es alone;
frequently you play to hearers who are listening for the first time to
the pieces you are performing. Try a few passages without pedal,--for
instance, those in which the changes of the harmony succeed each other
rapidly, even in the highest treble,--and see what repose, what serene
enjoyment, what refreshment is afforded, what delicate shading is
brought out. Or at first listen, and try to feel it in the playing of
others; for your habit is so deeply rooted that you no longer know when
and how often you use the pedal. Chopin, that highly gifted, elegant,
sensitive composer and performer, may serve as a model for you here. His
widely dispersed, artistic harmonies, with the boldest and most striking
suspensions, for which the fundamental bass is essential, certainly
require the frequent use of the pedal for fine harmonic effect. But, if
you examine and observe the minute, critical directions in his
compositions, you can obtain from him complete instruction for the nice
and correct use of the pedal.

By way of episode to my sorrowful lecture on the pedal, we will take a
walk through the streets some beautiful evening. What is it that we hear
in almost every house? Unquestionably it is piano-playing; but what
playing! It is generally nothing but a continual confusion of different
chords, without close, without pause; slovenly passages, screened by the
raised pedal; varied by an empty, stiff, weak touch, relying upon the
pedal for weight. We will escape into the next street. Oh, horrors! what
a thundering on this piano, which, by the way, is sadly out of tune! It
is a grand--that is, a long, heavy--etude, with the most involved
passages, and a peculiar style of composition, probably with the title
"On the Ocean," or "In Hades," or "Fancies of the Insane;" pounded off
with the pedal raised through the most marvellous changes of harmonies.
Finally, the strings snap, the pedal creaks and moans; conclusion,--_c_,
_c_ sharp, _d_, _d_ sharp resound together through a few exhausted bars,
and at last die away in the warm, soft, delicious air. Universal
applause from the open windows! But who is the frantic musician who is
venting his rage or this piano? It is a Parisian or other travelling
composer, lately arrived with letters of recommendation, who has just
been giving a little rehearsal of what we may expect to hear shortly in
a concert at the "Hotel de Schmerz."

CHAPTER VI.

THE SOFT-PEDAL SENTIMENT.

You