g on the wall. A flash of enthusiasm lightened his face, as if
a great thought were struggling to the surface, and he seized his violin
to improvise. The listeners declared that this "swan song" was the
most remarkable production of his life. He illustrated the stormy and
romantic career of the English poet in music. The accents of doubt,
irony, and despair mingled with the cry of liberty and the tumult of
triumph. Paganini had scarcely finished this wonderful musical picture
when the bow fell from the icy fingers that refused any longer to
perform their function, and the player sank into a dead swoon.

The shock had been too great, and Paganini never quitted his bed
afterward. The day before his death he seemed a little better, and
directed his servant to buy a pigeon for him, as he had a slight return
of appetite. On the last evening of his life he seemed very tranquil,
and ordered the curtains to be drawn that he might look out of the
window at the beautiful night. The full moon was sailing through the
skies, flooding everything with splendor. Paganini gazed eagerly, gave a
long sigh of pleasure, and fell back on his pillow dead.

VII.

Paganini was the first to develop the full resources of the violin as
a solo instrument. He departed entirely from the traditions of
violin-playing as practiced by earlier masters, as he believed that
great fame could never be acquired in pursuing their methods. A work of
Locatelli, one of the cleverest pupils of Corelli, and a great master
of technique, first seems to have inspired him with a conception of
the more brilliant possibilities of the violin. What further favored
Paganini's new departure was that he lived in an age when the artistic
mind, as well as thought in other directions, felt the desire of
innovation. The French Revolution stirred Europe to its deepest roots,
intellectually as well as politically. At a very early date in his
career Paganini seems to have begun experimenting with the new effects
for which he became famous, though these did not reach their full
fruitage until just before he left Italy on his first general tour.
Fetis says: "In adopting the ideas of his predecessors, in resuscitating
forgotten effects, in superadding what his genius and perseverance gave
birth to, he arrived at that distinctive character of performance which
contributed to his ultimate greatness. The diversity of sounds, the
different methods of tuning his instrument, the frequent