Part 6

"There is method in their madness," answered Mr. S---- laughingly. "A much more serious matter than a question of taste is at stake. Let me inform you immediately, my dear young lady, that those whom you see before you in red waistcoats are married men, while those in green are bachelors and in the market, so to speak. It strikes me as not a half-bad idea. Surely a girl can't innocently fall in love with the wrong man here."

"Unless she is color-blind," I added.

It is time for supper, and as Mrs. S---- has promised us a real American meal I don't want to risk being a second behindhand. No one can realize what that means--a real American meal--unless one has been living for four months on a German _pension_ diet. Why, after so many foreign menus, I feel like the poor soul who "near a thousand tables pined and wanted food." Yesterday we actually had muffins for breakfast. Think of that when one is living in a country where the mere hint of hot bread or ice water calls forth the remark, "I do not see why all you Americans don't die of indigestion."

I can't get it out of my head that the officer I met on the Promenade this morning was Lieutenant Blum. He passed by with a number of other officers and several showily dressed women, all talking and laughing loudly. It is quite possible that he might have come down here on leave, but hardly probable under the circumstances. I did not get a full look at his face. It was the swaggering walk and the little fat hand raised to salute a brother officer that made me start and look again. By that time he had almost passed. Nonsense! Probably this very minute he is at the _pension_ accepting a cup of tea from Fräulein Hartmann's slender hands, while Frau von Waldfel from behind the urn regards him with admiring glances, for of course the Fräulein is not allowed to see him alone. That would be a frightful breach of etiquette. Well, I will let you know when I return. For her sake, I rather hope I was mistaken.

INNSBRUCK, _January 3_.

Yesterday we regretfully left Meran, but the memory of our delightful stay there will long haunt us, and we are living in hopes of another visit to this earthly paradise. We reached Innsbruck at three o'clock, and by four found ourselves here, in this most fascinating of houses--for, Cecilia, we are actually living, eating, sleeping in a castle, a real, _bona fide_ castle, once the hunting lodge of the Emperor Maximilian. I see you start and your eyes glow. "A fig for music!" you say; "Let me live in your castle." Yes, you who so revel in mediævalism, to whom the glimpse of faded tapestries and dulled armor is as so much wine, would surely be in your element here.

How this former resort of knights and retainers sank to the materialistic, twentieth-century level of a _pension_ I have not yet learned, nor cared to. All I know is that the grand old dining-room, hung with ancient portraits of the royal house, still remains; that the carved balconies with their worn railings overlooking the rushing stream of the Inn, the narrow winding corridors, the high diamond-paned windows, the picturesque terrace, the goblets, beakers, and trophies of the hunt are yet here--decaying relics of a brilliant past.

This morning I discovered the crowning feature beneath this most enchanting of roof-trees. Leaving _Mütterchen_ to toast her feet by the fire, I went in search of a book in the library. In the many twistings and turnings of the corridors I lost my way. At length I found myself at the top of a short flight of steps, and thinking this was only another way to the library, I walked down them and along the hall. A worn door was at the end. I pushed it open and entered. For a moment the darkness of the place blinded me, coming as I had from the brightness of the outer house. Then I saw more clearly there were people, yes, actual, live people, kneeling on the stones and telling their beads within touch of my hand. No one noticed me as I stood by the door. As I looked about me I saw that I was in a chapel all of stone. Before me was an altar decorated garishly with paper flowers. The light of the sacrament burned dimly above, and cast a shadow on the rough crucifix hanging near. A few rays of sunlight sifting in through the high window at the farther end of the room sent a shattered shaft across the heads of the peasants, who, absorbed in prayer, made no movement save to slip their beads along their rosaries. The suddenness of the change, the sense of awe in coming upon this one room, this one place set aside as a shrine in the very midst of a busy household, was startling. I felt myself an intruder, and noiselessly slipped away.

