman may be quoted:

"'I did not hear Liszt again until his visit to London in 1840, when he puzzled the musical public by announcing "Pianoforte Recitals." This now commonly accepted term had never previously been used, and people asked, "What does he mean? How can any one _recite_ upon the pianoforte?" At these recitals, Liszt, after performing a piece set down in his programme, would leave the platform, and, descending into the body of the room, where the benches were so arranged as to allow free locomotion, would move about among his auditors and converse with his friends, with the gracious condescension of a prince, until he felt disposed to return to the piano.'

"The _Musical World_ referred to the 'Recitals' as 'this curious exhibition'; that the performance was 'little short of a miracle'; and that the Hexameron contained 'some difficulties of inconceivable outrageousness.' Another specimen of critical insight may be quoted--it refers to Liszt's participation in a concert given by John Parry:

"'On being unanimously recalled, he tore the National Anthem to ribbons, and thereby fogged the glory he had just achieved. Let him eschew such hyper-erudite monstrosities--let him stick to the 'recital' of sane and sanative music, and he will attain a reputation above all contemporary musical _mono_-facturers--and what is more, deserve it.'

"In the autumn of the same year (1840), Liszt formed one of a concert-party, organised by Lavenu, in a tour in the south of England. The party included John Parry, the composer of Wanted, a Governess, and the comic man of the Lavenu troup. Like Mendelssohn, Liszt seems to have taken to the jocose Parry, and he quite entered into the fun of the fair. For instance, at Bath, 'in addition to the pieces announced in the bills, Liszt played an accompaniment to John Parry's Inchape Bell, sung by the author, in which he introduced an extemporaneous storm, which had a most terrific effect.' We can well believe it. This storm was not 'a local disturbance,' as meteorologists would say, but it followed the party wherever they went, and it was doubtless received with thunderous applause.

"In November, a second and more extended tour, also under Lavenu's auspices, was undertaken, and the journey embraced the great provincial towns of England, Ireland, and Scotland. The preliminary announcement was couched in terms more or less pungent:

"'Mr. Lavenu with his corps musicale will enter the _lists_ again on the 23d instant, when it is to be hoped the _list_less provinces will _list_en with more attention than on his last experiment, or he will have en_list_ed his talented _list_ to very little purpose.'

"Liszt again appeared in London in 1841, and took the town by storm. Musical critics of the present day may be glad to enlarge their vocabulary from the following notice, which appeared in the columns of the _Musical World_ of sixty years ago:

"'M. Liszt's Recitals.--We walk through this world in the midst of so many wonders, that our senses become indifferent to the most amazing things: light and life, the ocean, the forest, the voice and flight of the pigmy lark, are unheeded commonplaces; and it is only when some comet, some giant, some tiger-tamer, some new Niagara, some winged being (mental or bodily, and unclassed in the science of ornithology) appears, that our obdurate faculties are roused into the consciousness that miracles do exist. Of the miracle genus is M. Liszt, the Polyphemus of the pianoforte--the Aurora Borealis of musical effulgence--the Niagara of thundering harmonies! His rapidity of execution, his power, his delicacy, his Briareus-handed chords, and the extraordinary volume of sound he wrests from the instrument, are each and all philosophies in their way that might well puzzle all but a philosopher to unriddle and explain.'

"Shortly before the 'recitals' above referred to, Liszt was thrown out of a carriage, and the accident resulted in a sprained wrist. At the performance, he apologised in French to the audience 'for his inability to play all the pieces advertised.'

"It is strange, but true, that no less than _forty-five_ years had come and gone before Liszt again set foot on Albion's shores. In the year 1886, aged seventy-five, he came again, and charmed everybody with the geniality of his presence.

"It was at the invitation of the late Mr. Henry Littleton (then head of the firm of Novello & Co.) that Liszt paid his last visit to England in 1886. The great pianist arrived on May 3, and remained under Mr. Littleton's hospitable roof at Westwood House, Sydenham, during the whole of his sojourn in this country. The events of those seventeen days were a series of triumphs to the grand old man of pianists. A command visit to Windsor Castle, when he played to Queen Victoria; dining with the Prince and Princess of Wales at Marlborough House; a visit to the Baroness Burdett Coutts; attending performances of his oratorio St. Elisabeth (conducted by Sir, then Mr. A. C. Mackenzie) at St. James's Hall and the Crystal Palace; concerts of Chev. Leonard E. Bach; the Royal Amateur Orchestral Society (when he was seated next to the king, then Prince of Wales); Monday Popular; pianoforte recitals by Mr. Frederic Lamond and Herr Stavenhagen; a visit to the Royal Academy of Music; in addition to receptions given by his devoted pupil and attached friend, the late Walter Bache at the Grosvenor Gallery, and the 'at homes' of his host and hostess at Westwood House.

"As an indication of the general interest aroused by the coming of Liszt, _Punch_ burst forth in the following strain:

"'A Brilliant Variation.--Mr. and Mrs. Littleton's reception of the Abbé Franz Liszt, at Westwood House, Saturday night last, was an event never to be forgotten. But it was not until all the Great 'uns had left the Littletons that the Greatest of them all sat at the piano in the midst of a cosy and select circle, and then, when _Mr. P-nch_ had put on his Liszt slippers ... but to say more were a breach of hospitality. Suffice it that on taking up his sharp-and-flat candlestick in a perfectly natural manner the Abbé, embracing _Mr. P-nch_, sobbed out, "This is the Abbé'ist evening I've ever had. Au plaisir!"--(_Extract from a Distinguished Guest's Diary. Privately communicated._)'

"Although he was in his seventy-sixth year at the time of this, his last sojourn in England, his pianoforte technic astonished those who were capable to form an opinion, and who were amazed that he did not 'smash the pianoforte, like his pupils!' He was immensely gratified at his visit, and in parting with Mr. Alfred and Mr. Augustus Littleton, at Calais, he said: 'If I should live two years longer I will certainly visit England again!' But alas! a little more than three months after he had said 'Good-bye' to these friends, Franz Liszt closed his long, eventful, and truly artistic career at Bayreuth on July 31, 1886. Professor Niecks said, 'Liszt has lived a noble life. Let us honour his memory.'"

