Chapter IX: Part 9

Moreover, the grandmothers of the community were kind to him, and mindful of his perfumes, his rose-water, his cosmetics, tooth-powders, pomanders, and pomades, the scented memory of which lingered about their toilet-tables, or came faintly back from the days when they were beautiful. Among this class of customers there was still a demand for certain comfortable little nostrums, (delicately sweet and pungent to the taste, cheering to the spirits, and fragrant in the breath,) the proper distillation of which was the airiest secret that the mystic Swinnerton had left behind him. And, besides, these old ladies had always liked the manners of Dr. Dolliver, and used to speak of his gentle courtesy behind the counter as having positively been something to admire; though, of later years, an unrefined, an almost rustic simplicity, such as belonged to his humble ancestors, appeared to have taken possession of him, as it often does of prettily mannered men in their late decay.

But it resulted from all these favorable circumstances that the Doctor's marble mortar, though worn with long service and considerably damaged by a crack that pervaded it, continued to keep up an occasional intimacy with the pestle; and he still weighed drachms and scruples in his delicate scales, though it seemed impossible, dealing with such minute quantities, that his tremulous fingers should not put in too little or too much, leaving out life with the deficiency or spilling in death with the surplus. To say the truth, his stanchest friends were beginning to think that Dr. Dolliver's fits of absence (when his mind appeared absolutely to depart from him, while his frail old body worked on mechanically) rendered him not quite trustworthy without a close supervision of his proceedings. It was impossible, however, to convince the aged apothecary of the necessity for such vigilance; and if anything could stir up his gentle temper to wrath, or, as oftener happened, to tears, it was the attempt (which he was marvellously quick to detect) thus to interfere with his long-familiar business.

The public, meanwhile, ceasing to regard Dr. Dolliver in his professional aspect, had begun to take an interest in him as perhaps their oldest fellow-citizen. It was he that remembered the Great Fire and the Great Snow, and that had been a grown-up stripling at the terrible epoch of Witch-Times, and a child just breeched at the breaking-out of King Philip's Indian War. He, too, in his school-boy days, had received a benediction from the patriarchal Governor Bradstreet, and thus could boast (somewhat as Bishops do of their unbroken succession from the Apostles) of a transmitted blessing from the whole company of sainted Pilgrims, among whom the venerable magistrate had been an honored companion. Viewing their townsman in this aspect, the people revoked the courteous Doctorate with which they had heretofore decorated him, and now knew him most familiarly as Grandsir Dolliver. His white head, his Puritan band, his threadbare garb, (the fashion of which he had ceased to change, half a century ago,) his gold-headed staff, that had been Dr. Swinnerton's, his shrunken, frosty figure, and its feeble movement,--all these characteristics had a wholeness and permanence in the public recognition, like the meeting-house steeple or the town-pump. All the younger portion of the inhabitants unconsciously ascribed a sort of aged immortality to Grandsir Dolliver's infirm and reverend presence. They fancied that he had been born old, (at least, I remember entertaining some such notions about age-stricken people, when I myself was young,) and that he could the better tolerate his aches and incommodities, his dull ears and dim eyes, his remoteness from human intercourse within the crust of indurated years, the cold temperature that kept him always shivering and sad, the heavy burden that invisibly bent down his shoulders,--that all these intolerable things might bring a kind of enjoyment to Grandsir Dolliver, as the life-long conditions of his peculiar existence.

