ully
and often to great singers. Mdlle. de Belleville the pianist and
Lipinski the violinist were admired, and he could write a sound
criticism when he chose. But the Gladowska is worrying him. "Unbearable
longing" is driving him to exile. He attends her debut as Agnese in
Paer's opera of that title and writes a complete description of the
important function to Titus, who is at his country seat where Chopin
visits him betimes. Agitated, he thinks of going to Berlin or Vienna,
but after much philandering remains in Warsaw. On October 11, 1830,
following many preparations and much emotional shilly-shallying, Chopin
gave his third and last Warsaw concert. He played the E minor concerto
for the first time in public but not in sequence. The first and last
two movements were separated by an aria, such being the custom of those
days. Later he gave the Fantasia on Polish airs. Best of all for him,
Miss Gladowska sang a Rossini air, "wore a white dress and roses in her
hair, and was charmingly beautiful." Thus Chopin; and the details have
all the relevancy of a male besieged by Dan Cupid. Chopin must have
played well. He said so himself, and he was always a cautious
self-critic despite his pride. His vanity and girlishness peep out in
his recital by the response to a quartet of recalls: "I believe I did
it yesterday with a certain grace, for Brandt had taught me how to do
it properly." He is not speaking of his poetic performance, but of his
bow to the public. As he formerly spoke to his mother of his pretty
collar, so as young man he makes much of his deportment. But it is all
quite in the role; scratch an artist and you surprise a child.

Of course, Constantia sang wonderfully. "Her low B came out so
magnificently that Zielinski declared it alone was worth a thousand
ducats." Ah, these enamored ones! Chopin left Warsaw November 1, 1830,
for Vienna and without declaring his love. Or was he a rejected suitor?
History is dumb. He never saw his Gladowska again, for he did not
return to Warsaw. The lady was married in 1832--preferring a solid
certainty to nebulous genius--to Joseph Grabowski, a merchant at
Warsaw. Her husband, so saith a romantic biographer, Count Wodzinski,
became blind; perhaps even a blind country gentleman was preferable to
a lachrymose pianist. Chopin must have heard of the attachment in 1831.
Her name almost disappears from his correspondence. Time as well as
other nails drove from his memory her image. If sh