EDVARD GRIEG

Grieg himself played his piano concerto at a Leipsic Gewandhaus concert in 1879, but it had already been heard in the same hall as early as February 22, 1872, when Miss Erika Lie played it, and the work was announced as new and "in manuscript." Before this time Grieg had shown the concerto to Liszt. The story is told in a letter of Grieg quoted in Henry T. Finck's biography of the composer:

"I had fortunately just received the manuscript of my pianoforte concerto from Leipsic, and took it with me. Besides myself there were present Winding, Sgambati, and a German Liszt-ite whose name I do not know, but who goes so far in the aping of his idol that he even wears the gown of an abbé; add to these a Chevalier de Concilium and some young ladies of the kind that would like to eat Liszt, skin, hair, and all, their adulation is simply comical.... Winding and I were very anxious to see if he would really play my concerto at sight. I, for my part, considered it impossible; not so Liszt. 'Will you play?' he asked, and I made haste to reply: 'No, I cannot' (you know I have never practised it). Then Liszt took the manuscript, went to the piano, and said to the assembled guests, with his characteristic smile, 'Very well, then, I will show you that I also cannot.' With that he began. I admit that he took the first part of the concerto too fast, and the beginning consequently sounded helter-skelter; but later on, when I had a chance to indicate the tempo, he played as only he can play. It is significant that he played the cadenza, the most difficult part, best of all. His demeanour is worth any price to see. Not content with playing, he at the same time converses and makes comments, addressing a bright remark now to one, now to another of the assembled guests, nodding significantly to the right or left, particularly when something pleases him. In the adagio, and still more in the finale, he reached a climax both as to his playing and the praise he had to bestow.

"A really divine episode I must not forget. Toward the end of the finale the second theme is, as you may remember, repeated in a mighty fortissimo. In the very last measures, when in the first triplets the first tone is changed in the orchestra from G sharp to G, while the pianoforte, in a mighty scale passage, rushes wildly through the whole reach of the keyboard, he suddenly stopped, rose up to his full height, left the piano, and, with big theatric strides and arms uplifted, walked across the large cloister hall, at the same time literally roaring the theme. When he got to the G in question, he stretched out his arms imperiously and exclaimed: 'G, G, not G sharp! Splendid! That is the real Swedish Banko!' to which he added very softly, as in a parenthesis: 'Smetana sent me a sample the other day.' He went back to the piano, repeated the whole strophe, and finished. In conclusion, he handed me the manuscript and said, in a peculiarly cordial tone: 'Fahren Sie fort; ich sage Ihnen, Sie haben das Zeug dazu, und--lassen Sie sich nicht abschrecken!' ('Keep steadily on; I tell you, you have the capability, and--do not let them intimidate you!')

"This final admonition was of tremendous importance to me; there was something in it that seemed to give it an air of sanctification. At times when disappointment and bitterness are in store for me, I shall recall his words, and the remembrance of that hour will have a wonderful power to uphold me in days of adversity."

RICHARD HOFFMAN'S RECOLLECTIONS

"I think it was in 1840 or 1841, in Manchester, that I first heard Liszt, then a young man of twenty-eight," wrote the late Richard Hoffman in _Scribner's Magazine_. "At that time he played only bravura piano compositions, such as the Hexameron and Hungarian March of Schubert, in C minor, arranged by himself. I recollect his curious appearance, his tall, lank figure, buttoned up in a frock coat, very much embroidered with braid, and his long, light hair brushed straight down below his collar. He was not at that time a general favourite in England, and I remember that on this occasion there was rather a poor house. A criticism of this concert which I have preserved from the _Manchester Morning Post_ will give an idea of his wonderful playing. After some introduction it goes on to say: 'He played with velocity and impetuosity indescribable, and yet with a facile grace and pliancy that made his efforts seem rather like the flight of thought than the result of mechanical exertion, thus investing his execution with a character more mental than physical, and making genius give elevation to art. One of the most electrifying points of his performance was the introduction of a sequence of thirds in scales, descending with unexampled rapidity; and another, the volume of tone which he rolled forth in the execution of a double shake. The rapture of the audience knew no bounds,' etc. I fancied I saw the piano shake and tremble under the force of his blows in the Hungarian March. I regret that I never had an opportunity of hearing him later in life, when I am sure I should have had more pleasure both in his playing and his programmes. He had appeared some sixteen years before in Manchester, in 1824, as a youthful phenomenon, in an engagement made for him by Mr. Andrew Ward, my father's partner. He stayed at his house while there, as the following letter specifies; both letters form part of a correspondence between Mr. Ward and the elder Liszt on this matter.

"'LONDON, _July 29, 1824_.

"'DEAR SIR: In answer to your letter of the 27th inst. I beg to inform you that I wish my Son to play as follows: viz:--At the first concert, a grand Concerto for the Piano Forte with orchestral accompaniment composed by Hummel, and the Fall of Paris also with grand orchestral accompaniment composed by Moscheles.

"'At the 2d Concert--Variations with orchestral accompaniments composed by Charles Czerni, and afterwards an Extempore Fantasia on a written Thema which Master Liszt will respectfully request any person of the Company to give him.

"'We intend to start to-morrow afternoon at three o'clock by the Telegraph Coach from the White Horse Fetter lane, and as we are entire strangers to Manchester it will be very agreeable to us if you will send some one to meet us.

"'M. Erard's pianoforte will be in your town on Sunday morning as I shall be glad for my son to play upon that instrument.

"'I remain, Dear Sir,

"'Yr. very humble Servant,

"'LISZT.'

"'15 GT. MARLBOROUGH STREET,

"'_July 22, 1824._

"'Mr. Liszt presents his compliments to Mr. Roe and begs to say, that the terms upon which he will take his son to Manchester to play at the concerts of the second and fourth of August next will be as follows:

"'Mr. Liszt is to receive one hundred pounds and be provided with board and lodgings in Mr. Ward's house during his stay in Manchester for his son and himself, and Mr. Liszt will pay the travelling expenses to and from Manchester.'"

