e took a pinch herself with evident relish. She had a
horrible squeaky voice, indulged in all sorts of ludicrous flourishes
and roulades, and so you may imagine what an effect all this, combined
with her ridiculous manners and style of dress, could not fail to have
upon me. My uncle overflowed with panegyrics; that I could not
understand, and so turned the more readily to my organist, who, looking
with contempt upon vocal efforts in general, delighted me down to the
ground as in his hypochondriac malicious way he parodied the ludicrous
old spinster.

"The more decidedly I came to share with my master his contempt for
singing, the higher did he rate my musical genius. He took a great and
zealous interest in instructing me in counterpoint, so that I soon came
to write the most ingenious toccatas and fugues. I was once playing one
of these ingenious specimens of my skill to my uncle on my birthday (I
was nineteen years old), when the waiter of our first hotel stepped
into the room to announce the visit of two foreign ladies who
had just arrived in the town. Before my uncle could throw off his
dressing-gown--it was of a large flower pattern--and don his coat and
vest, his visitors were already in the room. You know what an electric
effect every strange event has upon those who are brought up in the
narrow seclusion of a small country town; this in particular, which
crossed my path so unexpectedly, was pre-eminently fitted to work a
complete revolution within me. Picture to yourself two tall, slender
Italian ladies, dressed fantastically and in bright colours, quite up
to the latest fashion, meeting my uncle with the freedom of
professional _artistes_, and yet with considerable charms of manner,
and addressing him in firm and sonorous voices. What the deuce of a
strange tongue they speak! Only now and then does it sound at all like
German. My uncle doesn't understand a word; embarrassed, mute as a
maggot, he steps back and points to the sofa. They sit down, talk
together--it sounds like music itself. At length they succeed in making
my good uncle comprehend that they are singers on a tour; they would
like to give a concert in the place, and have come to him, as he is the
man to conduct such musical negotiations.

"Whilst they were talking together I picked up their Christian names,
and I fancied that I could now more easily and more distinctly
distinguish the one from the other, for their both making their
appearance toget