Upon inquiry at luncheon I discovered that it is the regular custom on fête days for the people of the village to climb up the hill and attend mass where the ruler of their fathers was wont to worship. On a second visit I discovered that on the right, just after entering the chapel, is a tiny square room which at a first glance looks like a cell. In the rough stones of the wall a square hole is cut, and beneath it is a bench to kneel upon. This place was the private oratory of the Emperor, and here he used to attend mass, receiving the sacrament through the orifice in the stones.

Can you imagine anything more fascinating than living in a house where every nook and corner is alive with memories of the past? I could stay here for weeks, but vacation is over and we leave for Munich to-morrow.

_January 11._

Here we are again in old München! Every one in the _pension_ expressed him or herself as delighted to see us back, with all that cordiality which is one of the most charming characteristics of the German nature.

I began again my lessons with Thuille on Wednesday. I had sent him at Christmas a little remembrance, as is the custom here. Naturally I expected he would thank me, but I was hardly prepared for what followed. As at his "_Herein!_" I entered the smoke-wreathed studio, he tossed his cigarette into the waste-basket, jumped up from his desk, and with both hands extended came to meet me.

"_Ach! gnädiges Fräulein!_" he exclaimed, "you were so kind to remember me in that charming way." Then what do you think he did? He bent over my hand in the most dignified way and kissed it. I felt like an empress holding court, and blushed to the roots of my hair at the honor he had done me. I took my accustomed chair beside his at the piano, inwardly praying that it would not be my ill luck to push off to the floor any one of the dozens of cigarettes which always lie carelessly strewn about. Then I placed my fugue on the music rack. Whatever I bring, be it sonatina, invention, or merely a counterpoint exercise, Thuille daringly plays it out _forte_. This is so different from the way Mr. Chadwick does. He seldom if ever touches the piano when looking over work, but takes the sheet and leaning back in his chair "hears it in his head," marking the mistakes with a blue pencil. My fugue was pronounced _recht gut_, which made me very happy, for I had spent several hours over it. When Herr Professor had finished with my work he brought out a piece of music from the cabinet.

"Here is a thing which is worth your while to study," he said. It was Mozart's Serenade in B flat major for wind instruments, including the _corno di basetto_ and the _contrafagotto_. If you want a task, try to play it from score at sight. Thuille rattled it off as though it were the simplest exercise. I could not repress a sigh when he had finished.

"_Ach Gott_, my child!" he exclaimed, smiling at my hopeless expression; "I don't expect you to play it now like that. Study the construction and the instrumentation. You will learn much from it."

As I rose to go I noticed a number of loose manuscript sheets on his desk.

"This is a new piece for orchestra I am doing," said he.

A page of full orchestra score always fascinates me. It's rather odd, when you stop to think of it, now isn't it, that all those little black dots with tails to them represent actual sounds of different instruments and that they together produce an harmonic whole? There is as much individuality in the writing of these dots as in handwriting. Thuille's notes are very small, distinct, and closely written. Professor Paine has a large, firm hand. Chadwick's notes appear as though hastily dashed off, although perfectly legible. I remember distinctly the day he showed me the score of his brilliant Symphonic Sketches. It looked interestingly complex, although, to tell the truth, what impressed me most were the original verses which preceded each sketch. They cleverly portray a definite mood, and are, as it were, the key to what follows. Never by any chance do these appear in the program book, so the listener is left to puzzle out for himself just what the composer means to convey.

I am to begin soon to study overture form, and Thuille asked me to bring Beethoven's overtures with me at my next lesson.

_Later._

We are both much struck with the change in Fräulein Hartmann. She is much paler than she was before we went to Meran, and flushes nervously at the least excitement. _Mütterchen_, who has the misfortune to be next to Frau von Waldfel at table, inquired if her niece were ill.

"Indeed, no!" answered the Hungarian woman somewhat sharply. "What can you expect when a girl betrothed to an officer makes ready for a grand wedding in the spring? There is much to be done and dozens of gowns to be ordered. My niece is merely tired with the happiness of it all."