HENRY REEVES

In Henry Reeves's biography I found this about Liszt:

"Liszt had already played a great fantasia of his own, and Beethoven's Twenty-seventh Sonata in the former part of the concert. After this latter piece he gasped with emotion as I took his hand and thanked him for the divine energy he had shed forth. At last I managed to pierce the crowd, and I sat in the orchestra before the Duchesse de Rauzan's box, talking to her Grace and Madame de Circourt, who was there. My chair was on the same board as Liszt's piano when the final piece began. It was a duet for two instruments, beginning with Mendelssohn's Chants sans Paroles and proceeding to a work of Liszt's. We had already passed that delicious chime of the Song Written in a Gondola, and the gay tendrils of sound in another lighter piece, which always reminded me of an Italian vine, when Mrs. Handley played it to us. As the closing strains began I saw Liszt's countenance assume that agony of expression, mingled with radiant smiles of joy, which I never saw in any other human face except in the paintings of our Saviour by some of the early masters; his hands rushed over the keys, the floor on which I sat shook like a wire, and the whole audience were wrapped in sound, when the hand and frame of the artist gave way. He fainted in the arms of the friend who was turning over for him, and we bore him out in a strong fit of hysterics. The effect of this scene was really dreadful. The whole room sat breathless with fear, till Hiller came forward and announced that Liszt was already restored to consciousness and was comparatively well again. As I handed Madame de Circourt to her carriage we both trembled like poplar leaves, and I tremble scarcely less as I write."

LISZT'S CONVERSION

"Have you read the story of Liszt's conversion as told by Emile Bergerat in Le Livre de Caliban?" asks Philip Hale. "I do not remember to have seen it in English, and in the dearth of musical news the story may amuse. I shall not attempt to translate it literally, or even English it with a watchful eye on Bergerat's individuality. This is a paraphrase, not even a pale, literal translation of a brilliant original.

THE CONVERSION OF THE ABBÉ LISZT

"And so he will not play any more.

"Well, a pianist cannot keep on playing forever, and if Liszt had not promised to stop, the Pope would never have pardoned him--no, never. For the pianist turned priest because he was remorseful, horror-stricken at the thought of his abuse of the piano. His conversion is a matter of history. When one takes Orders, he swears to renounce Satan, his gauds and his works--that is to say, the piano.

"If he should play he'd be a renegade. Of course he longs to touch the keys. His daddy-long-legs-fingers itch, and he doesn't know what to do with them. But an apostate? Perish the thought! And apostasy grins at him; lurks in the metronome with its flicflac. Here's what I call a dramatic situation.

"Wretched Abbé! Never more will you smash white or black keys; never more will you dance on the angry pedals; O never, never more! Do you not hear the croaking of Poe's raven? Never again, O Father, will you tire the rosewood! Good-bye to tumbling scales and pyrotechnical arpeggios! Thus must you do penance. The president of the Immortals does not love piano playing. He scowls on pianists. He condemns them to thump throughout eternity. In Dante's hell there is a dumb piano, and Lucifer sees to it that they practice without ceasing.

"I am naturally tender-hearted, but I approve of this eternal punishment.

"Yes, Father Liszt, because the piano is not in the scheme of Nature. Even in Society the fewer the pianos the greater the merriment. If the piano were really a thing in Nature the good Lord would have taken at least ten minutes of the seven days and designed a model. But the piano never occurred to Him. Now, as everything, existing or to exist, was foreseen by him, and a part of Him (that is, according to the dogma), I am inclined to think He was afraid of the piano. He recoiled at the responsibility of creating it. And yet the machine exists!

"A syllogism leads us to declare that the piano is an after-thought. Of whom? Why, Satan of course. A grim joke of Satan. The piano is the enemy of man. Liszt finally discovered this, though he was just a little late. So he will only go to Purgatory, and in Purgatory there are no dumb pianos. But there are organs without pipes, without bellows, and many have pulled the stops in vain for centuries. I earnestly beseech you, my Father, to accumulate indulgences.

"They tell many stories about the conversions of Abbé Liszt, and how he found out that the piano is the enemy of humanity. Lo, here is the truth. He once gave a concert in a town where there were many dogs. He was then exceedingly absent-minded; he mistook the date and appeared the night before. Extraordinary to relate, there was no one in the hall, although the concert was announced for the next day! Liszt sat down nevertheless, and played for his own amusement. The effect was prodigious, as George Sand told us in her Lettres d'un Voyageur. The dogs ran to the noise--curs, water spaniels, poodles, greyhounds--all the dogs, including the yellow outcast. They all howled fearfully, and they would fain have fleshed their teeth in the pianist.

"Then Liszt reasoned--in his fashion: 'Since the dog is the friend of man, if he abominates the piano it is because his instinct tells him, "the piano is my friend's enemy!"' Professor Jevons might not have approved the conclusion, but Liszt saw no flaw.

"And then a sculptor wished to make a statue of Liszt. He hewed him as he sat before a piano, and he included the instrument. It was naturally a grand piano, one lent by Madame Erard expressly for the occasion. Liszt went to the studio, saw the clay, and turned green.

"'Where did you get such a ghastly idea?' he asked, and his voice trembled. 'You represent me as playing a music coffin.'

"'What's that? I have copied nature. Is not the shape exact?'

"'Horribly,' said Liszt. 'And thus, thus shall I appear to posterity! I shall be seen hanging by my nails to this funereal box, a virtuoso, ferocious, with dishevelled hair, raising the dead and digging a grave at the same time! The idea puts me in a cold sweat!'

"The sculptor smiled. 'I can substitute an upright.'

"'Then I should seem to be scratching a mummy case. They would take me for an Egyptologist at his sacrilegious work.'

