Music-Study in Germany Part 4

BERLIN, _June 26, 1870_.

Last week the Emperor of Austria was here, and they had a parade in his honour. The B.'s took me in their carriage to see it. We drove to a large plain outside the city, and there we saw a mock battle, and all the manuvers of an army--how they advance and retreat, and how they form and deploy. There was a continual fire of musketry and artillery, and it was very exciting. The enemy was only imaginary, but the attacking party acted just as if there were one, and at last it ended with the taking by storm, which was done by the attacking party rushing on with one continued cheer, or rather yell, from one end of the lines to the other. Then they all broke up, the bands played the Russian Hymn, the King and the Emperor mounted horses and led off a great body of cavalry, and away we all clattered home--carriages and horses all together. It was a great sight, and I enjoyed it very much.

I am going to play before Tausig next Monday, and have been studying very hard. He praised me very much the last time, and said he would soon take me into his regular cla.s.s; but he is such a whimsical creature that one can't rely on him much. Two of the girls have almost finished their studies with him, and soon are going to give concerts. I am playing Scarlatti, which he is _awfully_ particular with, and expect to have my head taken off. Two of his scholars are playing the same pieces that I am, and he told one of them that she played "like a nut-cracker." He is very funny sometimes. The other day one of the young men played the Pastoral Sonata to him. Tausig gave a sigh, and said, "This _should_ be a garden of roses, but, as you play it, I see only potato plants."

Scarlatti is charming music. He writes _en suite_ like Bach, and is still more quaint and full of humour.

I find Berlin very pleasant, even in summer. Most of the better houses are made with balconies or bow windows, and around each one they will have a little frame full of earth in which is planted mignonette, nasturtiums, geraniums, etc., which trail over the edge, and as you look up from the street it seems as if the houses were festooned with flowers. On many of them woodbine is trained so that every window is set in a deep green frame. All the nice streets have pretty little front yards in which roses are planted, and I never saw anything like them.

The branches are cut to one thick, straight stem, which is tied to a stick. They grow very tall, and each one is crowned with a top-knot of superb roses. Every yard looks like a little orchard of roses, and they are of every imaginable shade of colour. Every American who comes here must be struck with the want of beauty in the cities he has left at home; and it is really shameful, that when our people are so much better off, and when such immense numbers of them see this European culture every year, still they do not introduce the same things into our country. Take Fifth Avenue or Beacon Street, for example, and one won't see anything the whole length of them but a little green gra.s.s and an occasional woodbine, whereas here they would be adorned with flowers and all sorts of contrivances to make them beautiful.

On Thursday a little party of three, including myself, was made up to take me out to Potsdam. The Museum, Charlottenburg and Potsdam, are, as Mr. T. B. says, "the three sights of Berlin." I have written you of the first two, and you shall now have the third. Potsdam is sixteen miles from here, and it took about as long to go there by train as it does from Boston to Lynn. It is the royal summer residence. On arriving we bought a large quant.i.ty of cherries and then seated ourselves in a carriage to drive through the city to Charlottenhof. Here we got out and walked into a superb park, filled with splendid old trees. The first thing we saw was a beautiful little building in the Pompeian style. This was where Humboldt used to stay with the last king and queen in summer.

We went into it and found it the sweetest little place you can imagine.

When we opened the door, instead of a hall was a little court with a fountain in it and two low, broad staircases (of marble, I think) sweeping up to the main story. The walls were delicately tinted and frescoed all round the borders with Pompeian devices. The windows were of some sort of thin transparent stained gla.s.s, through which the light could penetrate easily, and were also in the Pompeian fashion, with chariots, and horses, and G.o.ddesses, etc. The rooms all opened into each other, but we were obliged to go through them so hastily that I could not look at them much in detail. The walls were covered with lovely pictures, and there were tables inlaid with precious marbles and all sorts of beautiful things. We saw the table and chair where the king always sat, just as he had left it, with his papers and drawings; and the queen's boudoir, with her writing materials and her sewing arrangements. From her window one looked out on a fountain at the right, and on the left was a long arcade covered with vines which led to a garden of roses.

