resh and sonorous voices, in the hours of solitude, or in
those of happy idleness. Linking the most varying associations with
the melody, they were again and again carelessly hummed when traveling
through forests, or ploughing the deep in ships; perhaps they were
listlessly upon the lips when some startling emotion has suddenly
surprised the singer; when an unexpected meeting, a long-desired
grouping, an unhoped-for word, has thrown an undying light upon the
heart, consecrating hours destined to live forever, and ever to shine on
in the memory, even through the most distant and gloomy recesses of the
constantly darkening future.

Such inspirations were used by Chopin in the most happy manner, and
greatly enriched with the treasures of his handling and style. Cutting
these diamonds so as to present a thousand facets, he brought all their
latent fire to light, and re-uniting even their glittering dust, he
mounted them in gorgeous caskets. Indeed what settings could he have
chosen better adapted to enhance the value of his early recollections,
or which would have given him more efficient aid in creating poems, in
arranging scenes, in depicting episodes, in producing romances? Such
associations and national memories are indebted to him for a reign far
more extensive than the land which gave them birth. Placing them among
those idealized types which art has touched and consecrated with her
resplendent lustre, he has gifted them with immortality.

In order fully to understand how perfectly this setting suited the
varying emotions which Chopin had succeeded in displaying in all the
magic of their rainbow hues, we must have seen the Mazourka danced
in Poland, because it is only there that it is possible to catch the
haughty, yet tender and alluring, character of this dance. The cavalier,
always chosen by the lady, seizes her as a conquest of which he is
proud, striving to exhibit her loveliness to the admiration of his
rivals, before he whirls her off in an entrancing and ardent embrace,
through the tenderness of which the defiant expression of the victor
still gleams, mingling with the blushing yet gratified vanity of the
prize, whose beauty forms the glory of his triumph. There are few
more delightful scenes than a ball in Poland. After the Mazourka has
commenced, the attention, in place of being distracted by a multitude of
people jostling against each other without grace or order, is fascinated
by one couple of equal beaut