"Homeward he fled. In his own room he arranged the mirrors so that he could see himself in all positions while he was plying his hellish trade. And then salvation came to him. He saw that the machine was demoniacal, that it recalled nothing in the fauna or the flora of the good Lord, that the sculptor was right, that the piano had the appearance of the sure box, in which occurs vague metempsychosis, that is if the box only had a jaw. He was horror-stricken at his past life. Frightened, his soul tormented by doubt, it seemed to him that from under the eighty-five molars, which he snatched hurriedly from the shrieking piano, Astaroth darted his tongue. He ran to Rome and threw himself at the Pope's feet, imploring exorcism.

"The confession lasted three days and three nights. The possessed could not get to an end. There were crimes which the Pope himself knew nothing about, which he had never heard mentioned, professional crimes, crimes peculiar to pianists, horrid crimes in keys natural and unnatural! This confession is still celebrated.

"'Holy Father,' cried the wretch, 'you do not, you cannot know everything! There are pianists and pianists. You believe that the piano, as diabolical as it is, whether it be a Pleyel or an Erard, cannot give out more noise than it holds. You believe that he who makes it exhibit in full its terrible proportions is the strongest, and that piano playing has human limitations. Alas, alas! You say to yourself when in an apartment house of seven stories the seven tenants give notice simultaneously to the trembling landlord, it makes no difference whether the cause of the desperate flight is named Saint-Saëns, Pugno or Chabrier. The tenants run because the piano gives forth all that is inside of it, and the inanimate is acutely animate. How Your Holiness is deceived. There's a still lower depth!'

"Liszt smote his breast thrice, and continued: 'I know a man (or is it indeed a human being?) who never quitted the sonorous coffin until the entire street in which he raged had emigrated. And yet he had only ten fingers on his hands, as you and I, and never did he use his toes. This monster, Holy Father, is at your feet!'

"Pius IX shivered with fright. 'Go on, my son, the mercy of God is unbounded.'

"Then Liszt accused himself:

"Of having by Sabbatic concerts driven the half of civilised Europe mad, while the other half returned to Chopin and Thalberg.

"('There's Rubinstein,' said Pius, and he smiled.) Liszt pretended not to hear him, and he continued:

"'My Father, I have encouraged the trade in shrill mahogany, noisy rosewood and shrieking ebony in the five parts of the acoustic world, so that at this very moment there is not a single ajoupa or a single thatched hut among savages that is without a piano. Even wild men are beginning to manufacture pianos, and they give them as wedding gifts to their daughters.'

"('Just as it is in Europe,' said the Pope.)

"'And also,' added Liszt, 'with instructions how to use them. Mea culpa!'

"Then he confessed that apes unable to scramble through a scale were rare in virgin forests; that travellers told of elephants who played with their trunks the Carnival of Venice variations; and it was he, Franz Liszt, that had served them as a model. The plague of universal "pianisme" had spread from pole to pole. Mea culpa! Mea culpa!

"Overcome with shame, he wished to finish his confession at the piano. But Pius IX had anticipated him. There was no piano in the Vatican. In all Christendom, the Pope was the only one without a boxed harp.

"'Ah! you are indeed the Pope!' cried Liszt as he knelt before him.

"A little after this Liszt took Orders. They that speak without intelligence started the rumour that it was at La Trappe. But at La Trappe there is a piano, and Liszt swore to the Holy Father that he would never touch one.

"To-day the world breathes freely. The monster has been disarmed and exorcised.

"Now when Liszt sees a piano he approaches it with curiosity and asks the use of that singular article of furniture.

"It is true there's one in his room, but he keeps his cassocks in it."

VII

IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF LISZT

I

WEIMAR

After rambling over Weimar and burrowing in the Liszt museum, one feels tempted to pronounce Liszt the happiest of composers, as Yeats calls William Morris the happiest poet. A career without parallel, a victorious general at the head of his ivory army; a lodestone for men and women; a poet, diplomat, ecclesiastic, man of the world, with the sunny nature of a child, loved by all, envious of no one--surely the fates forgot to spin evil threads at the cradle of Franz Liszt. And he was not a happy man for all that. He, too, like Friedrich Nietzsche had dæmonic fantasy; but for him it was a gift, for the other a curse. Music is a liberation, and Nietzsche of all men would have benefited by its healing powers.

In Weimar Liszt walked and talked, smoked strong cigars, played, prayed--for he never missed early mass--and composed. His old housekeeper, Frau Pauline Apel, still a hale woman, shows, with loving care, the memorials in the little museum on the first floor of the Wohnhaus, which stands in the gardens of the beautiful ducal park.

[Illustration: Pauline Apel

Liszt's housekeeper at Weimar]

Here Goethe and Schiller once promenaded in a company that has become historic. And cannot Weimar lay claim to a Tannhäuser performance as early as 1849, the Lohengrin production in 1850, and the Flying Dutchman in 1853? What a collection of musical manuscripts, trophies, jewels, pictures, orders, letters--I saw one from Charles Baudelaire to Liszt--and testimonials from all over the globe, which accumulated during the career of this extraordinary man!

The Steinway grand pianoforte, once so dearly prized by the master, has been taken away to make room for the many cases containing precious gifts from sovereigns, the scores of the Christus, Faust Symphony, Orpheus, Hungaria, Berg Symphony, Totentanz, and Festklänge. But the old instrument upon which he played years ago still stands in one of the rooms. Marble casts of Liszt's, Beethoven's, and Chopin's hands are on view; also Liszt's hand firmly clasping the slender fingers of the Princess Sayn-Wittgenstein. Like Chopin, Liszt attracted princesses as sugar buzzing flies.

* * * * *

There is a new Weimar--not so wonderful as the two old Weimars--the Weimar of Anna Amalia and Karl August, of Goethe, Wieland, Herder, and Schiller, Johanna Schopenhauer and her sullen son Arthur, the pessimistic philosopher--and not the old Weimar of Franz Liszt and his brilliant cohort of disciples; nevertheless, a new Weimar, its intellectual rallying-point the home of Elisabeth Foerster-Nietzsche, the tiny and lovable sister of the great dead poet-philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche.