We opened a door and pa.s.sed through this arcade, and, after looking at the flowers, went on through the park until we came to another house, which was Pompeian, also, or Greek, I couldn't exactly tell which. It was built only to bathe in. The floors were all of stone, and it was as cool and fresh as could be. The bath itself was a large semi-circular place into which one went down by steps. It was large enough to swim in.

Those old peoples understood pretty well how to make themselves comfortable, didn't they? There was an ancient bath-tub there, set upon a pedestal, made of some precious stone, which Humboldt had appraised at half a million of thalers. Outside was a lovely little garden, of course, and one of the prettiest things I saw was a quant.i.ty of those flowers which only grow in cool, moist places, sheltered under an awning. The awning was circular, and stretched down to the ground on three sides, so that one could only see the flowers by standing just in front. There were any number of lady-slippers of every shade, each mottled exquisitely with a different colour, and behind them rose other flowers in regular gradation, and all of brilliant tints. It seemed as if they were all nestling under a great shaker bonnet, and they looked as coy and bewitching as possible. I thought it was a charming idea.

After we left this place we went on until we came to Sans Souci, which was built simply for the benefit of the orange trees--to give them a shelter in winter. At least, this was the pretext. It has a most dazzling effect in the sunshine as you look at it from below. Terrace rises above terrace, and at the top is this airy white building rising lightly into the sky, with galleries and towers, groups of statuary, colonnades, fountains, flowers, and every device one can imagine to make it look as much like a fairy palace as possible. The great burly orange trees stand in rows in the gardens in large green pots. Many of them were in blossom, and cast their heavy perfume on the air. You couldn't turn your eyes any where that _something_ was not arranged to arrest and surprise them. Here I saw another way of training roses. Running along on the green turf was a certain low growing variety, the branches of which they pin to the earth with a kind of wooden hair-pin, so that it does not show. They thus lie perfectly flat, and the gra.s.s is _literally_ "carpeted" with them. It was lovely. After we had sufficiently admired the exterior of the palace, we ascended the flights of steps which lead up the terraces, and went into it. Outside were the long galleries where the orange trees stand, and then we pa.s.sed into the large and n.o.ble rooms. First came the one which is devoted to Raphael's pictures. Copies of them all hang upon the walls. After we had gazed at them a long time, we looked at the other apartments, all of which were furnished in some extraordinary way, but I glanced at them too hastily to retain any recollection of them. I only remember that one was all of malachite and gold.

The next thing we did was to go over the palace originally named "Sans Souci," where Frederick the Great lived. We saw the benches--ledges rather--on which his poor pages had to sit in the corridor, and which were purposely made so narrow in order to prevent their falling asleep while on duty. The armchair in which he died is there, and the bust of Charles XII still stands on the floor at the foot of the statue of Venus, where Frederick placed it in derision, because Charles was a woman-hater. I think it was a very small piece of malice on Frederick's part, and in fact he had such a bad heart that none of his relics interested me in the least.

After we had seen everything we went to a little restaurant at the foot of Sans Souci, where we drank beer and coffee and ate cake seated round a little table under the trees. This fashion that the Germans have of eating out of doors in summer is perfectly delightful, I think. I laid in a fresh stock of cherries, though I had already eaten an immense quant.i.ty, but they looked so nice, piled in little pyramids upon a vine leaf, like the cannon b.a.l.l.s at the Cambridge a.r.s.enal, that there was no resisting them. I've thought of you ever since the cherry season began.

They are so extremely cheap here, that two groschens (about six cents) will buy as many as two persons can eat at one time. We drove from Sans Souci to Fingstenberg, which is only a place to see a view of the country. The landscape was perfectly flat, but it had the charm of quiet cultivation. It was green with beautiful trees, and the river wound along dotted with white sails, and there were wind-mills turning in every direction. After we left Fingstenberg we drove down to an inn where we ordered dinner, and this also was served out of doors. It was about six o'clock in the evening, and we were all very hungry, so we enjoyed this part of the programme very much.