At that moment I caught Fräulein Hartmann exchanging a glance across the table with the Poet's Wife. In that one, quick flash I read many things, for the eyes of the former betokened genuine distress, while the reassuring look which met hers was that of a sympathizing friend. A second later the Poet's Wife was tactfully leading Frau von Waldfel to give her views on the new cooking-school, while Fräulein Hartmann abstractedly replied to the queries of a stout American woman who sat next her. This new arrival is merely here for a few days. She and her apologetic-appearing husband are "doing" Germany, Italy, and France complete in three weeks.

"I want ter know where those pictures of Reuben are. Baedeker stars 'em three times," said the stout traveller, turning to me.

I was longing to ask "Reuben who"? but _Mütterchen_, evidently sensing my temptation, pressed my foot under the table; so I merely said as politely as I could, "I think you mean the pictures in the old Pinakothek by Rubens," and gave them the directions to Barer-strasse. While they were commenting upon them, I wondered what could have happened during our absence to make Fräulein Hartmann and the Poet's Wife close friends. I wanted to ask if Lieutenant Blum had been at Meran, but intuitively I felt it best not to mention the subject. Here is indeed a romance to which I have found no key, as Omar would say.

The Conservatory is open again and everything is in full swing. In spite of the fact that I have very little opportunity to practise on the piano--because my work for Thuille requires the greater part of my time,--I enjoy the lessons immensely. When we read at sight I find them especially interesting. We have been playing some splendid things for two pianos, among them those lovely Schumann variations in D major. If you don't know them get them by all means. Yesterday we finished Brahms' symphony in E minor, with its vigorous _allegro giocoso_, and have begun Liszt's Symphonic Poems.

How everything helps everything else in music! The orchestra reveals its nuances twice as clearly when one is familiar with the actual material of a work, and then in composition it is absolutely necessary to have a broad field of literature from which to draw models and examples.

Poor Frau Bianci is in a terrible state over my pronunciation of German. "It will go in speaking," she says, "but, _ach Gott!_ must be much finer for singing!" I managed to get Beethoven's "_Kennst du das Land?_" to suit her, but only after much toil for both of us. I repeated each phrase a dozen times after her before I was allowed to sing it. Truly, I feel very young and irresponsible. Don't talk about musical temperament and feeling to me! My one idea is to get the vowels open enough and to pronounce these fiendish umlauts in the approved fashion. I fell down most shamefully on Schubert's "Marguerite at the Spinning-Wheel." You know how wonderfully sad and beautiful that is. Bianci was quite pleased at my rendering of the first verse. Then I sang the second, where the music works up climactically and the words run,

"Sein hoher Gang, sein' edle Gestalt, Seines Mundes Lächeln, seiner Augen Gewalt, Und seiner Rede Zauberfluss, Sein Händedruck, und ach, sein Kuss!"

At this point Frau Bianci broke off playing, and leaned back in her chair with a sigh. Then she said with cutting sweetness of tone, "The idea of this song is to make your audience cry, not to make them laugh. That word is _Lächeln, Lächeln, Lächeln_!"

I felt as though I had suddenly shrunk from Marguerite to a naughty child of five. Then a sense of rebellion stirred me. I wanted to tell her that I had not been born with a German throat, and that such things as umlauts were a disgrace to any language. However, I controlled myself and said nothing.

"I think you had better go into Hofregisseur Müller's class," she said. "It will be of great benefit to you. Please attend to-morrow at nine o'clock."

Very meekly I answered, "Yes, Frau Professor," as I picked up my music and went out, not having the faintest idea who Hofregisseur Müller was, nor what his sonorous title meant.

At nine the following day I was at the Conservatory. On the stairs I met Miss P----, a Philadelphia girl who is in my piano class. She explained to me that Herr Müller was the Regisseur, that is, the coach for acting at the opera house, and that his class was the _Aussprache_, or dramatic class, for the vocal students who were to sing in public. She herself is studying for opera and finds her work with him very beneficial.

"But I'm not going on the stage," said I, quite startled. "What does one have to do?"

