formed there several pieces with very little effect; he
was not aware of the presence of the Genoese giant, whom he did not know
even by sight. Others, however, quickly recognized him, and he was asked
to play, which he at first declined, but finally consented to do after
urgent solicitation. Purposely he played a few variations in wretchedly
bad style, which caused a suppressed laugh from those ignorant of his
identity. The young professor came forward again and played another
selection in a most pretentious and pointed way, as if to crush the
daring wretch who had ventured to compete with him. Paganini again took
up the instrument, and played a short piece with such touching pathos
and astonishing execution, that the audience sat breathless till the
last dying cadence wakened them into thunders of applause, and hearts
thrilled as the name "Paganini" crept from mouth to mouth. The young
professor had already vanished from the room, and was never again seen
in the house where he had received so severe a lesson.

Paganini repeated his triumphs again the following year, performing
in Vienna and the principal cities of Germany, and everywhere arousing
similar feelings of admiration. Orders and medals were bestowed on him,
and his progress was almost one of royalty. His first concert in Paris
was given on March 9, 1831, at the opera-house. He was then forty-seven
years old, and Castil-Blaze described him as being nearly six feet
in height, with a long, pallid face, brilliant eyes, like those of an
eagle, long curling black hair, which fell down over the collar of his
coat, a thin and cadaverous figure--altogether a personality so gaunt
and delicate as to be more like a shadow than a man. The eyes sparkled
with a strange phosphorescent gleam, and the long bony fingers were so
flexible as to be likened only to "a handkerchief tied to the end of a
stick." Petis describes the impression he created at his first concert
as amounting to a "positive and universal frenzy." Being questioned as
to why he always performed his own compositions, he replied "that, if he
played other compositions than his own, he was obliged to arrange them
to suit his own peculiar style, and it was less trouble to write a piece
of his own." Indeed, whenever he attempted to interpret the works of
other composers, he failed to produce the effects which might have been
expected of him. This was especially the case in the works of Beethoven.

V.

When Pag