When we had finished our cutlet and green peas we got into the carriage again, and drove to Babelsberg. This is a little retreat which belongs to the queen, and where the royal family sometimes pa.s.ses a few weeks in summer. We walked through a n.o.ble park where the ground swelled upward on our left and sloped downward on our right. After following the windings of the road for a long distance, we at last arrived at the little castle, perched upon a hill-side and embowered in trees. A smart looking maid showed us through it, and I was more impressed here than by all I had previously seen. As Balzac says, "People who talk about a house 'being like a palace' should see one first,"--although, as Herr J.

observed, "Babelsberg is not a palace, but is more like the home of an English n.o.bleman." It is just a quiet little retreat, but the beauty with which everything is arranged is quite indescribable. Every window is planned so that you cannot look out without having something exquisite before you. Here it will be a little mosaic of rare flowers; there a fountain, etc. And then the bronzes, the pictures, the rare old pieces of gla.s.s and china, the thousand curious and beautiful objects of art that one must see over and over again to be able really to take in.

In these castles, too, there are no end of little nooks and crannies where two or three persons, only, can sit and talk. Dainty little recesses made for enjoyment.

I walked into the grand salon and imagined an elegant a.s.semblage of people in it, with all the means of entertainment at hand. It was a circular room, and large enough to dance the German in very comfortably.

We went up stairs and through the different apartments. I went into the Princess Royal's room, and "surveyed my queenly form" in the superb mirror, and arranged my veil by her toilette gla.s.s--which I envied her, I a.s.sure you, for it shone like silver. We saw the cane of Frederick the Great, with a lion couchant on it--the one which he shook on some occasion and frightened somebody--(now you know, don't you?) Last of all we went up into the tower, and after climbing the dizzy staircase, we stood on the balconies for a long time, and looked over the splendid park about the country. Altogether, I was enchanted with Babelsberg, and nothing will suit me now but to have it for the retreat of my old age. I think I shall apply to be a servant there, for it must be a delightful situation. The royal family is only a short time there, and the servants have this exquisite habitation, which is always kept in perfect order, all the rest of the year, and have nothing to do but show visitors over it and take in half thalers!

After we left Babelsberg we took a carriage and drove to the station, where we got into the cars about half-past nine, and went back to Berlin. Herr J. had made himself extremely agreeable, and had exerted himself the whole day on our behalf. We had a most perfect time of its kind, and I enjoyed every minute of it, but came back in the worst of spirits, as I generally do. It seems so hard that one can never get together _all_ the elements of perfect happiness! Here in Babelsberg everything was so lovely that one could scarcely believe that there had ever been a "Fall." It seemed as if people _must_ be happy there, and yet I'm told that the queen is very unhappy. I suppose because she has such a faithless old husband.

CHAPTER VI.

The War. German Meals. Women and Men. Tausig's Teaching. Tausig Abandons his Conservatory. Dresden. Kullak.

BERLIN, _July 23, 1870_.

Just now the grand topic of course is this dreadful war that has just been declared between Prussia and France, and everybody is in the wildest state of excitement over it. It broke out so very suddenly that it is only just one week since it has been decided upon, and ever since, the drafting has been going on, and the streets are filled with regiments and with droves of horses, cannon, and all the implements of war. The trains are going out all the time packed with soldiers, and the railroad stations are the constant scene of weeping women of all cla.s.ses, come to see the last of their dear ones. There is such a storm of indignation against Napoleon that one hears nothing but curses against him. I am entirely on the German side, and am anxious to see the result, for between two such great nations, and with so much at stake, it will be a tremendous struggle.

We are promised a holiday soon, when I shall have a let-up from practicing, and only practice three hours a day, instead of five or six.

Don't think I am making extraordinary progress because I practice so much. I find that the strengthening and equalizing of the fingers is a terribly slow process, and that it takes much more time to make a step forward than I expected. You may know how a thing _ought_ to be played, but it is another matter to get your hands into such a training that they obey your will. Sometimes I am very much encouraged, and feel as if I should be an artist "immediately, if not sooner," and at others I fall into the blackest despair. I don't know but that S. J. was in the right of it, not to attempt anything, for it is an awful pull when you _do_ once begin to study!

I wish S. could come here and spend a winter. I am sure it would be capital for her health. The Germans have a great idea that you must "_starken_ (strengthen)" yourself. So they eat every few hours. When you first arrive you feel stuffed to bursting all the time, for you naturally eat heartily at every meal, because, as we only eat three times a day in America, we are accustomed to take a good deal at once.

