fashion,
as a token of respect, on the right shoulder, and introduced
me to him, whereupon the old friendly gentleman shook hands
with me and said some kindly words.

This, then, was Pan Joseph Elsner, the ancestor of modern
Polish music, the teacher of Chopin, the fine connoisseur and
cautious guide of original talents. For he does not do as is
done only too often by other teachers in the arts, who insist
on screwing all pupils to the same turning-lathe on which
they themselves were formed, who always do their utmost to
ingraft their own I on the pupil, so that he may become as
excellent a man as they imagine themselves to be. Joseph
Elsner did not proceed thus. When all the people of Warsaw
thought Frederick Chopin was entering on a wrong path, that
his was not music at all, that he must keep to Himmel and
Hummel, otherwise he would never do anything decent--the
clever Pan Elsner had already very clearly perceived what a
poetic kernel there was in the pale young dreamer, had long
before felt very clearly that he had before him the founder
of a new epoch of pianoforte-playing, and was far from laying
upon him a cavesson, knowing well that such a noble
thoroughbred may indeed be cautiously led, but must not be
trained and fettered in the usual way if he is to conquer.

Of Chopin's studies under this master we do not know much more than
of his studies under Zywny. Both Fontana and Sowinski say that he went
through a complete course of counterpoint and composition. Elsner, in a
letter written to Chopin in 1834, speaks of himself as "your teacher
of harmony and counterpoint, of little merit, but fortunate." Liszt
writes:--

Joseph Elsner taught Chopin those things that are most
difficult to learn and most rarely known: to be exacting
to one's self, and to value the advantages that are only
obtained by dint of patience and labour.

What other accounts of the matter under discussion I have got from books
and conversations are as general and vague as the foregoing. I therefore
shall not weary the reader with them. What Elsner's view of teaching was
may be gathered from one of his letters to his pupil. The gist of his
remarks lies in this sentence:--

That with which the artist (who learns continually from his
surroundings) astonishes his contemporaries, he can only
attain by himself and through himself.

Elsner had insight and sel