Chapter II: Front Matter (2)

In 1828, Ole Bull became acquainted with two young men in Christiania who were destined to wield a mighty influence on Norse literature and politics. The one was Johan S. C. Welhaven, born in Bergen in 1807, the other Henrik Arnold Wergeland, born in Christiansand in 1808. Both became very eminent poets, and about 1832 both were leaders of contending parties. Wergeland gave the first poetical expression to the glowing patriotic enthusiasm for liberty and independence. He desired to root out every vestige of Danish influence. Welhaven was the leader of the conservatives, and aimed to build the Norse culture on the basis of the Danish. The discussion, at first limited to the students of the University, soon became a national issue in which every thoughtful man and woman in the land took part.

Wergeland died at the age of thirty–six, but he lived long enough to see his cause victorious, and the fruits of his labors are felt to–day.

In the celebration of Independence Day commemorative of the Norse constitution, Wergeland saw a powerful means of waking the people from their political sleep to a patriotic fervor. He used all his influence to promote the celebration of this day, which was as unpopular as possible with the king. The latter had more than once attempted to bring about changes in the constitution, but the people had been true to it, refusing to amend it even at royal request.

On the 17th of May, 1829, a peaceful gathering of people in the Christiania market–place was attacked and dispersed by a troop of cavalry. Ole Bull was with Wergeland, who was severely wounded by one of the soldiers. This roused the people to preserve and defend their rights. The 17th of May has been celebrated with increasing enthusiasm ever since, and Wergeland’s name is never omitted from the orations of the day.

The day following the battle of the market–place and the first celebration of the 17th of May, Ole Bull, as we have said, left for Cassel to visit Spohr. His reception there was a cold one. “I have come more than five hundred miles to hear you,” Ole Bull said, politely, to which Spohr replied: “Very well, you can now go to Nordhausen; I am to attend a musical festival there.” To Nordhausen he accordingly went, where he heard a quartette by Maurer, performed by the composer himself, Spohr, Wiele, and the eldest of the brothers Müller. He was so overwhelmed with disappointment at the manner in which the composition was played by these four masters—a manner which differed so utterly from his own conception—that he left the concert with the crushing conviction that he was deceived in his aspirations, and had no true calling for music. He determined at once to give up art and to return to his academic studies.

Falling in with some lively Göttingen students, returning from a trip in the Hartz Mountains, he joined them and went to Göttingen. He stayed there some months, and a merry life his violin called forth. The burgomaster of the neighboring town, Münden, heard of the foreign student who played so marvelously well, and asked a friend to bring him with some other musical acquaintances to Münden, to give a concert for the poor. One fine summer morning, accordingly, eight young fellows set out for Münden, four playing in one carriage, four singing in another. In grand state the two carriages drew up before the door of the burgomaster, who in full dress received his guests, and immediately led them to the dinner–table. Ole Bull anxiously observed during the feast how one after another of his assistants dropped off into dreamland. He remonstrated, but was only laughed at; he was in despair, and at last angry. The toasts still kept up: “Long life to the burgomaster—his wife—his daughter—the good city of Münden,” etc., and when, at length, they rose from the board, with shaky knees and dizzy heads, the violinist knew not what to do. No rehearsal was held, and none was possible. The last piece on the programme was to be an improvisation, “The Storm,” in which the student Ziedler was to give the thunder on the piano in accompaniment to the violin; but he was fast losing himself. Ole Bull expostulated with him, and tried to rouse him, but in vain. At last, losing his temper in his despair, he called him _Dummer junge_ (stupid fellow). This, as the reader familiar with the customs of the German students knows, is an offense that blood alone can redress. Ole Bull accepted the challenge which followed, practiced fencing for a week, acted on the suggestion of tiring out his adversary by dexterous parrying, and gave him at last a slight scratch. Then came a grand scene of reconciliation, and eternal friendship was sworn; but the director of the police gave the party a friendly hint to leave the town.[2]

[2] This is the sole foundation for the absurd story that has appeared in certain encyclopædias, to the effect that Ole Bull had killed a fellow–student in a duel.

September found Ole Bull again in Norway; and a friend wrote thus of his return:—

Feeling as if the very soil of Europe had repelled him, he
returned to Christiania. It was a wet autumn evening, and he went
to the theatre, the musical direction of which he had given up.
While standing there in a dark corner, he was soon recognized, and
it was whispered through the house, “Ole Bull has returned;” then,
the whisper rising into a loud cry, the violinist was called to
the direction of the orchestra; and on his taking the bâton the
audience called for the national anthem, thus welcoming him as
with the heart of the nation.

To go to Paris, to hear De Beriot, Baillot, and Berlioz, now became his absorbing plan. In the summer of 1830 he visited Trondhjem and Bergen, and gave three concerts, from which he made five hundred dollars. In August, 1831, he went by sea to Ostend, and thence directly to Paris. Seven years passed before he saw Norway again, but good reports soon came from him, and these grew in number and frequency. When he finally came himself, his reputation was made.