Here they have five meals a day, and one has to learn how to take a little at a time. But it is a pretty good idea, for you are continually repairing yourself, and you never have such a strain on your system as to get hungry! The German women are plump roly-polies, as a general rule, and it is probably in consequence of this continual "strengthening." One has full opportunity to observe their condition, for they generally have their dress "_aus-geschnitten_ (square neck),"

as they call it, in order to save collars, and you will see them strolling along the streets with their dresses out open in front. They are not handsome--irregular features and muddy complexions being the rule. The way they neglect their teeth is the worst. They are always complimenting Americans on what they call our "fine Grecian noses," and, in fact, since they have said so much about it, I have noticed that nearly all Americans _have_ straight and reasonably proportioned noses.--One sees a great many handsome _men_ on the street, however--many more than we do at home. Perhaps it is because the Prussian uniform sets them off so, and then their blonde beards and moustaches give them a _distingue_ air.

From what you tell me of the shock of our respected friend---- over B.'s travelling from the West under Mr. S.'s escort, I think the "conventionalities" are taking too strong a hold in America, and it will not be many years before they are as strict there as they are here, where young people of different s.e.xes can never see anything of each other. I regard it as a shocking system, as the Germans manage it. Young ladies and gentlemen only see each other in parties, and a young man can never call on a girl, but must always see her in the presence of the whole family. I only wonder how marriages are managed at all, for the s.e.xes seem to live quite isolated from each other. The consequence is, the girls get a lot of rubbish in their heads, and as for the men, I know not what they think, for I have not seen any to speak of since I have been here. You can imagine that with my co-education training and ideas, I have given Fraulein W.'s moral system a succession of shocks.

She has been fenced up, so to speak, her whole life, and, consequently, was dumbfounded at the bold stand I take. I cannot resist giving her a sensation once in a while, so I come out with some strong expression. Do you know, since I've seen so much of the world I've come to the conclusion that the New England principle of teaching daughters to be independent and to look out for themselves from the first, is an excellent one. I've seen the evil of this German system of never allowing children to think for themselves. It _does_ make them so mawkish. A girl here nearly thirty years old will not know where to buy the simplest thing, or do without her mother any more than a baby. The best plan is the old-fashioned American one, viz.: Give your children a "stern sense of duty," and then throw them on their own resources.

BERLIN, _August 6, 1870_.

Until yesterday I have had no holiday, for I got into Tausig's cla.s.s finally, so I had to practice very hard. He was as amiable to me as he ever can be to anybody, but he is the most trying and exasperating master you can possibly imagine. It is his principle to rough you and snub you as much as he can, even when there is no occasion for it, and you can think yourself fortunate if he does not hold you up to the ridicule of the whole cla.s.s. I was put into the cla.s.s with Fraulein Timanoff, who is so far advanced that Tausig told her he would not give her lessons much longer, for that she knew enough to graduate. You can imagine what an ordeal my first lesson was to me. I brought him a long and difficult Scherzo, by Chopin, that I had practiced carefully for a month, and knew well. Fancy how easy it was for me to play, when he stood over me and kept calling out all through it in German, "Terrible!

Shocking! Dreadful! O Gott! O Gott!" I was really playing it well, too, and I kept on in spite of him, but my nerves were all rasped and excited to the highest point, and when I got through and he gave me my music, and said, "Not at all bad" (very complimentary for him), I rushed out of the room and burst out crying. He followed me immediately, and coolly said, "What are you crying for, child? Your playing was not at all bad."

I told him that it was "impossible for me to help it when he talked in such a way," but he did not seem to be aware that he had said anything.

And now to show how we all have our troubles, and that blow falls upon blow--I will tell you that at our last lesson Tausig informed us that he was _not going to give another lesson to anybody_, and that the conservatory would be shut up on the first of October!! This is the most _awful_ disappointment to me, for just as I have worked up to the point where I am prepared to profit by his lessons, he goes away! I suppose that he has left Berlin by this time, or that he will very soon, but he wouldn't tell when or where he was going, and only said that he was going off, and did not know when he was coming back, or what would become of him. Of course he _does_ know, but he does not want to be plagued with applications from scholars for private lessons. I heard that he was only going to retain two of his scholars, and that one was a princess and the other a countess.

