les of
harmony, the most elementary rules of composition, were absolutely alien
to this chaotic structure. Instead of the scientifically compacted
music which Gambara described, his fingers produced sequences of fifths,
sevenths, and octaves, of major thirds, progressions of fourths with no
supporting bass,--a medley of discordant sounds struck out haphazard
in such a way as to be excruciating to the least sensitive ear. It is
difficult to give any idea of the grotesque performance. New words would
be needed to describe this impossible music.

Andrea, painfully affected by this worthy man's madness, colored, and
stole a glance at Marianna; while she, turning pale and looking down,
could not restrain her tears. In the midst of this chaos of notes,
Gambara had every now and then given vent to his rapture in exclamations
of delight. He had closed his eyes in ecstasy; had smiled at his piano;
had looked at it with a frown; put out his tongue at it after the
fashion of the inspired performer,--in short, was quite intoxicated
with the poetry that filled his brain, and that he had vainly striven to
utter. The strange discords that clashed under his fingers had obviously
sounded in his ears like celestial harmonies.

A deaf man, seeing the inspired gaze of his blue eyes open on another
world, the rosy glow that tinged his cheeks, and, above all, the
heavenly serenity which ecstasy stamped on his proud and noble
countenance, would have supposed that he was looking on at the
improvisation of a really great artist. The illusion would have been
all the more natural because the performance of this mad music required
immense executive skill to achieve such fingering. Gambara must have
worked at it for years.

Nor were his hands alone employed; his feet were constantly at work
with complicated pedaling; his body swayed to and fro; the perspiration
poured down his face while he toiled to produce a great _crescendo_
with the feeble means the thankless instrument placed at his command.
He stamped, puffed, shouted; his fingers were as swift as the serpent's
double tongue; and finally, at the last crash on the keys, he fell back
in his chair, resting his head on the top of it.

"_Per Bacco!_ I am quite stunned," said the Count as he left the house.
"A child dancing on the keyboard would make better music."

"Certainly mere chance could not more successfully avoid hitting two
notes in concord than that possessed creature has done durin