His stay in Paris was a venture which brought him many hardships, but which ended like a fairy–tale in a piece of good fortune. His recommendations from home opened no serviceable doors to him, and to his violin no one seemed willing to listen. A passer–by might stop for a moment and ask, “Who lives here? He plays well.” A grisette might open her window across the street, and look at “le pauvre jeune homme la.” A melancholy acquaintance among the German musicians might sit down before him in unavailing admiration. But no lessons from Baillot, no engagement at the Grand Opéra, and every day the purse growing leaner and leaner. The cholera was raging terribly in Paris during that winter of 1831. The Revolution of the previous July was still a vivid memory, and under the feverish excitement of danger and death the pulse of life beat with double rapidity in the great city. Madame Malibran was singing at the Opéra, and the house was crowded nightly by the enthusiastic Parisians. In the topmost gallery, in one of the cheapest seats, might be seen a tall young man with feverish eyes, drinking in those tones with his whole soul.

He had still sufficient means to carry him through the winter; but an elderly gentleman who lived in the same house, and who, with a shrewd mingling of cordiality and dignity, played the part of a fatherly friend, contrived to win his confidence, and persuaded him that, in the disturbed state of financial affairs, his money was not safe where he had deposited it. He therefore drew it from the bank. The following morning found him robbed of everything but an old suit of clothes, and his paternal friend gone. He was now reduced to extreme want; but an acquaintance, accidentally meeting him, recommended him to Madame Charon, with whom he himself boarded, and who kept a house patronized chiefly by German music teachers and scholars. She offered to receive Ole Bull until he could hear from home, his friend giving security for sixty francs a month, which provided the young man with black bread for breakfast, and, towards evening, with a dinner of two slices of meat, the first course of soup being much like that which made the sailor boy exclaim, “This is very good; I have found one pea!”

As time went on Madame began to look suspicious, and his friend’s manner grew cold. One morning at breakfast, a stranger appeared, who at once attracted his attention. He had black, rough hair, his complexion was olive, his eyes black, large, and penetrating. His expression was cynical, but refined; his conversation cold and ironical; his figure thin and wasted; in short, he looked quite a Mephistopheles. He made a bad impression on young Bull. When told by his friend that the man was a detective, he said that he had suspected as much, which was overheard, and at first made the stranger very angry, but when Ole replied in a calm, manly way his bearing suddenly changed to one of kindly interest in the violinist. “May I trouble you a moment, sir?” Mephistopheles said; “I have something to tell you. Not far from here, in the Rue Vaugirard, is an _estaminet_ where we shall be undisturbed;” and thither they went. It was one of those public houses where the lamp is kept burning all day, and young men, who look as if they had not slept at night, move round the billiard–tables in their shirt–sleeves, pipes in their mouths, and glasses filled with _eau de vie_ on the window–seats and the chimney–pieces.

“Listen,” said the stranger. “I know you are in want; but follow my advice; you must try your luck at play.” “But I have no money.” “You must manage to get five francs; then go to–night, between ten and eleven o’clock, not earlier, to Frascati’s, in the Boulevard Montmartre. Mount the stairs, ring the bell, and give your hat boldly to the liveried servant in attendance; enter the hall, go straight to the table, put your five francs on the red, and let it remain there.”

The young man ran home, raised the five francs, and was on the spot at the appointed hour. He made his way to the green table, surrounded by ladies and gentlemen playing at _trente et quarante_. He placed his five francs on the red, but through his awkwardness it rolled over to the black, and was lost. He stood as if struck by lightning, without a _sous_ in his pocket. He came to himself on hearing, “Messieurs, faites vos jeux.” He called, “Cinq francs,” but his foreign accent made it sound like “Cent francs,” and one hundred francs were shoved over to him as his winnings. He stands pale for a moment, unable to speak or move; then places his money on the red, and wins once, again, and yet again, until, at last, eight hundred francs in gold lie in a heap before him. “I was in a fever,” he said, when relating the adventure later; “I acted as if possessed by a spirit not my own. No one can understand my feelings who has not been so tried, left alone in the world, as if on the extreme verge of existence, with the abyss yawning beneath, and at the same time feeling something within that might merit a saving hand at the last moment.” Suddenly, from amid the crowd surrounding the table, a delicate hand, gleaming with diamonds, glided over the golden pile; but the iron hand of the Norwegian grasped the little white one. A woman’s shriek was heard; several voices called out, “À la porte! à la porte!” But a man near Ole Bull, in a calm, clear voice that seemed to command all in the room, said: “Madame, leave this gold alone;” and to Bull: “Monsieur, take your money, if you please.” It was his strange friend, who, as he afterwards learned, was none other than Vidocq, the famous Parisian chief of police. All give way, the lady turns pale, and Ole Bull mechanically seizes the gold, but, riveted to the spot, sees red winning till the end of the _taille_. Had he had the courage, and left his money there, he would that very night have won a small fortune. Meanwhile, he had the eight hundred francs in his pocket; but it was only on reaching his room and drawing them out, and hearing the metallic clink and seeing the glitter, that he convinced himself he was not dreaming. “What a hideous joy I felt,” he said; “what a horrid pleasure to hold in the hand one’s own soul saved by the spoil of others!” Singularly enough, he never saw Vidocq again. He soon learned that a man could not be true to his art or himself who yielded to the insane excitement of the then polite recreation of gambling.