He is a perfect rock. I went to his house to see if I could persuade him to give me private lessons. He came into the room and accosted me in his sharpest manner, with "_Nun, was ist's?_ (Well, what is it?)" I soon found that no impression was to be made on him. He only said that when he happened to be in Berlin, if I would come and play to him, he would give me his judgment. But I never should venture to do this, for as likely as not he would be in a bad humour, and send me off--he is such a difficult subject to come at. I told him I thought it was very hard after I had come all this way, and had been at so much expense only to have lessons from him, that I should have to go back without them. He said he was very sorry, but that most of his scholars came from long distances, and that he could not show any special favor to me. He asked me why I insisted upon having lessons from him, and said that Kullak or Bendel both teach as well as he does. The fact is, he is a capricious genius, entirely spoiled and unregulated, and the conservatory is a mere plaything to him. He amused himself with it for a while, and now he is tired of it, and doesn't like to be bound down to it, and so he throws it up. Money is no consideration to him.

It really seems almost as difficult to get a _great_ teacher in Europe as in America. Tausig is the only celebrity who teaches, and now he has given up. He rather advised my taking lessons of Bendel, who is a resident artist here, and a pupil of Liszt's.

I suffered terribly over Tausig's going off. I heard of it first two weeks ago, and couldn't sleep or anything. The only consolation I bare is that I should have been "worn to the bone," as H. C. says, if I had kept on with him, for all his pupils except little Timanoff, who is at the age of plump fifteen, look as thin as rails. However--"the bitterness of death is past!" When one is stopped off in one direction, there is nothing for it but to turn in another. But it seems as if the more one tried to accomplish a thing, the thicker hindrances and difficulties spring up about one, like the dragon's teeth. I suppose I shall end by going to Kullak. He used to be court pianist here before Tausig and has had immense experience as a teacher. Indeed, Professor J.

K. Paine recommended me to go to him in the first place, you remember.

If I do, I hope I shall have a better fate than poor young N., whom, also, Professor Paine recommended to go to Kullak. He could not stand--or else _under_stand the snubbing and brow-beating they gave him in Kullak's conservatory, and from being deeply melancholy over it, he got desperate, and actually committed suicide!

Germans cannot understand blueness. They are never blue themselves, and they expect you always to preserve your equanimity, and torment you to death to know "what is the matter?" when there is nothing the matter, except that you are in a state of disgust with everything. Moods are utterly incomprehensible to them. They feel just the same every day in the year.

BERLIN, _August 21, 1870_.

I suppose that C. has described to you in full our Dresden visit, and what a lovely time we had. It was really a poetic five days, as everything was new to both of us. We were a good deal surprised at many things in Dresden. In the first place, the beauty of the city struck us very forcibly, and we both remarked how singular it was that of all the people we know who have been there no one should have spoken of it. The Bruhl'sche Terra.s.se is the most lovely promenade imaginable. It runs along the bank of the Elbe River, which is here quite broad and handsome, and I always felt myself under a species of enchantment as soon as we had ascended the broad flight of steps that lead to it. We always took tea in the open air, and listened to a band of music playing. The Germans just live in the open air in summer, and it is perfectly fascinating. They have these gardens everywhere, filled with trees, under which are little tables and chairs and footstools; and there you can sit and have dinner or tea served up to you. At night they are all lighted up with gas.

It seemed like fairy land, as we sat there in Dresden. The evenings were soft and balmy, the very perfection of summer weather. The terrace is quite high above the river, and you look up and down it for a long distance. The city lies to the left, below you, and the towers rise so prettily--precisely as in a picture. This air of the culture of centuries lies over everything, and the soft and lazy atmosphere lulls the soul to rest. We used to walk until we came to the Belvidere, which is a large restaurant with a gallery up-stairs running all round it.