But, alas! it was a terrible mistake. This weight of years had a perennial novelty for the poor sufferer. He never grew accustomed to it, but, long as he had now borne the fretful torpor of his waning life, and patient as he seemed, he still retained an inward consciousness that these stiffened shoulders, these quailing knees, this cloudiness of sight and brain, this confused forgetfulness of men and affairs, were troublesome accidents that did not really belong to him. He possibly cherished a half-recognized idea that they might pass away. Youth, however eclipsed for a season, is undoubtedly the proper, permanent, and genuine condition of man; and if we look closely into this dreary delusion of growing old, we shall find that it never absolutely succeeds in laying hold of our innermost convictions. A sombre garment, woven of life's unrealities, has muffled us from our true self, but within it smiles the young man whom we knew; the ashes of many perishable things have fallen upon our youthful fire, but beneath them lurk the seeds of inextinguishable flame. So powerful is this instinctive faith that men of simple modes of character are prone to antedate its consummation. And thus it happened with poor Grandsir Dolliver, who often awoke from an old man's fitful sleep with a sense that his senile predicament was but a dream of the past night; and hobbling hastily across the cold floor to the looking-glass, he would be grievously disappointed at beholding the white hair, the wrinkles and furrows, the ashen visage and bent form, the melancholy mask of Age, in which, as he now remembered, some strange and sad enchantment had involved him for years gone by!

To other eyes than his own, however, the shrivelled old gentleman looked as if there were little hope of his throwing off this too artfully wrought disguise, until, at no distant day, his stooping figure should be straightened out, his hoary locks be smoothed over his brows, and his much enduring bones be laid safely away, with a green coverlet spread over them, beside his Bessie, who doubtless would recognize her youthful companion in spite of his ugly garniture of decay. He longed to be gazed at by the loving eyes now closed; he shrank from the hard stare of them that loved him not. Walking the streets seldom and reluctantly, he felt a dreary impulse to elude the people's observation, as if with a sense that he had gone irrevocably out of fashion, and broken his connecting links with the network of human life; or else it was that nightmare-feeling which we sometimes have in dreams, when we seem to find ourselves wandering through a crowded avenue, with the noonday sun upon us, in some wild extravagance of dress or nudity. He was conscious of estrangement from his towns-people, but did not always know how nor wherefore, nor why he should be thus groping through the twilight mist in solitude. If they spoke loudly to him, with cheery voices, the greeting translated itself faintly and mournfully to his ears; if they shook him by the hand, it was as if a thick, insensible glove absorbed the kindly pressure and the warmth. When little Pansie was the companion of his walk, her childish gayety and freedom did not avail to bring him into closer relationship with men, but seemed to follow him into that region of indefinable remoteness, that dismal Fairy-Land of aged fancy, into which old Grandsir Dolliver had so strangely crept away.

Yet there were moments, as many persons had noticed, when the great-grandpapa would suddenly take stronger hues of life. It was as if his faded figure had been colored over anew, or at least, as he and Pansie moved along the street, as if a sunbeam had fallen across him, instead of the gray gloom of an instant before. His chilled sensibilities had probably been touched and quickened by the warm contiguity of his little companion through the medium of her hand, as it stirred within his own, or some inflection of her voice that set his memory ringing and chiming with forgotten sounds. While that music lasted, the old man was alive and happy. And there were seasons, it might be, happier than even these, when Pansie had been kissed and put to bed, and Grandsir Dolliver sat by his fireside gazing in among the massive coals, and absorbing their glow into those cavernous abysses with which all men communicate. Hence come angels or fiends into our twilight musings, according as we may have peopled them in by-gone years. Over our friend's face, in the rosy flicker of the fire-gleam, stole an expression of repose and perfect trust that made him as beautiful to look at, in his high-backed chair, as the child Pansie on her pillow; and sometimes the spirits that were watching him beheld a calm surprise draw slowly over his features and brighten into joy, yet not go vividly as to break his evening quietude. The gate of heaven had been kindly left ajar, that this forlorn old creature might catch a glimpse within. All the night afterwards, he would be semi-conscious of an intangible bliss diffused through the fitful lapses of an old man's slumber, and would awake, at early dawn, with a faint thrilling of the heart-strings, as if there had been music just now wandering over them.

CURRENCY.

It is not only for gold that men labor, fight, and die. One labors long to perfect an invention; another, to illustrate a theory; a third, to express a sentiment; a fourth, to acquire real estate. With success, the first has a machine; the second, a treatise; the third, a poem; the fourth, a deed. Perhaps no other four persons would willingly expend the same amount of labor on the same objects; yet this difference of estimate effects no difference in the objects. Estimation, therefore, or value, is not a quality of those objects, but a state of mind in relation to them; accordingly, the poem has value as well as the machine,--the deed, as well as the wealth it defines. The value of the deed is, however, widely different from that of the wealth. The value of the wealth is based on desire, that of the deed on right, though in neither case exclusively, as, in a general sense, value always involves both desire and right, and is, therefore, a commercial relation, resulting from a state of society.