To drift into this delightful Thuringian town; to stop at some curious old inn with an eighteenth century name like the Hotel Zum Elephant; to walk slowly under the trees of the ducal park, catching on one side a glimpse of Goethe's garden house, on the other Liszt's summer home, where gathered the most renowned musicians of the globe--these and many other sights and reminiscences will interest the passionate pilgrim--interest and thrill. If he be bent upon exploring the past glories of the Goethe régime there are bountiful opportunities; the Goethe residence, the superb Goethe and Schiller archives, the ducal library, the garden house, the Belvidere--here we may retrace all the steps of that noble, calm Greek existence from robust young manhood to the very chamber wherein the octogenarian uttered his last cry of "More light!" a cry that not only symbolised his entire career, but has served since as a watchword for poetry, science, and philosophy.

If you are musical, is there not the venerable opera-house wherein more than a half century ago Lohengrin, thanks to the incredible friendship and labour of Franz Liszt, was first given a hearing? And this same opera-house--now no more--is a theatre that fairly exhales memories of historic performances and unique dramatic artists. Once Goethe resigned because against his earnest protest a performing dog was allowed to appear upon the classic boards which first saw the masterpieces of Goethe and Schiller.

But the new Weimar! During the last decade whether the spot has a renewed fascination for the artistic Germans or because of its increased commercial activities, Weimar has worn another and a brighter face. The young Grand Duke Ernst, while never displaying a marked preference for intellectual pursuits, is a liberal ruler, as befits his blood.

Great impetus has been given to manufacturing interests, and the city is near enough to Berlin to benefit by both its distance and proximity. Naturally, the older and conservative inhabitants are horrified by the swift invasion of unsightly chimneys, of country disappearing before the steady encroachment of railroads, mills, foundries, and other unpicturesque but very useful buildings. And the country about Weimar is famed for its picturesque quality--Jena, Tiefurt, Upper Weimar, Erfurt, museums, castles, monuments, belvideres, wayside inns, wonderful roads overhung by great aged trees. But other days, other ways.

Weimar has awakened and is no longer proud to figure merely as a museum of antiquities. With this material growth there has arisen a fresh movement in the stagnant waters of poetic and artistic memories--new ideas, new faces, new paths, new names. It is a useless, though not altogether an unpleasant theme, to speculate upon the different Weimar we would behold if Richard Wagner's original plan had been put into execution as to the location of his theatre. Most certainly Bayreuth would be a much duller town than it is to-day--and that is saying much. But emburgessed prejudices were too much for Wagner, and a stuffy Bavarian village won his preference, thereby becoming historical.

However, Weimar is not abashed or cast down. A cluster of history-making names are hers, and who knows, fifty years hence she may be proud to recall the days when one Richard Strauss was her local Kapellmeister and that within her municipal precincts died a great poetic soul, the optimistic philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche.

Now, Weimar is the residence and the resort of a brilliant group of poets, dramatists, novelists, musicians, painters, sculptors, and actors. Professor Hans Olde, who presides over the imposing art galleries and art school, has gathered about him an enthusiastic host of young painters and art students.

There have been recently two notable exhibitions, respectively devoted to the works of the sculptor-painter, Max Klinger, and the French sculptor, Auguste Rodin. Nor is the new artistic leaven confined to the plastic arts. Ernst von Wildenbruch, a world-known novelist and dramatist (since dead); Baron Detlev von Liliencron, one of Germany's most gifted lyric poets; Richard Dehmel, a poet of the revolutionary order, whose work favourably compares with the productions of the Parisian symbolists; Paul Ernst, poet; Johannes Schlaf, who a few years ago with Arno Holz blazoned the way in Berlin for Gerhart Hauptmann and the young realists--Schlaf is the author of several powerful novels and plays; Count Kessler, a cultured and ardent patron of the fine arts and literature, and Professor van de Velde, whose influence on architecture and the industrial arts has been great, and the American painter Gari Melchers, are all in the Weimar circle.

In the summer Conrad Ansorge, a man not unknown to the New York musical public, gathers around him in pious imitation of his former master, Liszt, a class of ambitious pianists. A former resident of New York, Max Vogrich, pianist and composer, has taken up his residence at Weimar. In its opera-house, which boasts an excellent company of singers, actors, and a good orchestra, the première of Vogrich's opera Buddha occurred in 1903. Gordon Craig, the son of Ellen Terry, often visits the city, where his scheme for the technical reform of the stage--lighting, scenery, costumes, and colours--was eagerly appreciated, as it was in Berlin, by Otto Brahm, director of the Lessing Theatre. Mr. Craig is looked upon as an advanced spirit in Germany. I wish I could praise without critical reservation the two new statues of Shakespeare and Liszt which stand in the park; but neither one is of consummate workmanship or conception.

When I received the amiable "command" of Elisabeth Foerster-Nietzsche, bidding me call at a fixed hour on a certain day, I was quite conscious of the honour; only the true believers set foot within that artistic and altogether charming Mecca at the top of the Luisenstrasse.

The lofty and richly decorated room where repose the precious mementos of the dead thinker is a singularly attractive one--it is a true abode of culture. Here Nietzsche died in 1900; here he was wheeled out upon the adjacent balcony, from which he had a surprising view of the hilly and delectable countryside.

His sister and devoted biographer is a comely little lady, vivacious, intellectual, bright of cheek and eye, a creature of fire and enthusiasm, more Gallic than German. I could well believe in the legend of the Polish Nietzskys, from whom the philosopher claimed descent, after listening to her spirited discussion of matters that pertained to her dead brother. His memory with her is an abidingly beautiful one. She says "my poor brother" with the accents of one speaking of the vanished gods.

His sister showed me all her treasures--many manuscripts of early and still unpublished studies; his original music, for he composed much during his intimacy with Richard Wagner; the grand pianoforte with which he soothed his tortured nerves; the stately bust executed by Max Klinger; the painful portrait etched by Hans Olde, and many other souvenirs.

