-thish classhic music--makesh me
shick--I mean tired. I played Bluebottle for plashe to-day--50 to 1
shot--whoop!"

Another bottle was opened.

In a corner they were telling the story of Herr Schwillmun, the famous
pianist who was found crazy with wine in a Fourth Avenue undertaker's
shop trying to play the Dvo[vr]ak Concerto on the lid of a highly
polished coffin. The Finnish virtuoso thought he was in a piano
wareroom. Another lie, I knew, for Schwillmun was most poetic in
appearance and surely not an intemperate man!

Wherever I went I heard nothing but malicious remarks, slurring
accusations and tittle-tattle. Finally I joined a crowd in the upper
hall attracted by the appearance of a white-haired man of intelligent
aspect, who, with kindly smile and abundant gesture was making much
merriment about him. I got close enough to hear what he was saying.

"Music in New York! There is none. You fellows ought to work for your
grub, as I do, on a daily, and write up the bosh concerts that
advertise. Humbug, boys; rank humbug! Modern music is gone to the devil.
Brahms was a fraud who patched up a compound of Beethoven and Schumann,
put in a lot of mystifying harmonic progressions, and thought he was
new. Verdi, the later Verdi was helped out by Boito: Just compare
'Otello' and 'Falstaff' with 'Mefistofele'! Dvo[vr]ak, old 'Borax' as
they call him, went in for 'nigger' music and says there's no future for
American music unless it is founded on plantation tunes. Hence the
'coon' song and its long reign. Tschaikowsky! Well, that tartar with his
tom-tom orchestra makes me tired; he should have been locked up in the
'Ha-Ha House.' Rubinstein never could do ten bars of decent
counterpoint. Saint-Saens, with his symphonic poems, his Omphalic Roues,
is a Gallic echo of Bach and Liszt--a Bach of the Boulevards. The
English have no composers; the Americans never will have, and, begad,
sir, we're all going to the dogs. Music--rot!"

I was shocked. Here was a great critic abusing the gods of modern music
and not a dissenting voice was raised. I determined to do my duty. I
would ask this cynical old man why he belittled his profession. "Sir!"
said I, raising my voice, but got no further, for a household servant,
whose breath reeked, caught me by the arm and in a whisper explained:

"Oh, Mr. Trybill, Miss Edith is a-lookin' for you everywheres and sent
me to tell you as how you're wanted in the music-room. It's her turn
next."

M