and he had a mastery, a tyranny, of
the keyboard that Chopin could not have possessed. Diaz had come to the
front in a generation of pianists who had lifted technique to a plane of
which neither Liszt nor Rubinstein dreamed. He had succeeded primarily by
his gigantic and incredible technique. And then, when his technique had
astounded the world, he had invited the world to forget it, as the glass
is forgotten through which is seen beauty. And Diaz's gift was now such
that there appeared to intervene nothing between his conception of the
music and the strings of the piano, so perfected was the mechanism.
Difficulties had ceased to exist.

The performance of some pianists is so wonderful that it seems as if
they were crossing Niagara on a tight-rope, and you tremble lest they
should fall off. It was not so with Diaz. When Diaz played you
experienced the pure emotions caused by the unblurred contemplation of
that beauty which the great masters had created, and which Diaz had
tinted with the rare dyes of his personality. You forgot all but beauty.
The piano was not a piano; it was an Arabian magic beyond physical laws,
and it, too, had a soul.

So Diaz laid upon us the enchantment of Chopin and of himself. Mazurkas,
nocturnes, waltzes, scherzos, polonaises, preludes, he exhibited to us in
groups those manifestations of that supreme spirit--that spirit at once
stern and tender, not more sad than joyous, and always sane, always
perfectly balanced, always preoccupied with beauty. The singular myth of
a Chopin decadent, weary, erratic, mournful, hysterical, at odds with
fate, was completely dissipated; and we perceived instead the grave
artist nourished on Bach and studious in form, and the strong soul that
had dared to look on life as it is, and had found beauty everywhere. Ah!
how the air trembled and glittered with visions! How melody and harmony
filled every corner of the hall with the silver and gold of sound! How
the world was changed out of recognition! How that which had seemed
unreal became real, and that which had seemed real receded to a horizon
remote and fantastic!...

He was playing the fifteenth Prelude in D flat now, and the water was
dropping, dropping ceaselessly on the dead body, and the beautiful calm
song rose serenely in the dream, and then lost itself amid the presaging
chords of some sinister fate, and came again, exquisite and fresh as
ever, and then was interrupted by a high note like a clarion; and