him. He was now entirely thrown on his own resources for
support, for Adam Liszt had left his affairs so deeply involved that
there was but little left for his son and widow. A powerful nature,
turned awry by unhealthy broodings, is often rescued from its own mental
perversities by the sense of some new responsibility suddenly imposed on
it. Boy as Liszt was, the Titan in him had already shown itself in
the agonies and struggles which he had undergone, and, now that the
necessity of hard work suddenly came, the atmosphere of turmoil and
gloom began to clear under the imminent practical burden of life. He set
resolutely to work composing and giving concerts. The religious mania
under which he had rested for a while turned his thoughts to sacred
music, and most of his compositions were masses. But the very effort of
responsible toil set, as it were, a background against which he could
appoint the true place and dimensions of his art work. There was another
disturbance, however, which now stirred up his excitable mind. He fell
madly in love with a lady of high rank, and surrendered his young heart
entirely to this new passion. The unfortunate issue of this attachment,
for the lady was much older than himself, and laughed with a gentle
mockery at the infatuation of her young adorer, made Liszt intensely
unhappy and misanthropical, but it did not prevent him from steady
labor. Indeed, work became all the more welcome, as it served to
distract his mind from its amorous pains, and his fantastic musings,
instead of feeding on themselves, expressed themselves in his art.
Certainly no healthier sign of one beginning to clothe himself in his
right mind again can easily be imagined.

Liszt was now twenty years of age, and had regularly settled in Paris.
He became acquainted intimately with the leaders of French literature,
and was an habitue of the brilliant circles which gathered these great
minds night after night. Lamartine and Chateaubriand were yielding
place to a young and fiery school of writers and thinkers, but cordially
clasped hands with the successors whom they themselves had made
possible. Mme. George Sand, Balzac, Dumas, Victor Hugo, and others were
just then beginning to stir in the mental revolution which they made
famous. Liszt felt a deep interest in the literary and scientific
interests of the day, and he threw himself into the new movement with
great enthusiasm, for its strong wave moved art as well as letters w