Men have the sense of right, and the intellect to define it, the will to defend, and the power to enforce it; and, for the more perfect development of these capabilities, they have instituted government. The functions of government are, therefore, the definition, the defence, and the enforcement of right.

The exercise of the function of definition led to the invention of two classes of commercial instrumentalities,--the real, consisting of weights and measures, and the ideal or representative, consisting of writing and notation. The exercise of the remaining functions of government secures the wealth these serve to define. It may, indeed, be true, in a rude sense, that possession is nine points of the law; but it is equally true, in a proper sense, that the remaining point is worth more than the nine; the defence and enforcement of right being an absolute and well-defined rule of government. In a state of barbarism men prefer fact to right, for an obvious reason; but as they advance in science and civilization, as their conceptions become more distinct, their definitions more exact, their defences more complete, and their enforcements more powerful, their faith in right increases, and their esteem increases with their faith, until right becomes of more value than possession.

Exchange, whether by barter or sale, is the result of differences of estimate or value. By barter, the articles exchanged are themselves the mediums; if, therefore, a given article be generally accepted to that use, it becomes a common medium; and if it be divided by government into well-defined quantities, suited and intended for that use, it becomes money. Money, therefore, in its original form, is a common medium of barter, that is accepted to that use by authority of law,--a medium which, considered distinctly from that authority, is simply an article of merchandise possessing qualities that make it preferable as a means of barter, and which, for convenience of use, bears the stamp of the government-inspector, defining the exact quantity contained in each piece, but which, inasmuch as it is authorized, and partakes of the nature of law, has ideal qualities that make it the means of sale: these are, right of use, nomination, and numeration. The ideal qualities of money serve to establish price, to create money of account, to make credits possible, and ultimately to produce credit-mediums of exchange, or bills, which, in a given form, though mere declarations of right to the wealth they are said to represent, become, in the hands of a civilized people, a species of currency that, with all its defects, has proved itself to be the most effectual means both of commerce and of government.

Wealth is that which may be used. Value is that by means of which wealth may be exchanged. A currency, therefore, should consist of representatives of value,--of representatives, because value, being ideal, is known only by that means,--of value, because it is only by differences of estimate or value that exchanges are possible. But, as these representatives are wholly nominal, and may, therefore, be issued in any quantity, and as their increase or decrease affects the value of credits, their issue requires regulation. The quantity of the currency may be well regulated by finding the rate per head of population during a favorable state of trade, and by adhering to that invariably.

That the people of the United States have reached the degree of science and civilization proper to the creation of such a currency is not yet evident; but there is reason to believe that they will take the lead in this as they have in some other actions indicative of advance,--that they will erelong understand the impropriety of attempting to measure value by means of merchandise, that is, by a means that is subject to variations of quantity,--a conclusion that may not appear obvious in this aspect, but it will be readily understood that in commerce a variable measure is absurd in theory and intolerable in practice. Yet this is precisely parallel with using gold, or any other article of merchandise, as a measure of value.

The elements of currency are value, a commercial relation derived from persons, and quantity, a property of things derived heretofore from the precious metals or their representatives. But this quantity is inconstant, and to use an inconstant quantity as a measure, is absurd. The quantity of the currency may, however, be rendered constant, both positively and relatively, by deriving it wholly from persons,--that is, by giving it an invariable quantitative relation to the population: a rule that is both simple and easy of practice, because value is already nominated and numerated, and the population is already sufficiently well known. The divisions of the currency should be the simplest possible, that is, binary, and the definitions of the parts should be as simple as those of coins.

With regard to the legal-tender currency, so called, it serves well for temporary use,--much better, indeed, than any of its predecessors; and as long as its promises are ignored, and as long as its quantity is not increased faster than the increase of the population, it is practically a value-currency, resting on its own inherent right of use, with the exception of the limitation defined by the law of legal tender.