The artist’s note–book, written in pencil, tells us that a house to which he removed through the aid of the Swedish ambassador, Count Lovenhjelm, was soon after invaded by cholera, which was then epidemic in Paris, and that he walked the deserted streets many a night, listening to the moans of the dying in the infected houses, hastening his steps past doors which opened for the egress of those bearing the dead.

He was again reduced to want and almost hopeless. The waters of the Seine had an alluring sound as they murmured between the stone piers of the bridges, while the noise and glare of the Parisian streets, muffled or diminished by the influence of the pest, seemed to him peculiarly repulsive and disheartening. The idea of suicide, however, it was easy to keep down; but how subdue the fever which, from the despair of the moment and the natural excitement of his nervous system, began to affect his brain?

One day, while roving about the streets, he stopped in front of No. 19 Rue des Martyrs. He could go no farther; he was exhausted. The house seemed to look kindly on him, and on a little ticket in one of the windows he read: “Furnished rooms to let.” The porter insisted that it was a mistake, but remembered, at last, that on the second floor lived an old lady who had recently lost her son, and who, perhaps, might have a vacant room. The young man ascended the stairs, rang the bell, and was received by an elderly and motherly–looking gentlewoman. But, no! there was no vacant room. “Grandmamma, look at him!” cried a young girl. The old lady put on her glasses, and as she looked at Ole Bull the tears filled her eyes; he resembled so strikingly the son she had just lost. He meantime stood with a questioning gaze. At last she said: “Very well, Monsieur, if you please, return to–morrow at noon” (_à midi_). “Oui, Madame, à douze heures.” A peal of laughter from the young girl greeted his reply, which only a foreigner would have made. This beautiful maiden was Alexandrine Félicie Villeminot, an orphan. She afterwards became the wife of Ole Bull.

The following day found him established in Madame Villeminot’s house. He was almost immediately attacked by brain fever. On regaining his consciousness he found the old lady sitting by his bedside, and her first words were of hope and encouragement. She assured him that he need not worry about his means of payment, and he felt the soothing influence of motherly care and affection.

He was attended by Dr. Dufours, a celebrated physician and an intimate friend of Thiers. His name occurs frequently in Ole Bull’s letters, for he was the friend and adviser of himself and his family for many years.

Shortly after the young man’s recovery, his friends in Christiania, learning of his misfortunes, sent him three thousand francs from the Musical Lyceum in that city. Matters now began to mend.

Paganini came to Paris the winter of 1831, and was heard for the first time by the young Norwegian, whose notes show how carefully he studied him.

About this time he tried again for a place in the orchestra of the Opéra Comique, but in vain. Applicants for the position were obliged to compete, and were given a piece of music to play at sight. To Ole Bull the piece selected seemed so simple that, in the arrogance of youth, he asked at which end he should begin. This offense caused him to be rejected without a hearing.

One day as he was examining an instrument at a dealer’s, he made the acquaintance of one Monsieur Lacour, who assured him that he had discovered a certain varnish by the use of which an ordinary violin would gain the sweetness and quality of a Cremona instrument. Ole Bull found that violins thus treated had really a fine tone, while Monsieur Lacour, on his side, amazed at the young man’s power, felt that he had come across the right man to give his instruments a reputation. He arranged with him to play on one of them at a soirée to be given by the Duke of Riario, Italian chargé d’affaires in Paris. There he met a very numerous and elegant company. He instinctively felt that Fortune was in the room, if he could but catch her. But, because of the intense heat, that mysterious varnish which Monsieur Lacour applied to his violins gave forth such an intolerable smell from the assafœtida it contained that he became first embarrassed, then excited, furious, wild,—and in this state he played. When he had finished and awakened as from a bad dream, Fortune stood before him with smiles, compliments, congratulations, and, as is not always her wont, with more substantial rewards.

The Duke of Montebello, Marshal Ney’s son, invited him to breakfast the next day, and shortly after, April 18, 1832, he gave his first concert under the duke’s patronage in the German Stoeppel’s Hall, Rue Neuve des Augustins, with the assistance of Ernst, Chopin, and other great artists. His share of the proceeds was fourteen hundred francs. He came to know Chopin intimately, and they played often together in public and private. George Sand, in her _Malgrétout_, has given a charming account of the effect of Ole Bull’s playing at that period of his life.

As the Grand Opéra was still closed to him, he soon made a concert tour through Switzerland and Italy. His first concert at Lausanne was a great success, and he assisted at a religious festival in Morges on Lake Geneva. From there he went to Milan, where he gave a concert in the Scala Theatre which brought him both money and fame. A few days afterwards he saw in one of the Milan journals a very severe criticism upon his playing. What struck him, however, was not so much its severity as its truth. It was to this effect:—

Monsieur Bull played compositions by Spohr, Mayseder, and Paganini
without understanding the true character of the music, which he
marred by adding something of his own. It is quite obvious, that
what he adds comes from genuine and original talent, from his own
musical individuality; but he is not master of himself; he has no
style; he is an untrained musician. If he be a diamond, he is
certainly in the rough and unpolished.

