rs, there are
poets; and as a poet Liszt was possibly never so sublimely or genuinely
inspired as in that performance, which remains a bright and precious
thing in the midst of all the curiously parti-colored recollections of
the Beethoven festival at Bonn."

In 1846, among Liszt's other musical experiences, he played in concerts
with Berlioz throughout Austria and Southern Germany. The impetuous
Osechs and Magyars showed their hot Tartar blood in the passion of
enthusiasm they displayed. Berlioz relates that, at his first concert at
Pesth, he performed his celebrated version of the "Rakoczy March," and
there was such a furious explosion of excitement that it wellnigh put an
end to the concert. At the end of the performance Berlioz was wiping the
perspiration from his face in the little room off the stage, when the
door burst open, and a shabbily dressed man, his face glowing with a
strange fire, rushed in, throwing himself at Berlioz's feet, his eyes
brimming with tears. He kissed the composer over and over again, and
sobbed out brokenly: "Ah, sir! Me Hungarian... poor devil... not
speak French... _un, poco l'taliano_.... Pardon... my ecstasy... Ah!
understand your cannon... Yes! yes! the great battle... Germans, dogs!"
Then, striking great blows with his fists on his chest, "In my heart I
carry you... A Frenchman, revolutionist... know how to write music for
revolutions." At a supper given after the performance, Berlioz tells
us Liszt made an inimitable speech, and got so gloriously be-champagned
that it was with great difficulty that he could be restrained from
pistolling a Bohemian nobleman, at two o'clock in the morning, who
insisted that he could carry off more bottles under his belt than Liszt.
But the latter played at a concert next day at noon "assuredly as he had
never played before," says Berlioz.

Before passing from that period of Liszt's career which was distinctly
that of the virtuoso, it is proper to refer to the unique character of
the enthusiasm which everywhere followed his track like the turmoil of
a stormy sea. Europe had been familiar with other great players, many of
them consummate artists, like Hummel, Henri Herz, Czerny, Kalkbrenner,
Field, Moscheles, and Thalberg, the most brilliant name of them all. But
the feeling which these performers aroused was pale and passionless
in comparison with that evoked by Franz Liszt. This was not merely the
outcome of Liszt as a player and musician, but of Li