One of the duties of the National Government is to supply the people with a currency. That this is to be used is sufficiently obvious; and that, being intended for use, and authorized by law, it has the right of use, is equally obvious; there is, therefore, little need of a law of legal tender to give it that right. Accordingly, however affirmative such laws may be in form, their intention is not so much to bestow as to withhold.

That the currencies of the world have great defects is so well known that the statement of the fact would be superfluous, except as introductory to an attempt to ascertain the nature of those defects, and to propose an adequate remedy,--an attempt suggested by the rapidity with which the people, profiting by their present tuition, are learning wisdom by the things which they suffer in the defence and enforcement of right.

Of a specie-currency the defect is want of constancy. This defect, derived from its material element, has a particular and a general aspect. The particular is the reduction of the quantity of metal in coins. The Roman money-unit--the _as_--consisted originally of a pound of bronze; that of England--the pound sterling--and that of France--the livre--consisted each of a pound of silver. The first Punic war caused the pound of bronze to be reduced to two ounces; the second caused its further reduction to half an ounce; and what now is the weight of the pound sterling? where now is the livre? and what of coins generally? Like these individuals, types of the class, they depreciate. The general aspect is, the occasional reduction of the quantity of coin in circulation. The merchant, believing it to be more immediately profitable, exports the coin,--that is, finding the currency to consist of an article of merchandise that suits his immediate purpose, he treats it accordingly,--though by so doing he causes a rise of prices where he buys and a fall where he sells, and to that extent nullifies his own business-intentions, and deranges those of others. If this derangement be sufficient, hoarding commences; and as this action multiplies itself, the currency is soon reduced to its minimum quantity, and business of every kind with it, until the industry of the country is reduced to a state of atrophy, until a mere commercial derangement is converted into an immense loss; because the rise in the value of the currency, due to its scarcity, causes a corresponding fall in the value of all the wealth of the country, and thus checks industry and stays production.

These defects are not pointed out for the purpose of preventing the adoption of a specie-currency. There is no probability of such a currency ever prevailing in this country, except in the neighborhood of the mines, and there only for a time. Much is said about it, as is usually the case with subjects that are little understood; but the driblets of specie that may be seen occasionally are not a currency; neither are those larger quantities held by banks and brokers. Indeed, a specie-currency in the presence of bank-notes is an impossibility, because the notes proclaim their own inferiority; consequently, the specie is retained and the notes circulated. Yet, the operations of the mint are continued, with the avowed object of creating a specie currency. This practice is, however, of some use. It serves to show that mind and matter are governed by the same general laws,--that either being put in motion wilt continue to move in the given direction, though the original intention may have ceased. That the original intention of coining has ceased when the use of the precious metals is confined almost exclusively to ornamentation and security is a plain case.

The National Government issues coin for currency, and the States create banks, with the privilege of using the coin as security, and of issuing in its stead a larger quantity of notes. These, diluted in value to the extent of the difference, form, with the authority derived from State laws, a species of currency that, because of its great convenience, derived from its representative character, has become, notwithstanding its defects, one of the greatest powers known to man. The defects of a bank-note currency are, that, being based on specie, it is necessarily inconstant, and being insufficiently based, it is necessarily insecure.

The precious metals are desired for three distinct uses,--ornamentation, security, and currency; they have, therefore, three distinct elements of value. By the creation of banks a portion of the currency is converted into security, and another portion undergoes the same change by reason of the insecurity of bank-notes. Thus, by the influence of banks, the precious metals are deprived of most of the value they had as currency, the specie and the notes depreciating together, and maintaining an equilibrium of value, until the exportation of the former to countries where its value is not thus impaired becomes profitable. Then, if the notes continue to depreciate, as is sometimes the case, the equilibrium is destroyed, and specie commands a premium. This causes the remainder to be hoarded, so that it then commands an additional premium as security, in view of the increasing insecurity of bank-notes.