The artist went to the publisher and asked who had written the criticism. “If you want the responsible person, I am he,” was the answer. “No,” said the musician, “I have not come to call the writer to account, but to thank him. The man who wrote that article understands music; but it is not enough to tell me my faults, he must tell me how to rid myself of them.” “You have the spirit of a true artist,” replied the journalist. “It is a singing–master to whom I shall introduce you. It is in the art of song that you will find the key to the beauties of music in general, and the hidden capacities of the violin in particular; for the violin most resembles the human voice.” The same evening he took Ole Bull to one of the most famous of the _repetitore_, a man over seventy years of age, who knew the traditions of the great masters and artists. Ole Bull used to say that never in his life had he been so impressed as by this old singer whose voice was broken. He found in his delivery and style the clue to the power which he had admired in the great artists. Now to him also was the secret revealed. He at once became a pupil, devoting himself to continuous study and practice for six months under the guidance of able masters, throwing his whole heart and soul into his work.

From this ardent study, assisted by eminent teachers of Italian song, came his command of melody, which enabled him to reproduce with their true native character the most delicate and varied modifications of foreign music that he met with—Italian, Spanish, Irish, Arabian, Hungarian, as well as the national songs of his own country. But the chief result of these studies was, that he found himself; he learned to know the nature and limits of his own talent, and was able to give form to his musical feelings.

In a letter to a friend, at this time, he mentions a kind of vision which he had. Worn out and exhausted by the difficulties which he met in the work of a new composition, his “Concerto in A major,” his father seemed suddenly to stand before him as he was playing, and to speak, with his eyes rather than his lips, this warning: “The more you overwork the more wretched you make yourself; and the more wretched you are the harder you will have to struggle.” Ever afterwards he avoided over–practice, lest it should deaden the finer sensibilities which must be relied upon for inspiration.

In studying Italian music, he discovered how great was his need of schooling; but he found, too, that the rules taught for playing the violin were not sufficient to help him in developing the capacity of the instrument. He therefore kept up, at the same time, a course of independent study. Here again we may quote from Mr. Goldschmidt, who says of his studies at that time:—

We will endeavor to give an exposition of the musical principles
upon which he acted, and of the means by which he strove to bring
them into practice. What was his aim, and how did he endeavor to
reach it? We have heard of his marvelous dexterity, of wonderful
“tricks” he displayed on his violin, and of “stupendous effects”
which he produced,—and the question arises, Were these tricks and
effects the end, as some have fancied, or were they the means to
an end? I answer, they were the means to an end, and this end was
_to reproduce the Hulder_. You will ask me to give you an idea of
what the Hulder is, not only as a popular fancy, but as a poetic
symbol. In trying to do so, let me remind you that from the
mountains, forests, and valleys of the North proceeded that race
which has conquered half the world; from whose love, devotion, and
aspirations chivalry sprang into existence under a more Southern
sky; their yearning souls and powerful hands produced the wonders
of Gothic architecture; their blood throbs in the veins of your
proudest aristocracy; whilst the stern tribe, remaining at home,
struggling against a severe climate, against the wild beasts of
the forest, and in internal feuds among themselves, had no other
organs for their longings, hopes, aspirations, triumphs, and woes,
than song and music. As future purple–clad kings and emperors were
hidden in the “Odelsbonde,”[3] who sent out his sons as
“Vikings,” so an unspeakable majesty and delicacy is hidden in the
simplicity of Northern strains. But there is more. Amid the
subdued yet intense feeling of the glory and dignity of man,
suddenly enters the foreboding of death: there is almost always
beneath the highest mirth an under–current of melancholy,—the
pictures are golden, on a black ground. But, at the same time, the
foreboding of death augments the feeling of life. The waters, the
trees, the mountains, live a life of their own, tempting you with
the sweetest, the most potent and secret powers of nature, or
crushing you with their colossal strength; no blind powers, no
mere creations of superstitious terror, but always animated by a
higher spirit, as behooves the fairy beings created by a
big–brained race. And, amid all these sounds, terrible or
mysterious, is heard the innocent bell–shaped flower, accompanied
by the grass of the meadow. This may give you a faint idea of the
Hulder—the spirit of the North. Southern music generally consists
of sounds that please the ear, whilst Northern music strives to
tell you secret tales of your own soul.

[3] A freeborn owner and cultivator of inherited soil, more than farmer and less than nobleman.

It was the Hulder which Ole Bull would reproduce on the violin;
but when he came to feel what really moved itself within him—what
musical soul it was that craved for a body, a frame, a voice—the
violin put into his hand and the received rules for its use were
but ill–fitted to assist him in solving the problem. Therefore,
descending from the heights of enthusiasm, he began to study the
rudiments, and, first of all, the principle on which the old
violins—the old master–makers’ violins—were constructed. It has
been said that those violins owe their excellence to their age
alone. Why is it, then, that the Cremonese instruments are almost
human in their temper and character of tone, while contemporary
instruments from the Tyrol, etc., are now worth nothing? Whether
the Italian masters worked with unconscious ingenuity, or acted
upon the principles well known to their great musical epoch,
certain it is that their violins, like the buried soul of the
legend, challenge a searching question for the betrayal of their
secret.