There was a band of music, and here we sat and took our tea, and spent two or three hours, always. The moonlight, the river flowing along and spanned with beautiful bridges, the thousands of lamps reflected in it and trembling across the water and under the arches, the infinity of little steamers and wherries sailing to and fro and brilliantly lighted up, the music, and the throngs of people pa.s.sing slowly by, put one into a delicious and bewildered sort of state, and one feels as if this world were heaven!

The day after we arrived we went, of course, to the picture gallery, and here I was entirely taken by surprise. Nothing one reads or hears gives one the least idea of the magnificence of the pictures there. I never knew what a picture was before. The softness and richness of the colouring, and their exquisite beauty, must be seen to be understood.

The Sistine Madonna fills one with rapture. It is perfectly glorious, and one can't imagine how the mind of man could have conceived it. One sees what a flight it was after looking at all the other Madonnas in the Gallery, many of which are wonderful. But this one soars above them all.

Most of the Madonnas look so stiff, or so old, or so matronly, or so expressionless, or, at best, as in Corregio's Adoration of the Shepherds (a magnificent picture), the rapture of the mother only is expressed in the face. In the Sistine Madonna the virgin looks so young and innocent--so virgin-like--not like a middle-aged married woman. The large, wide-open blue eyes have a dewy look in them, as if they had wept many tears, and yet such an innocence that it makes you think of a baby whom you have comforted after a violent fit of crying. The majesty of the att.i.tude, and the perfect repose of the face, upon which is a look of _waiting_, of ineffable expectancy, are very striking. Mr. T. B.

says it looked to him as though she had been overwhelmed at the tremendous dignity that had been put upon her, and was yet lost in the awe of it--which I think an exquisite idea. St. Sixtus, who is kneeling on the right of the virgin, has an expression of anxious solicitude on his features. He is evidently interceding with her for the congregation toward whom his right hand is outstretched, for this picture was intended to be placed over an altar. The only fault to be found with the picture, I think, is in the face of Santa Barbara, who kneels on the left. She looks sweetly down upon the sinners below, but with a slight self-consciousness. The two cherubs underneath are exquisite. Their little round faces wear an exalted look, as if their eyes fully took in the august pair to whom they are upturned. The background of the picture--all of the faces of angels cloudily painted--gives the finishing touch to this astounding creation. But you must see it to realize it.

Since my return I have finally decided to take private lessons of Kullak. Kullak is a very celebrated teacher, and plays splendidly himself, I am told, though he doesn't give concerts any more. He used to be court pianist here, and has had so much experience in teaching that I hope a good deal from him, though I don't believe he will equal our little Tausig, capricious and ill-regulated though he is. Never shall I forget the _iron_ way he used to stand over those girls, his hand clenched, determined to _make_ them do it! No wonder they played so!

They didn't dare not to. He told one of the cla.s.s that "it was _in_ me, and he could knock it out of me if he had chosen to keep on with me."

And I know he could--and that is what distracts me!

But just think what a way to behave--to leave his conservatory so, at a day's notice, in holiday time, without even informing his teachers! He left everything to be attended to by Beringer. Many of the scholars are very poor, and have made a great effort to get here in order to learn his method. Off he went like a shot, because he suddenly got disgusted with teaching, and he hasn't told a soul where he was going, or how long he intended to remain away. He wrote to Bechstein, the great piano-maker here, "I am going away--away--away." He wouldn't condescend to say more.

Mr. Beringer has been to his house to see him on business connected with the conservatory, but he was flown, and his housekeeper told Beringer that both letters and telegrams had come for Tausig, and she did not know where to send them. Did you ever hear of such a capricious creature? I was so provoked at him that after the first week I ceased to grieve over his departure. One cannot rely on these great geniuses, but I hope that, as Kullak makes a business of teaching, and not of playing, more is to be gained from him. At any rate, he will not be off on these long absences.

I am just studying my first concerto. It is Beethoven's C minor, and it is extremely beautiful. Mr. Beringer tells me that two years is too short a time to make an artist in; and indeed one does not know how extremely difficult it is until one tries it. He plays splendidly himself, and is to make his _debut_ in the Gewandhaus in Leipsic, this October. The best orchestra in Germany is there. Tausig has turned out five artists from his conservatory this summer. Time will show if any of them become first cla.s.s.