menal that he carried everything
before him in London, and met with a success so brilliant as to be
almost without precedent. Socially and musically he was one of the
idols of the hour, and the great Handel himself had not met with as much
adulation. Apropos of the great sonata above mentioned, with which the
Clementi furore began in London, it is said that John Christian Bach,
son of Sebastian, one of the greatest executants of the time, confessed
his inability to do it justice, and Schroter, one of those sharing the
honor of the invention of the piano-forte, and a leading musician of his
age, said, "Only the devil and Clementi could play it." For seven years
the subject of our sketch poured forth a succession of brilliant works,
continually gave concerts, and in addition acted as conductor of the
Italian opera, a life sufficiently busy for the most ambitious man. In
1780 Clementi began his musical travels, and gave the first concerts
of his tour at Paris, whither he was accompanied by the great singer
Pacchierotti. He was received with the greatest favor by the queen,
Marie Antoinette, and the court, and made the acquaintance of Gluck, who
warmly admired the brilliant player who had so completely revolutionized
the style of execution on instruments with a keyboard. Here he also met
Viotti, the great violinist, and played a _duo concertante_ with the
latter, expressly composed for the occasion. Clementi was delighted with
the almost frantic enthusiasm of the French, so different from the more
temperate approbation of the English. He was wont to say jocosely that
he hardly knew himself to be the same man. From Paris Clementi passed,
via Strasburg and Munich, where he was most cordially welcomed,
to Vienna, the then musical Mecca of Europe, for it contained two
world-famed men--"Papa" Haydn and the young prodigy Mozart. The Emperor
Joseph II, a great lover of music, could not let the opportunity slip,
for he now had a chance to determine which was the greater player, his
own pet Mozart or the Anglo-Italian stranger whose fame as an executant
had risen to such dimensions. So the two musicians fought a musical
duel, in which they played at sight the most difficult works, and
improvised on themes selected by the imperial arbiter. The victory
was left undecided, though Mozart, who disliked the Italians, spoke
afterward of Clementi, in a tone at variance with his usual gentleness,
as "a mere mechanician, without a pennyworth of