At the end of his six months’ study he went from Milan to Venice where his performances created an excitement, and he was made a member of the Philharmonic Society. There and in Trieste his improvisations awakened the liveliest interest, and the extremely enthusiastic criticisms of Dr. Jael made his name known in Vienna. But he could not then visit that city, as his thoughts and longings turned toward the South. He went first to Bologna, where, in the most extraordinary way, he won the great celebrity which followed him ever afterwards, by one of those happenings in human life, stranger than those which fancy creates, and making visible, as it were, the hand of Providence. It was from Bologna that his friends at home first received the news of his triumphs.

Bologna was, at that time, reputed the most musical city in Italy; and its Philharmonic Society, under the direction of the Marquis Zampieri, was recognized as one of the greatest authorities in the musical world. Madame Malibran had been engaged by the directors of the theatre for a series of nights; but she had made a condition which compelled them to give the use of the theatre without charge to De Beriot, with whom she was to appear in two concerts. Zampieri seized the opportunity of persuading these artists to appear in a Philharmonic concert. All was arranged and announced, when, by chance, Malibran heard that De Beriot was to receive in recognition of his services a smaller sum than had been stipulated for herself. Piqued at this, she sent word that she could not appear on account of indisposition, and De Beriot himself declared that he was suffering from a sprained thumb.

Ole Bull had now been a fortnight in Bologna. He occupied an upper room in a poor hotel, a sort of soldiers’ barracks, where he had been obliged to take temporary refuge, because of the neglect of a friend to send him a money–order. Secluded from society, he spent the days in writing on his concerto; and when evening came, and the wonderful tones of his violin sounded from the open windows, the people would assemble in the street below to listen. One evening the celebrated Colbran (Rossini’s first wife, and a native of Bologna) was passing Casa Soldati and heard those strains. She paused. The sounds seemed to come from an instrument she had never heard before. “It must be a violin,” she said, “but a divine one, which will be a substitute for De Beriot and Malibran. I must go and tell Zampieri.”

On the night of the concert, Ole Bull, having retired very early on account of weariness, had already been in bed two hours, when he was roused by a rap on the door, and the exclamation, “Cospetto di Bacco! What stairs!” It was Zampieri, the most eminent musician of the Italian nobility, a man known from Mont Cenis to Cape Spartivento. He asks Ole Bull to improvise for him; and then cries, “Malibran may now have her headaches!” He must off to the theatre at once with the young artist. There is no time even for change of dress, and the violinist is hurried before a disappointed but most distinguished audience. The Grand Duke of Tuscany was there, and De Beriot with his hand in a sling. It seemed to Ole Bull that he had been transported by magic, and at first that he could not meet the cold, critical exactions of the people before him; for he knew his appearance was against him, and his weariness had almost unnerved him. He chose his own composition, and the very desperation of the moment, which compelled him to shut his eyes and forget his surroundings, made him play with an _abandon_, an ecstasy of feeling, which charmed and captivated his audience. As the curtain fell and he almost swooned from exhaustion, the house shook with reiterated applause.

When, after taking food and wine, he appeared with renewed strength and courage, he asked three ladies, whose cold, critical manner had chilled him on his first entrance, for themes to improvise upon. The wife of Prince Poniatowsky gave him one from “Norma,” and the ladies at her side, one each from the “Siege of Corinth” and “Romeo and Juliet.” His improvisation, in which it occurred to him to unite all these melodies, renewed the excitement. The final piece was to be a violin solo. The director was doubtful of Ole Bull’s strength, but he stepped forth firmly, saying, “I will play! oh, you must let me play!” and again the same unrestrained enthusiasm followed. When he finished there was a rain of flowers, and he was congratulated by Zampieri, De Beriot, and the principal musicians present. He was at once engaged for the following concert, and the assistance of the society was offered for a concert of his own. One gentleman asked for sixty tickets, another for one hundred, and Emile Loup, the owner of a large theatre in Bologna, offered him his house and orchestra free of expense.

The wheel of fortune was turning in his favor; the Norns were now weaving bright threads in the web of his life. He played at both concerts, was accompanied to his hotel by a torch–light procession, made honorary member of the Philharmonic Society, and his carriage drawn home by the populace. This was Ole Bull’s real _début_.

Malibran was at first angry, and would neither see nor hear him. He had superseded the man she loved, and she possibly suspected some intrigue. At last she allowed him to be introduced, and civilly asked him to play something. After the first tones the blood rushed to her face, and when he had finished she exclaimed: “Signor Ole Bull, it is indeed your own fault that I did not treat you as you deserved. A man like you should step forth with head erect in the full light of day, that we may recognize his noble blood.” From that time she had for him not only a friendly but an affectionate interest. Another day when he was playing at her house, she said: “He has a much sweeter tone than you, De Beriot.” The latter thought that the superiority lay in the instrument, but failed on trial to satisfy her of this.