Mrs. Foerster-Nietzsche, who once lived in South America--she speaks English, French, and Italian fluently--assured me that she sincerely regretted the premature publication in English of The Case of the Wagner. This book, so terribly personal, is a record of the disenchanting experiences of a shattered friendship.

Madame Foerster spoke most feelingly of Cosima Wagner and deplored the rupture of their intimate relations. "A marvellous woman! a fascinating woman!" she said several times. What with her correspondence in every land, the publication of the bulky biography and the constant editing of unpublished essays, letters and memorabilia, this rare sister of a great man is, so it seems to me, overtaxing her energies. The Nietzsche bibliography has assumed formidable proportions, yet she is conversant with all of it. A second Henrietta Renan, I thought, as I took a regretful leave of this very remarkable woman, not daring to ask her when Nietzsche's unpublished autobiography, Ecce Homo, would be given to the world. (This was written in 1904; Ecce Homo has appeared in the meantime.)

Later, down in the low-ceilinged café of the Hotel zum Elephant, I overheard a group of citizens, officers, merchants--all cronies--discussing Weimar. Nietzsche's name was mentioned, and one knight of this round table--a gigantic officer with a button head--contemptuously exclaimed:--"Nietzsche Rauch!" (smoke). Yes, but what a world-compelling vapour is his that now winds in fantastic spirals over the romantic hills and valleys of the new Weimar and thence about the entire civilised globe! Friedrich Nietzsche, because of his fiery poetic spirit and ecstatic pantheism, might be called the Percy Bysshe Shelley of philosophers.

II

BUDAPEST

My first evening in Budapest was a cascade of surprises. The ride down from Vienna is not cheery until the cathedral and palace of the primate is reached, at Gran, a superb edifice, challenging the valley of the Danube. Interminable prairies, recalling the traits of our Western country, swam around the busy little train until this residence of the spiritual lord of Hungary was passed. After that the scenery as far as Orsova, Belgrade, and the Iron Gates is legendary in its beauty.

To hear the real Hungarian gipsy on his own heath has been long my ambition. In New York he is often a domesticated fowl, with aliens in his company. But in Budapest! My hopes were high. The combination of that peppery food, paprika gulyas, was also an item not to be overlooked. I soon found an establishment where the music is the best in Hungary, the cooking of the hottest. After the usual distracting tuning the band splashed into a fierce prelude.

Fancy coming thousands of miles to hear the original of all the cakewalks and eat a preparation that might have been turned out from a Mexican restaurant! It was too much. It took exactly four Czardas and the Rakoczy march to convince me that I was not dreaming of Manhattan Beach.

But this particular band was excellent. Finding that some of the listeners only wished for gipsy music, the leader played the most frantically bacchanalian in his repertory. Not more than eight men made up the ensemble! And such an ensemble. It seemed to be the ideal definition of anarchy--unity in variety. Not even a Richard Strauss score gives the idea of vertical and horizontal music--heard at every point of the compass, issuing from the bowels of the earth, pouring down upon one's head like a Tyrolean thunderstorm. Every voice was independent, and syncopated as were the rhythms. There was no raggedness in attack or cessation.

Like a streak of jagged, blistering lightning, a tone would dart from the double bass to the very scroll of the fiddles. In mad pursuit, over a country black as Servian politics went the cymbalom, closely followed by two clarinets--in B and E flat. The treble pipe was played by a jeweller in disguise--he must have been a jeweller, so fond was he of ornamentation and cataracts of pearly tones. He made a trelliswork behind which he attacked his foes, the string players. In the midst of all this melodic chaos the leader, cradling his fiddle like something alive, swayed as sways a tall tree in the gale. Then he left the podium and hat in hand collected white pieces and _kronen_. It was disenchanting.

The tone of the band was more resilient, more brilliant than the bands we hear in America. And there were more heart, fire, swing and dash in their playing. The sapping melancholy of the Lassan and the diabolic vigour of the Friska are things that I shall never forget. These gipsies have an instinctive sense of tempo. Their allegretto is a genuine allegretto. They play rag-time music with true rhythmic appreciation for the reason that its metrical structure is grateful to them.

In Paris the cakewalk is a thing of misunderstood, misapplied accents. The Budapest version of the Rakoczy march is a revelation. No wonder Berlioz borrowed it. The tempo is a wild quickstep; there is no majestic breadth, so suggestive of military pomp or the grandeur of a warlike race. Instead, the music defiled by in crazy squads, men breathlessly clinging to the saddles of their maddened steeds; above them hung the haze of battle, and the hoarse shouting of the warriors was heard. Five minutes more of this excitement and heart disease might have supervened. Five minutes later I saw the band grinning over their tips, drinking and looking absolutely incapable of ever playing such stirring and hyperbolical music.

After these winged enchantments I was glad enough to wander next morning in the Hungarian Museum, following the history of this proud and glorious nation, in its armour, its weapons, its trophies of war and its banners captured from the Saracen. Such mementos re-create a race. In the picture gallery, a modest one, there are some interesting Munkaczys and several Makarts; also many specimens of Hungarian art by Kovacs, Zichy (a member of a noble and talented family), Székely, and Michael Zichy's cartoon illustrations to Mádach's The Tragedy of Mankind.

Munkaczy's portrait of Franz Liszt is muddy and bituminous. Two original aquarelles by Doré were presented by Liszt. I was surprised to find in the modern Saal the Sphynx of Franz Stuck, a sensational and gruesome canvas, which made a stir at the time of first hanging in the Munich Secession exhibition. Budapest purchased it; also a very characteristic Segantini, an excellent Otto Sinding, and Hans Makart's Dejanira. A beautiful marble of Rodin's marks the progressive taste of this artistic capital.

It would seem that even for a municipality of New York's magnitude the erection of such a Hall of Justice and such a Parliament building would be a tax beyond its purse. Budapest is not a rich city, but these two public buildings, veritable palaces, gorgeously decorated, proclaim her as a highly civilised centre. The opera-house, which seats only 1,100, is the most perfectly appointed in the world; its stage apparatus is better than Bayreuth's. And the natural position of the place is unique. From the ramparts of the royal palace in Buda--old Ofen--your eye, promise-crammed, sweeps a series of fascinating façades, churches, palaces, generous embankments, while between its walls the Danube flows torrentially down to the mysterious lands where murder is admired and thrones are playthings.