A result of the inconstancy of a bank-note currency is exhibited in each of its several states,--as a diluted, as a depreciated, and as an irredeemable currency; but more especially in this its third state. But as it is not intended to be redeemed, except to a very limited extent, and as these several states are proper to it, and differ only in degree, it will be sufficient to point out the final result or climax. This is depreciation in relation to specie, because of the demand for that article, first for exportation, and then for security; and, at the same time, appreciation in relation to every other article of merchandise, because of the reduction of its own quantity, necessary to the restoration of the lost equilibrium,--necessary to the reestablishment of its essential element, credit. Thus it appears that the results of a bank-note currency are similar to those of a specie-currency, but as much more disastrous as its expansions and contractions are greater and more sudden.

To avoid these disasters, it is proposed to issue a national currency that is constant, and that is therefore a standard measure of value,--an instrumentality that commerce has never yet been furnished with, though it is the only one capable of affording to the industry of the country proper, that is, invariable, encouragement. Not being empirical, it will make no pretence of furnishing the precious metals at less than the market-rate, either for exportation or hoarding; but it will have the effect of reducing them to their true position, that of merchandise, so that they may be exchanged for the products of other countries with profit. For the same reason it will not be redeemable. To redeem a currency is to replace it by another. What other? Specie? That is out of the question. However desirable specie may be as wealth, as a currency, except for change, it is a nuisance. Accordingly, merchants prefer a representative currency, even though its representative character be somewhat problematical. And government failing to supply a better, this becomes the currency of the country by a species of necessity. In short, because of its inconveniences and risks, specie is not used as a currency, and will not be, because, in addition to these obstacles, the representative currency in use, being without proper regulation, has increased to such an extent that there is not sufficient coin to replace it,--a fact that practically settles in the negative the question of the sufficiency of the precious metals for currency, in addition to their other use, in a country where civilization has established credit as a means of trade. Nevertheless, a specie-currency is advocated even by those who carefully avoid handling it, and who would be the last to consent to such a reduction of the currency as its exclusive use would require,--a confusion of mind due to the fact that the difference between value and wealth is not always distinctly recognized. Moreover, it is not the function of a currency to be replaced, but to be a means of payment. This the proposed currency will be by right of use,--a right inherent in a national currency, and respected as long as the government respects itself, that is, as long as the people govern wisely.

A dollar, value-currency, will always buy a dollar's worth of gold, but it may not always buy the quantity of gold contained in the gold dollar. How much it will buy depends on the quantitative relation of the currency to the population,--a relation which, though entirely optional, should never be changed, because, with whatever change, provided the proper relation of the parts to the whole be preserved, with little there will be no lack, and with much, there will be nothing over,--and because any change of that relation is injurious to commerce, inasmuch as it produces a corresponding change in the value of credits. And assuming a change to have been made, a return to the former rate, instead of being a mitigation, will be a repetition of the injury, except in regard to credits so extended that they embrace both changes. If, however, a reduction be insisted on, a suitable mode may be proposed. Twenty dollars per head gives six hundred millions. Assuming this quantity to be superabundant, if it be adhered to until the population reaches forty millions, the rate will be fifteen dollars per head, which may be assumed to be abundant. If it be adhered to until the population reaches sixty millions, which it will probably do in one generation, the rate will be ten dollars per head, which may be assumed to be convenient; and any attained rate may be continued, or made constant, by increasing the currency proportionately with the increase of the population. This mode of reduction, however, is possible with a national value-currency only. A specie-currency is incapable of regulation. The same may be said of any currency based on specie. Indeed, a credit-currency will necessarily collapse under a superabundant issue, unless its promises be ignored, or unless it be sustained at the expense of the nation,--an expense which the nation itself cannot sustain permanently.

