up, and but indifferently received. "Don Giovanni," said its author,
"was rather written for Prague than Vienna, but chiefly for myself and
my friends." It is a disgraceful fact, that it was eclipsed in
popularity among the Viennese by the "Tarrare" of Salieri, of which no
one now knows any thing.

In 1787 Mozart's father died at Salzburg, less happy, it is to be
feared, than his own worth and his son's genius should have made him.
But he was ignorant of the great truth, that fame, and often merely
posthumous fame, is the chief external blessing that awaits men of
extraordinary mental powers in the arts, and that the appropriate
reward of genius, any more than of virtue, is not always--"bread." On
hearing of his father's illness, Mozart had written him in
affectionate terms--

"I have just received some news which has given me a sad blow; the
more so, as your last letter left me reason to suppose that you
were in perfect health. I now, however, learn that you are really
very ill. How anxiously I await and hope for some comforting
intelligence from you I need hardly say, although I have long
since accustomed myself in all things to expect the worst. As
death, rightly considered, fulfils the real design of our life, I
have for the last two years made myself so well acquainted with
this true friend of mankind, that his image has no longer any
terrors for me, but much that is peaceful and consoling; and I
thank God that he has given me the opportunity to know him as the
key to our true felicity. I never lie down in bed without
reflecting that, perhaps (young as I am), I may never see another
day; yet no one who knows me will say that I am gloomy or morose
in society. For this blessing I daily thank my Creator, and from
my heart wish it participated by my fellow-men."

In the autumn of the same year, he lost a valued and valuable friend
in Dr Barisani of Vienna, whose medical attentions had already been
eminently useful to him, and might, if they had been continued, have
saved him from those irregularities of alternate labour and indulgence
which so soon afterwards began to affect his health. Mozart made, on
this occasion, an affecting entry in his memorandum-book, under some
lines which his friend had written for him.

"To-day, the 2d of September, I have had the misfortune to lose,
through an unexpected death, this honourable man, by best and