One night at the opera Ole Bull, who was standing at the side of the stage, was so completely overcome by the dramatic power and the glorious voice of the great artist, that, unconsciously to himself, the tears were streaming down his face. Suddenly Malibran caught sight of him, turned for a moment from the audience, and without interruption perceptible to them made a most absurd grimace. The discovery of her entire self–control while she moved others to the utmost was a disappointment which he could not afterward disguise, but she laughingly excused it by saying: “It would not do for both of us to blubber;” and when he thought what a comic sight his face must have been he could not help joining in the laugh.

Another evening, having invited him to supper after the performance, Malibran insisted on hurrying him off in her carriage, and, running up the stairs to her rooms before him, she threw over him as he entered a large cape, tied on his head an old–fashioned bonnet, and, pulling down a veil over his face, pushed him into a chair in the corner behind the table just as the rest of the party were heard outside. Putting her finger to her lips to warn him to be silent, she introduced each guest in turn to her “aunt just arrived from the country;” but after they had taken seats at the table a few cuts with her riding–whip sent bonnet and cape flying from the head and shoulders of her respectable relative.

Among the strangers who came to Bologna to attend Ole Bull’s concerts was Prince Carlo Poniatowsky, who invited the artist to visit Florence; and on the 2d of May, 1834, he gave a concert there in the Cocomero Theatre. His “Concerto in A major,” made the same sensation as in Bologna. He used to say that from that concert in Florence dated his confidence in his own powers.

He gave two more concerts there assisted by such artists as Duprez and Madame Ronzi de Begnis. At this time he composed his “Quartetto a Violino Solo,” and his “Adagio Religioso: Preghiera d’una Madre,” written for the friars of Santa Maria Novello at Florence. The circumstances attending its composition are pleasantly told by Mrs. Child.

The monks wanted some new music for their church. Ole Bull had
promised it, but neglected from day to day to write it. At last,
they waited upon him early in the morning, and told him it must be
ready for rehearsal the next day. “I was in bed when they came,”
said he; “I had been up all night with the moon, sympathizing
with her. I had thought of Norway, of home, of many sad things. I
said to the Dominicans that they should have the music the next
morning. I took my violin, and it sang to me so sweetly the
thoughts of the night! I wrote down its voice, and as this brought
before me the image of a mother kneeling at the altar, entreating
for her child, I called it ‘The Mother’s Prayer.’ The Dominicans
complained that it was too plaintive. They said that they already
had so much sad, solemn music, they wanted something cheerful. So
I composed something in a more lively strain for them.” This was
the motive to the “Polacca Guerriera,” which had occurred to him
while looking at Vesuvius, and which he now wrote out for the
monks on the spot, giving it an introduction and accompaniment for
the organ.

These friars became very warmly attached to him, and tried hard to persuade him to join their fraternity. “A tame finale,” as Mrs. Child remarks, “this would have been to the life opera which began with swinging to the winds in the tops of Norwegian pines.”

During the hot months he retired to Pierro a Silve, a small village hanging high in the clefts of the Apennines. He carried a letter from the prior of Santa Maria to the prior of the cloister there. While in this mountain retreat he composed a trio, and wrote a “Grammar of the Violin” for his own use.

In the course of that season, he visited the famous baths of Lucca. Prince Poniatowsky was there, as also the Duke of Tuscany, the Duke of Lucca, and the Queen Dowager of Naples. Malibran, De Beriot, and Döhler, the pianist, had come all the way from Sinigaglia to hear him. The morning before the concert he was to play at the Duke of Lucca’s. After the introduction by the piano had been played, a buzz of conversation was kept up, in which the Queen Dowager was taking a prominent part. Döhler whispered to Ole Bull not to mind it, and begin his solo; but he quietly placed his violin under his arm in the attitude of waiting. The duke stepped forward and asked if he desired anything. “I am quite ready, your Grace, but fear to interrupt the conversation. The Queen Dowager has probably something of importance to impart, and I would not disturb her.” Saying he would speak to her, the duke crossed the room, and, after a whispered sentence, she lifted her eyeglass to scan the spirited young artist; but he was not again annoyed by conversation. The next morning, Ole Bull met on the promenade Mr. Schmucker, one of the gentlemen in attendance on the Queen. He said he had come from her Majesty, who desired to see him, and proposed that he should immediately present him. The Queen opened the conversation by remarking that she supposed they had a great many bears in Norway, to which Ole Bull replied that he had himself had the good fortune to be nursed by one, and that he should always hold in grateful remembrance its tender devotion to him. “But why,” she asked, “would you not play last evening?” “I did not wish to disturb your Majesty’s conversation.” “Oh! I understood that you were offended; but you must overcome that sensitiveness. In Neapolitan society, conversation always goes on during music.” “I should not think of visiting a city so barbarous, where music is considered a mere recreation to lighten the tedium of more important occupations, your Majesty.” “But you must come! I sent for you to ask you, and I assure you that you shall have none but silent listeners, for you deserve them.” The Queen continued to show her kindly interest, giving him most valuable letters of introduction, and she often used her influence in his behalf, as he found out later.

