following
superscription:--

Der Abend daemmert, das Mondlicht scheint
Da sind zwei Herzen in Liebe vereint
Und halten sich selig umfangen.

--_Sternau_.

And it offers a delightful tone-picture. The moon "o'er heaven's clear
azure spreading her sacred light," the calm of evening, and happy,
though ever-sighing, lovers: 'tis a scene to tempt poet, painter, and
musician. The last, however, seems to have greatest advantage; music
by imitation and association can describe scenes of nature; and it can
paint, for are not its harmonies colours? But the musician can do what
is possible to neither poet nor painter,--he can make a direct appeal
to the emotions in their own language. The soft, dreamy coda--which,
with its Andante molto, its Adagio, and widened-out closing cadence,
seems to indicate the unwillingness of the lovers to part--has
Schubert colouring and charm. The reminiscence, at the commencement of
this movement, of the middle movement of the "Pathetique" cannot fail
to attract attention. Then, again, the opening of the Scherzo[107]--

[Music illustration]

sounds familiar. It must surely have been this movement in which
someone pointed out to the composer a reminiscence of Mendelssohn.
"Anyone can find that out," was the rough-and-ready reply of Brahms.
But if Mendelssohn be the prevailing influence in the Scherzo,
Schubert has his turn in the Trio. The fourth movement is an
Intermezzo, entitled "Rueckblick" (Retrospect). The opening phrase, and
indeed the whole of the short movement, carries us back to the picture
of the lovers. Some change has taken place: have the lovers grown
cold? or has death divided them? The themes are now sad, and clothed
in minor harmonies. The Finale, perhaps, shows skill rather than
inspiration; with regard to some of the subject-matter, it is, like
the previous movement, also retrospective.

Liszt's sonata in B minor, dedicated to Robert Schumann, was evidently
written under the special influence of Beethoven's later
sonatas,--perhaps more particularly the one in A flat, Op. 110. There
is by no means unanimity of opinion among musicians with regard to
Liszt's merit as a composer; some consider that his genius has not yet
been properly recognised; others, that he will not for a moment bear
comparison with any one of the great masters who preceded him, and who
wrote for the pianoforte. Among his works which have specially given
rise to discussion stands this B m