Miss P---- laughed at my distressed expression. "Why, nothing but read before the class. Your pronunciation is corrected by Herr Müller. It is just as good as a German lesson," she said. "Oh, by the bye, don't mind if they laugh at you. They always laugh at foreigners."

With this parting shot as my encouragement, I went in. The room, on the upper floor just opposite the hall where we have the chorus rehearsals, is large and barnlike. A grand piano stands in dignified solitude in the centre, and at the end, near the green porcelain stove, is a long table around which the class sits. Herr Müller has his place at the head. He is an interesting type of man, very portly, with snow-white hair and mustache, and a pair of noticeably keen, speculative eyes. The appreciation of the humorous is strongly marked on his broad features.

"_Eine Amerikanerin!_" he said, smiling, as I came in. It is odd how quickly the people here detect our nationality. He motioned me to a chair, then slowly drew a large watch from his pocket and laid it on the table before him.

"Well, Fräulein, what have you?" he inquired of the first girl on his left, who promptly handed him the "Bride of Messina" and going to the farther end of the room began to recite shrilly a passage by heart. At every line the Herr Regisseur would thunder forth criticisms in his great, vibrant voice. When her turn, which lasted five minutes, was past, he called on the next girl, a soft-voiced, shrinking creature in a low-necked blouse. She murmured haltingly that she had "_Das Veilchen_" (The Violet). "_Ach! Das Veilchen!_" lisped he, with his head on one side, in the same tremulous tones. The imitation was such a capital one that we all laughed. In the bare room the effect was that of a hilarious whoop. I began to see what was in store for me. After a few wretched moments I determined to take the whole affair as a joke. There were nine girls to be called on before it came my turn, but in what seemed an incredibly short space of time they had all finished and Herr Müller was calling my name.

"Recite one verse very slowly," said he.

"_Meine Ruhe ist hin_" (My rest is o'er), I began bravely, feeling how poignantly applicable the line was to my present situation. Throughout my recital I could plainly hear titterings from the girls, but I kept my eyes firmly fixed on the picture of Beethoven over the door. When I had finished, Herr Regisseur laid the book down on the table, leaned back in his chair, and laughed. The whole class joined with him. Not to be outdone, I laughed too, albeit somewhat weakly.

"Now much louder and slower, _Fräulein aus Amerika_," he said. "Repeat after me, '_Meine Ruhe ist hin._'"

It was the same thing that I had tried with Frau Bianci, only now I enunciated every syllable with painful effort, my voice pitched to _fortissimo_.

"Not bad," said he, when I had finished, although his eyes twinkled. "Learn another verse for next time."

We all went over to the Gärtner Platz Theatre last week to see "The Geisha." The little opera house is very cosy, but oh! how strange "The Geisha" sounded in its new word-clothes! From a musical standpoint it was delightfully given, but to my mind the Germans have not snap enough to produce light opera well. We have seen two or three things there, among them Strauss' charming _Fledermaus_, and have invariably remarked the same thing. The chorus sang excellently, but were selected with absolutely no eye for beauty or grace. And how the Amazons did wear their armor! They reminded me more of tired waitresses after a hard day's work than the spirited war-maidens they were supposed to represent. Sparkle, vivacity, delicacy,--all these elements which make light opera what it should be,--were lacking. I am convinced that God created the Germans for grand opera and that in the captivating froth of operettas they are distinctly out of their element. One wishes he might look into the music of the future and see how the school of the versatile American will eventually evolve; whether it will be individually characteristic, or blindly content to follow the path laid down by its forerunners across the sea.

There is splendid skating now in the _Englischer Garten_. Last Saturday after lessons six of us met at the _Sieges Thor_ with our skates. The ice on the _Grosse Hesselohe_, the pond at the upper end of the garden, was in excellent condition. At the farther end of it the International Hockey Team, composed of men from the University of Munich and the Polytechnic, was having a match with some strangers. The Germans skate very well and seem devoted to the sport. This seems rather odd to me, as they do not as a rule care for outdoor exercise except walking. Golf is unknown as yet, and although they have a game which they call football, it would hardly be recognized by that name in our country.

