pin's touch and
style. The conversation seems to have turned on Schubert, one of
Schumann's great favourites, for Chopin, in illustration of something he
said, played the commencement of Schubert's Alexander March. Meanwhile
Wieck was sorely tried by his curiosity when Chopin was playing, and
could not resist the temptation of listening in the adjoining room, and
even peeping through the door that stood slightly ajar. When the visit
came to a close; Schumann conducted Chopin to the house of his friend
Henrietta Voigt, a pupil of Louis Berger's, and Wenzel, who accompanied
them to the door, heard Schumann say to Chopin: "Let us go in here where
we shall find a thorough, intelligent pianist and a good piano." They
then entered the house, and Chopin played and also stayed for dinner.
No sooner had he left, than the lady, who up to that time had been
exceedingly orthodox in her musical opinions and tastes, sent to
Kistner's music-shop, and got all the compositions by Chopin which were
in stock.

The letter of Mendelssohn which I shall quote presently and an entry in
Henrietta Voigt's diary of the year 1836, which will be quoted in the
next chapter, throw some doubt on the latter part of Herr Wenzel's
reminiscences. Indeed, on being further questioned on the subject,
he modified his original information to this, that he showed Chopin,
unaccompanied by Schumann, the way to the lady's house, and left him at
the door. As to the general credibility of the above account, I may say
that I have added nothing to my informant's communications, and that in
my intercourse with him I found him to be a man of acute observation and
tenacious memory. What, however, I do not know, is the extent to which
the mythopoeic faculty was developed in him.

[Footnote: Richard Pohl gave incidentally a characterisation of this
exceedingly interesting personality in the Signale of September, 1886,
No. 48. Having been personally acquainted with Wenzel and many of his
friends and pupils, I can vouch for its truthfulness. He was "one of
the best and most amiable men I have known," writes R. Pohl, "full of
enthusiasm for all that is beautiful, obliging, unselfish, thoroughly
kind, and at the same time so clever, so cultured, and so many-sided
as--excuse me, gentlemen--I have rarely found a pianoforte-teacher.
He gave pianoforte lessons at the Conservatorium and in many private
houses; he worked day after day, year after year, from morning till
night, and