In the Liszt museum is the old, bucolic pianino upon which his childish hands first rested at Raiding (Dobrjàn), his birthplace. His baton; the cast of his hand and of Chopin's and the famous piano of Beethoven, at which most of the immortal sonatas were composed, and upon which Liszt Ferencz played for the great composer shortly before his death in 1827. The little piano has no string, but the Beethoven--a Broadwood & Sons, Golden Square, London, so the fall-board reads--is full of jangling wires, the keys black with age. Liszt presented it to his countrymen--he greatly loved Budapest and taught several months every winter at the Academy of Music in the spacious Andrassy strasse.

A harp, said to have been the instrument most affected by Marie Antoinette, did not give me the thrill historic which all right-minded Yankees should experience in strange lands. I would rather see a real live tornado in Kansas than shake hands with the ghost of Napoleon.

III

ROME

The pianoforte virtuoso, Richard Burmeister, and one of Liszt's genuine "pet" pupils, advised me to look at Liszt's hotel in the Vicolo Alibert, Rome. It is still there, an old-fashioned place, Hotel Alibert, up an alley-like street off the Via Babuino, near the Piazza del Popolo. But it is shorn of its interest for melomaniacs, as the view commanding the Pincio no longer exists. One night sufficed me, though the manager smilingly assured me that he could show the room wherein Liszt slept and studied. A big warehouse blocks the outlook on the Pincio; indeed the part of the hotel Liszt inhabited no longer stands. But at Tivoli, at the Villa d'Este, with its glorious vistas of the Campagna and Rome, there surely would be memories of the master. The Sunday I took the steam-tramway was a threatening one; before Bagni was reached a solid sheet of water poured from an implacable leaden sky. It was not a cheerful prospect for a Liszt-hunter. Arrived at Tivoli, I waited in the Caffé d'Italia hoping for better weather. An old grand pianoforte, the veriest rattletrap stood in the eating salle; but upon its keys had rested many times the magic-breeding fingers of Liszt. Often, with a band of students or with guests he would walk down from the villa and while waiting for their carriages he would jestingly sweep the keyboard. At the Villa d'Este itself the cypresses, cascades, terraces, and mysterious avenues of green were enveloped in a hopeless fog. It was the mistiest spot I ever visited. Heaven and earth, seemingly, met in fluid embrace to give me a watery welcome. Where was Liszt's abode is a Marianite convent. I was not permitted to visit his old room which is now the superior's. It was at the top of the old building, for wherever Liszt lived he enjoyed a vast landscape. I could discover but one person who remembered the Abbate; the conciêrge. And his memories were scanty. I wandered disconsolately through the rain, my mood splenetic. So much for fame. I bitterly reflected in the melancholy, weedy, moss-infested walks of the garden.

As I attempted to point out to our little party the particular window from which Liszt saw the miraculous Italian world, I stepped on a slimy green rock and stretched my length in the humid mud. There was a deep, a respectful silence as I was helped to my feet--the gravity of the surroundings, the solemnity of our recollections choked all levity; though I saw signs of impending apoplexy on several faces. To relieve the strain I sternly bade our guide retire to an adjacent bosky retreat and there roar to his heart's content. He did. So did we all. The spell broken we returned to the "Sirene" opposite the entrance to the famous Tivoli water-falls and there with Chianti and spaghetti tried to forget the morning's disappointments. But even there sadness was invoked by the sight of a plaster bust of Liszt lying forlorn in the wet grass. The head waiter tried to sell it for twenty liri; but it was too big to carry; besides its nose was missing. He said that the original was somewhere in Tivoli.

Sgambati in Rome keeps green the memory of the master in his annual recitals; but of the churchly compositions no one I encountered had ever heard. At Santa Francesca Romana, adjoining the Forum, Liszt once took up his abode; there I saw in the cloister an aged grand pianoforte upon which he had played in a concert given at the Church of Santa Maria Maggiore many years ago. About an hour from Rome is the Oratory of the Madonna del Rosario on Monte Mario. There Liszt lived and composed in 1863. But his sacred music is never sung in any of the churches; the noble Graner Mass is still unheard in Rome. Even the Holy Father refers to the dead Hungarian genius as, "il compositore Tedesco!" It was different in the days of Pius IX, when Liszt's music was favoured at the Vatican. Is it not related that Pio Nono bestowed upon the great pianist the honour of hearing his confession at the time he became an abbé? And did he not after four or five hours of worldly reminiscences, cry out despairingly to his celebrated penitent:

"Basta, Caro Liszt! Your memory is marvellous. Now go play the remainder of your sins upon the pianoforte." They say that Liszt's playing on that occasion was simply enchanting--and he did not cease until far into the night.

Liszt's various stopping-places in and around Rome were: Vicolo de Greci (No. 43), Hotel Alibert, Vicolo Alibert, opposite Via del Babuino; Villa d'Este with Cardinal Hohenlohe, also at the Vatican; in 1866 at Monte Mario, Kloster Madonna del Rosario, Kloster Santa Francesca Romana, the Princess Sayn-Wittgenstein first resided in the Via del Babuino, later (1881) at the Hotel Malaro. Monsignor Kennedy of the American College shows the grand piano upon which Liszt once played there.