By way of Pisa, Leghorn, and Lucca,—where he once more met with Prince Poniatowsky,—he went in the autumn to Naples. The Neapolitans, like the Bolognese, were reputed for their highly cultivated musical taste; but in Naples it was vocal music which was especially appreciated, and the city, when Ole Bull arrived, was ringing with shouts and plaudits for Madame Malibran. He waited for the conclusion of her engagement, and then played in the Theatre of San Carlo. After he had finished his “Quartetto a Violino Solo,” and the audience were wild with enthusiasm, De Beriot exclaimed: “What sorcery must a violin possess to electrify the Neapolitans!” As Ole Bull left the stage after the last piece, De Beriot met him, and asked that he would wait until Malibran could come to him; he of course rushed to her box, where she received him with open arms, embracing him amid the plaudits of the vast audience.

He gave several concerts in Naples, but during his stay he met with a sad loss. His Santo Seraphino, his dear violin, which he had used in his first concert at Paris, which Chopin had helped him to procure, and with which he had won his first laurels, was stolen from him. He saw it again, many years later, in Moscow, in the possession of a Russian nobleman, to whom he told its history. To take its place, he bought in Naples a Nicholas Amati.

February 5, 1835, Ole Bull went to Rome. He led a merry life among the artists there during the Carnival. Several of these were Northmen, among whom were the Norse landscape artist, Fearnley, “the best fellow in the world,” and Thorwaldsen. It was at this time that Ole Bull completed his “Polacca Guerriera.” The circumstances of its composition are given as told by Mrs. Child.

The “Polacca Guerriera” was first conceived at Naples, alone at
midnight, gazing on Mount Vesuvius flaming through the darkness.
He went to Rome soon after, and carried the vague conception in
his mind, intending to arrange it there, and bring it out at his
last concert. At Rome, he shared the apartment of a talented young
artist, who became warmly attached to him. The intimate relation
between music and painting was a favorite theme with this young
man, and, to the musician, the sounds of an orchestra had always
suggested colors. When he slept late in the morning, the artist
would often rouse him by saying, “Come, Ole, get up and play to
me! I can’t paint unless you play to me.” Being urged and urged,
he would at last shake off his drowsiness, and, half dressed,
begin to play. The violin would soon absorb him, till an
exclamation from the painter broke in upon his reverie: “Ah, dear
Ole, give me that once more, it is such a brilliant red!” or,
“Play that again, dear Ole, it is such a heavenly blue!”

Thorwaldsen, who was then at Rome, loved Ole Bull with most
devoted affection, and delighted in his genius. These friends, of
course, felt a deep interest in his success. From day to day they
would ask whether he had done any thing toward completing the
Polacca. His answer always was, “No, but I _shall_ do it.” As the
time for the concert drew nigh, they remonstrated against such
dangerous delay. “How can you be so careless of your fame, Ole?”
said Thorwaldsen; “do try to have this new piece done in season;
if not for your own sake, at least for mine; for, independent of
my affection for you, you know I claim you as a countryman, and my
pride of country is at stake.”[4]

[4] Norway and Denmark, it will be remembered, were formerly included under the same government.

