rt, "you have no training for the great world, and
you speak too few languages."

Haydn replied: "My language is understood by all the world."

He set out on December 15, 1790, and did not return to Vienna till
July, 1792. In London, where he wrote and conducted a number of
symphonies for Salomon, he was the "lion" of the season, being in
constant request for conducting concerts and paying visits to the
nobility. Of these symphonies Salomon once said to him: "I am strongly
of opinion that you never will surpass this music."

"I never mean to try," was the answer.

But this must not be taken to mean that Haydn had given up striving
after the truest perfection in his art, and it probably meant no more
than that for the time he was satisfied with his work. Far more like
the genuine expression of the feeling of the great artist was his
utterance, just before he died, to Kalkbrenner: "I have only just
learned in my old age how to use the wind-instruments; and now that I
do understand them, I must leave the world."

[Illustration: Haydn Composing his "Creation."]

Great as the work accomplished in his youth and early manhood
unquestionably was, it remained for his old age to accomplish his
greatest work, and that by which he is best known--the oratorio of
"The Creation." It is said that the first ideas for this came to him
when, in crossing the English Channel, he encountered a terrific
storm. Soon after his leaving London, where the words had been given
him by Salomon, Haydn set about composing the music. "Never," he says,
"was I so pious as when composing 'The Creation.' I knelt down every
day and prayed God to strengthen me for my work." It was first
produced on March 31, 1799, his 67th birthday, at the National
Theatre, Vienna, and was at once accorded an extraordinary share of
popular favor. There is a pathetic story of the last performance of
the work, at which Haydn, in extreme old age, in 1808, was present,
when Salieri conducted. He was carried in an arm-chair into the hall,
and received there with the warmest greeting by the audience. At the
sublime passage, "And there was light!" Haydn, quite overcome, raised
his hand, pointing upward and saying, "It came from thence." Soon
after this his agitation increased so much that it was thought better
to take him home at the end of the first part. The people crowded
round him to take leave, and Beethoven is said to have reverently
kissed his hand and forehead. After