We had a delightful afternoon and came back ravenous for supper.

_Friday._

I haven't yet told you what a time I had to get the candy S---- sent. It was the day after your bountiful Christmas box came. By the bye, I trust you have received our acknowledgment of it by this time, and I want to tell you now that the plum pudding was not hurt a particle. The cook steamed it, and we invited all the _pensionnaires_ to share it with us at dinner. If you could have but heard their compliments, you or your cook would certainly have blushed with pride. Why, even Frau von Waldfel confessed that, after all, people did have something good to eat in America, a fact she had never formerly believed. But about the candy.

In my morning's mail I found a _Legitimations-Karte_. Doesn't that sound imposing, as though I had graduated with honors from some academy? It really is nothing more than a statement that a package lies in the custom-house waiting to be called for. The office itself is in a large room like a hall, and full of all sorts of bundles, boxes, and burlap bags, which look like the accumulation of years. The blue-bloused _Dienstmann_ behind the counter found my box for me and cut the string, for which I, of course, gave him a tip. (You know nothing is free in Germany. We have to pay even for our programs at the theatre or opera.[2])

[2] A universal custom all over Europe.

Having concluded this first matter, I walked down a corridor and into the room on the right. Here I took my place at the end of a long line of people. It was certainly twenty minutes before I reached the scales, for all the packages are weighed, you know. With impressive dignity the burly man in charge leisurely weighed my box, recorded the number, and directed me into yet another room.

Accordingly I made my way to the desk where duties are registered. Here I waited again in line for some time. After all this red tape I fancied I should have to pay at least six marks, but when my turn came I found that only forty-five pfennigs were required before I could make my escape. As I began tying my box together yet another of these persistent officers accosted me.

"Your number," said he, as if I were a freshman taking an entrance examination. I stared at him, then recalled the red figures on my package.

"Two hundred and two," I said.

"You must step here," he announced authoritatively.

I was so tired of stepping this way and that, that my first impulse was to refuse, but for fear that this might mean the sacrifice of my real American candy, I followed him meekly into the next room, where he solemnly scribbled something in a big black book. Then, with a flourish which shook the gold fringe of his uniform, he handed me a paper.

"That is all," he said.

"All?" I asked. Now that escape seemed so near I doubted its possibility.

"That is all," he repeated, with a low bow. I turned on my heel and never slackened my pace till I was at the door of the _pension_. By this ridiculous proceeding I had lost just two hours on my counterpoint. The candy, however, is wonderful! I never tasted anything more refreshing. Certainly, Germany is no place for candy--nor for doing things quickly, either.

On the fifteenth came the first production in Germany of the French opera _Messidor_ before a crowded audience at the opera house. The libretto is by Zola and the music by Bruneau. The work is typical of its school, especially in the orchestration. As in some of Massenet's pieces, the trombones burst forth every few minutes, as if to say, "Don't fancy for a moment, kind public, that we have gone out for a glass of beer. We never miss but a few bars." The so-called symphonic _Legende vom Golde_, a symbolic pantomime, if I may so call it, which opens the third act, struck me as unutterably tawdry, but the last scene had a perfectly charming setting, and the climax was very effective. At the final curtain the composer was called out several times, but the opinion of the audience seemed to be divided, for although the applause was plentiful, continued hissing from the opponents of the French school was distinctly audible. Bruneau is tall and slight, with black pointed beard and waxed mustache. He responded in several constrained little bows, as though charmed with the applause, and as if utterly unconscious of any less complimentary sounds.

We are hearing much talk of balls and frivolity, for the carnival is just beginning. Already the Baron is planning to make up a large party for something, and of course I shall write you all about it. Louise and Edith are coming over to do ear-training to-night at eight, and it is already time for supper, so this must end my letter for to-day. All good wishes for you.

M.