The concert was advertised, and the Polacca was in the programme;
still it had no existence, except in the musician’s soul. “_Have_
you written that music?” said Thorwaldsen. “_Are_ you crazy?”
inquired the painter. But he would throw his arms around them, and
laugh and jest, as if his musical reputation concerned everybody
more than it did himself. The day before the concert his friends
were in despair when they saw him prepare to go out after
breakfast. “Have you written any of that music?” said they,
entreatingly. “No, my dear friends, but I have it all here,”
replied he, playfully touching his forehead. They urged that the
concert was to be the next day, and that the piece must be
rehearsed. “I will do it this evening,” said he. “You are an
imprudent man,” they replied; “the public of Rome will not bear
such treatment even from a favorite like yourself; you will make a
complete failure.” He laughed, and coaxed them caressingly not to
be troubled on his account. The evening was far spent when he
returned. The artist, in anxious tones, asked, “Dear Ole, _have_
you done anything about that music?” “No, I have not had time.”
“Well, do set about it this moment.” “Oh, I cannot; I am so tired
that I must go directly to bed.” In vain the artist remonstrated
and entreated. A spirit of mischief had taken possession of the
wayward minstrel. He plunged into bed, and soon pretended to be
sound asleep. The young man had the habit of talking to himself;
and as he listened to the bass solo of the counterfeit sleeper, he
muttered, “How _can_ he go to sleep with nothing done about that
music? It is more than I can comprehend. I wish I could feel as
easy about it as he does.” He retired to rest early, and as soon
as he was fairly asleep, Ole sprang out of bed, lighted a candle,
and stepped softly into an adjoining room, where he began to write
down his music with prestissimo speed. The outline had long been
in his mind, and new thoughts for the filling up came with a rush
of inspiration. He wrote as fast as the pen could fly. At four
o’clock the score for all the orchestral parts was written out.
For his violin part he trusted entirely to his own wonderful
memory. Having arranged all, he crept quietly back into bed. The
artist, who was an early riser, soon began to stir. Ole breathed
sonorously, as if he were in a deep sleep. “Still asleep!”
murmured his friend: “as quietly as if the music were all ready
for the orchestra. I wish we were safely through this evening.” It
was not long before his anxiety took a more active form. He began
to shake the sleeper, saying, “Ole, do wake up, and try to do
something about that music.” But he obtained only the drowsy
answer, “Oh I cannot, I am so very sleepy.” Vexed and discouraged,
the painter went to his easel, and said no more. At breakfast, Ole
was full of fun and frolic; but Thorwaldsen and the artist were
somewhat impatient with what they deemed such thoughtless trifling
with public expectation. “You will come to my concert to–night,
will you not?” said the mischievous musician. In dismal tones,
they replied, “No, Ole, we love you too well to witness your
disgrace. Take it as lightly as you please; but you may be assured
the public of Rome will not bear such treatment.” “Oh, do come,”
pleaded the musician coaxingly, “just a little, _little_ within
the door; and then when I am disgraced, you can easily slip away.”
They would not promise, however, and he hurried off to keep his
appointment with the orchestra. He had an excellent band of
musicians, who could play the most difficult music with the
slightest preparation. The rehearsal went off to his complete
satisfaction, and he returned to his friends as gay as a lark. His
apparent recklessness made them still more sad. The dreaded
evening came. The house was crowded. Ole was full of that joyful
confidence which genius is so apt to feel in effusions that have
just burst freshly from its overflowing fountain. The orchestra
delighted in the composition and played it with their hearts. The
brilliancy of the theme and the uncommon beauty of the _cantabile_
took the audience by surprise. The novelty and marvelous
difficulty of the finale, in which the violin alone performs four
distinct parts and keeps up a continuous shake through fifteen
bars, completely electrified them. There was a perfect tempest of
applause. In the midst of his triumph, the composer, looking as
quiet and demure as possible, glanced toward the door. There stood
Thorwaldsen and the artist. The latter had a trick of moving
tobacco from one side of his mouth to the other when he was
excited and pleased. It was now flying from cheek to cheek almost
as rapidly as the violin bow through the continuous shake of
fifteen bars.

The moment he left the stage his friends rushed into his arms,
exclaiming, “When on earth did you do it? Only tell us that. Oh,
it was too beautiful!” “Don’t be so gay, my dear friends,” replied
he, with mock gravity; “you know the public of Rome won’t bear
such trifling. Why did you come to witness my disgrace?”

The next day all Rome was ringing with praises of the Norwegian
violinist. They knew not which to applaud most, his genius or his
superhuman strength in performing the four distinct parts on the
violin at once, and keeping up the motion of his bow with such
lightning swiftness, for so long a time. No person who has not
tried it can conceive of the extreme difficulty of playing at once
distinct parts on each of the strings. It requires muscles strong
as iron, and elastic as india–rubber. Paganini had sufficient
elasticity, but not sufficient strength. Ole Bull is the only man
in the world that ever did it. When the Parisians first heard him
produce this wonderful effect of four violins, it seemed so
incredible, that a story was circulated that it was all a
deception; that some other musician was playing two of the parts
behind the scenes. Thus originated the charge of “charlatanry,” so
often and so unjustly repeated.

The Polacca brought its composer a brilliant reputation at once;
and musical critics were obliged to content themselves with
saying that it was not written in the right measure for a Polacca.

In May he went from Rome directly to Paris. The doors of the Grand Opéra were now open to him, and he gave several concerts there, making some provincial tours in the intervals. From his second appearance at the Grand Opéra dates Jules Janin’s criticism written for the _Journal des Débats_. Wergeland says:—

In spite of the half ludicrous self–assertion of its author, and
the unnecessary prominence given to his own personality, it is a
very happy piece of art criticism. Jules Janin had a wonderful
power of making other people see, hear, and feel as he saw, heard,
and felt. His opinions became the opinions of the world. As if
with a wizard’s wand, he made a fame, and it was only when he
tried to unmake one that his own vulnerable points were exposed.
In the present case, he hit most happily upon just those features
in Ole Bull’s genius and character, which were sure to win
sympathy—the simplicity, the brightness, the sweet innocence,
which in his music suddenly rises from the chaos of tumultuous
passion, and the naïveté, generosity, and warm devotion, which in
his personal intercourse with men were so singularly blended with
his fierce hatred of all intrigue and malice.

In Norway we read this criticism with great delight. It was the
legal rite duly performed. The last anxiety disappeared. Ole Bull
was now in the eyes of all the world the great genius, the perfect
artist.

Jules Janin’s criticism (which would only be marred by translation) was as follows:[5]—

[5] Ole Bull used to mention a personal grievance which Janin had against Paganini: the latter was asked to play for the poor of Janin’s native town and refused.