Perhaps Rome, at a superficial glance, still affects the American as it did Taine a half century ago, as a provincial city, sprawled to unnecessary lengths over its seven hills, and, despite the smartness of its new quarters, far from suggesting a Weltstadt, as does, for example, bustling, shining Berlin or mundane Paris. But not for her superb and imperial indifference are the seductive spells of operatic Venice or the romantic glamour of Florence. She can proudly say "La ville c'est moi!" She is not a city, but the city of cities, and it needs but twenty-four hours' submergence in her atmosphere to make one a slave at her eternal chariot wheels. The New York cockney, devoted to his cult of the modern--hotels, baths, cafés and luxurious theatres--soon wearies of Rome. He prefers Paris or Naples. Hasn't some one said, "See Naples and die--of its smells?" As an inexperienced traveller I know of no city on the globe where you formulate an expression of like or dislike so quickly. You are Rome's foe or friend within five minutes after you leave its dingy railway station. And it is hardly necessary to add that its newer quarters, pretentious, cold, hard and showy, are quite negligible. One does not go to Rome to seek the glazed comforts of Brooklyn.

The usual manner of approaching the Holy Father is to go around to the American Embassy and harry the good-tempered secretary into a promise of an invitation card, that is, if you are not acquainted in clerical circles. I was not long in Rome before I discovered that both Mgr. Kennedy and Mgr. Merry del Val were at Frascati enjoying a hard-earned vacation. So I dismissed the ghost of the idea and pursued my pagan worship at the Museo Vaticano. Then the heavy hoofs of three hundred pilgrims invaded the peace of the quiet Hotel Fischer up in the Via Sallustiana. They had come from Cologne and the vicinity of the Upper Rhine, bearing Peter's pence, wearing queer clothes and good-natured smiles. They tramped the streets and churches of Rome, did these commonplace, pious folk. They burrowed in the Catacombs and ate their meals, men and women alike, with such a hearty gnashing of teeth, such a rude appetite, that one envied their vitality, their faith, their wholesale air of having accomplished the conquest of Rome.

Their schedule, evidently prepared with great forethought and one that went absolutely to pieces when put to the test of practical operation, was wrangled over at each meal, where the Teutonic clans foregathered in full force. The third day I heard of a projected audience at the Vatican. These people had come to Rome to see the Pope. Big-boned and giantlike Monsignor Pick visited the hotel daily, and once after I saw him in conference with Signor Fischer I asked him if it were possible----

"Of course," responded the wily Fischer, "anything is possible in Rome." Wear evening dress? Nonsense! That was in the more exacting days of Leo XIII. The present Pope is a democrat. He hates vain show. Perhaps he has absorbed some of the Anglo-Saxon antipathy to seeing evening dress on a male during daylight. But the ladies wear veils. All the morning of October 5 the hotel was full of eager Italians selling veils to the German ladies.

Carriages blocked the streets and almost stretched four square around the Palazzo Margherita. There was noise. There were explosive sounds when bargains were driven. Then, after the vendors of saints' pictures, crosses, rosary beads--chiefly gentlemen of Oriental persuasion, comical as it may seem--we drove off in high feather nearly four hundred strong. I had secured from Monsignor Pick through the offices of my amiable host a parti-hued badge with a cross and the motto, "Coeln--Rom., 1905," which, interpreted, meant "Cologne--Rome." I felt like singing "Nach Rom," after the fashion of the Wagnerians in act II of Tannhäuser, but contented myself with abusing my coachman for his slow driving. It was all as exciting as a first night at the opera.

The rendezvous was the Campo Santo dei Tedeschi, which, with its adjoining church of Santa Maria della Pieta, was donated to the Germans by Pius VI as a burying-ground. There I met my companions of the dining-room, and after a stern-looking German priest with the bearing of an officer interrogated me I was permitted to join the pilgrims. What at first had been a thing of no value was now become a matter of life and death.

After standing above the dust and buried bones of illustrious and forgotten Germans we went into the church and were cooled by an address in German from a worthy cleric whose name I cannot recall. I remember that he told us that we were to meet the Vicar of Christ, a man like ourselves. He emphasised strangely, so it appeared to me, the humanity of the great prelate before whom we were bidden that gloomy autumnal afternoon. And then, after intoning a Te Deum, we filed out in pairs, first the women, then the men, along the naked stones until we reached the end of the Via delle Fundamenta. The pilgrims wore their everyday clothes. One even saw the short cloak and the green jägerhut. We left our umbrellas at a garderobe; its business that day was a thriving one. We mounted innumerable staircases. We entered the Sala Regia, our destination--I had hoped for the more noble and spacious Sala Ducale.

Three o'clock was the hour set for the audience; but His Holiness was closeted with a French ecclesiastical eminence and there was a delay of nearly an hour. We spent it in staring at the sacred and profane frescoes of Daniele da Volterra, Vasari, Salviati and Zucchari staring at each other. The women, despite their Italian veils, looked hopelessly Teutonic, the men clumsy and ill at ease. There were uncouth and guttural noises. Conversation proceeded amain. Some boasted of being heavily laden with rosaries and crucifixes, for all desired the blessing of the Holy Father. One man, a young German-American priest from the Middle West, almost staggered beneath a load of pious emblems. The guilty feelings which had assailed me as I passed the watchful gaze of the Swiss Guards began to wear off. The Sala Regia bore an unfamiliar aspect, though I had been haunting it and the adjacent Sistine Chapel daily for the previous month. An aura, coming I knew not whence, surrounded us. The awkward pilgrims, with their daily manners, almost faded away, and when at last a murmur went up, "The Holy Father! the Holy Father! He approaches!" a vast sigh of relief was exhaled. The tension had become unpleasant.

We were ranged on either side, the women to the right, the men to the left of the throne, which was an ordinary looking tribune. It must be confessed that later the fair sex were vigorously elbowed to the rear. In America the women would have been well to the front, but the dear old Fatherland indulges in no such new fangled ideas of sex equality. So the polite male pilgrims by superior strength usurped all the good places. A tall, handsome man in evening clothes--solitary in this respect, with the exception of the Pope's body suite--patrolled the floor, obsequiously followed by the Suiss in their hideous garb--a murrain on Michelangelo's taste if he designed such hideous uniforms! I fancied that he was no less than a prince of the royal blood, so masterly was his bearing. When I discovered that he was the Roman correspondent of a well-known North German gazette my respect for the newspaper man abroad was vastly increased. The power of the press----!

"His Holiness comes!" was announced, and this time it was not a false alarm. From a gallery facin