ecomes more quick at discovery. Is not the puzzle which we work out
for ourselves more readily remembered than the ideas which are merely
learned by heart?

A wise man, a disciple of Socrates--who has been greatly ridiculed, but
by whose lessons the science of pedagogy has greatly profited,--Jacotot,
gave similar advice to teachers: "Put your questions, but let the
scholar think and work out his answers instead of putting them into his
mouth."

The talent of young Francois once established, he left the inhospitable
house where he had been so misunderstood, and was taken into the family
of an old musician, "Father Bambini," as Delsarte loved to call him.

Here, finding it in the order of facts, I must repeat almost literally a
page from the little work quoted before.

Father Bambini was one of those old-fashioned masters, who treat their
art with love and veneration. He gave concerts at which he was at once
performer and audience, judge and client. Delsarte was sometimes
present. He saw the good man take up a Gluck score as one handles a
sacred book; he surprised him pressing it to his heart, or to his head,
as if to win a blessing from the great soul which poured itself forth in
these immortal compositions.

Here we most assuredly have the foundation of the unlimited admiration
which our great artist felt for the author of "Alcestis" and of
"Iphigenia." Everyone knows that it was Delsarte who drew Gluck from the
oblivion in which he had languished since the beginning of the century.
Delsarte alone could have revived him, his assured and majestic talent
being amply capable of correctly interpreting those colossal works.
Delsarte is the equivalent of Gluck, and, if we may say so, the
_incarnation of his thought_. When the artist sang a part in those lyric
tragedies of which Gretry says: "They are the very expression of truth,"
it seemed as if the illustrious chevalier lived again in him to win
better comprehension than ever before and to be avenged at last for all
the injustice and bad taste from which he had suffered.

Delsarte received no very regular musical education from Father Bambini.
The lesson was often given while the teacher was shaving, which did not
distract the attention of either party. The master, having no hand at
liberty to hold a book, made his pupil explain all the exercises aloud,
sing every composition, and read at sight the authors with whom he
wished him to be familiar. Great progress can be