The rate of the currency governs the value of wealth. It is important, therefore, that government have time to pay its debts before any great decrease of currency takes place; otherwise, that decrease will be equivalent to an increase of taxes, without producing a corresponding decrease of the public debt. For the portion payable in gold it will be better economy to pay the premium than to reduce the currency sufficiently to avoid it; because such a reduction will work a corresponding reduction of the value of all the wealth of the country, a sum much greater than the debt. It is scarcely necessary to suggest that the more currency the less taxes, and the greater the ability to pay them; or that, when the war is over, government will cease to spend several hundred millions per annum, and the industry this money supports will require time to rearrange and adapt itself to pacific demands; or that, if the currency be suddenly and largely reduced at such a time, an accumulation of distress will follow, such as is rarely seen. With the proposed currency, however, and the proposed mode of reduction, if a reduction be agreed on, the change from the condition of war to that of peace may take place without producing the prostration of business so justly anticipated, because so fully warranted by experience of a credit-currency, and so earnestly to be deprecated, because so evidently and so easily avoidable by the adoption of a national currency that is capable of regulation, and that, being properly regulated, cannot fail.

Though this currency, like that of bank-notes, is wholly nominal, the words of which it consists are those of a nation, and represent power. Accordingly, they give to the currency power to perform its allotted function; but they give it no other power. Has any other currency any other power? A specie-currency may be converted into ear-rings, but it is no longer a currency; it may be buried in iron pots, or locked in iron safes, but it is not then a currency; it may be exported to foreign lands, but it is not there a currency until reauthorized. Currencies, properly speaking, are ideas clothed in words,--the words of a nation, otherwise called laws. The merchandise attached to a specie-currency is an evidence of former barbarism,--a remain of the primitive practice of barter,--an incongruous element, tending to impede rather than to assist circulation, to destroy rather than to create a currency.

But is a value-currency possible? It is, to a people enjoying universal equality before the law, and knowing that every individual has a direct and immediate interest in it,--knowing that it is a part of the business-policy of each. And it is only such a people that will dare to inaugurate, and persevere to sustain it. Nevertheless, as it cannot but appear problematical to minds that have not given to the subject the most earnest attention, its adoption will doubtless be most strenuously opposed, by habits of thought, by modes of action, and by interests, as ancient, as universal, and apparently as fixed as the race itself. Yet, as M. Arago justly remarks in one of his biographies addressed to the French Academy,--"The moral transformations of society are subject to the laws of continuity; they rise and grow, like the productions of the earth, by imperceptible gradations. Each century develops, discusses, and adapts to itself, in some degree, truths--or, if you prefer it, principles--of which the conception belonged to the preceding century; this work of the mind usually goes on without being perceived by the vulgar; but when the day of application arrives, when principles claim their part in practice, when they aim at penetrating into political life, the ancient interests, if they have only this same antiquity to invoke in their favor, become excited, resist, and struggle, and society is shaken to its foundations. The tableau will be complete, Gentlemen, when I add, that, in these obstinate conflicts, it is never the principles that succumb."

IN MEMORY OF

J. W.--R. W.

No mystic charm, no mortal art
Can bid our loved companions stay;
The bands that clasp them to our heart
Snap in death's frost and fall apart;
Like shadows fading with the day,
They pass away.

The young are stricken in their pride,
The old, long tottering, faint and fall;
Master and scholar, side by side,
Through the dark portals silent glide,
That open in life's mouldering wall
And close on all.

Our friend's, our teacher's task was done,
When mercy called him from on high;
A little cloud had dimmed the sun,
The saddening hours had just begun,
And darker days were drawing nigh:
'Twas time to die.

A whiter soul, a fairer mind,
A life with purer course and aim,
A gentler eye, a voice more kind,
We may not look on earth to find.
The love that lingers o'er his name
Is more than fame.

These blood-red summers ripen fast;
The sons are older than the sires;
Ere yet the tree to earth is cast,
The sapling falls before the blast;
Life's ashes keep their covered fires,--
Its flame expires.

Struck by the noiseless, viewless foe,
Whose deadlier breath than shot or shell
Has laid the best and bravest low,
His boy, all bright in morning's glow,
That high-souled youth he loved so well,
Untimely fell.

Yet still he wore his placid smile,
And, trustful in the cheering creed
That strives all sorrow to beguile,
Walked calmly on his way awhile:
Ah, breast that leans on breaking reed
Must ever bleed!

So they both left us, sire and son,
With opening leaf, with laden bough:
The youth whose race was just begun,
The wearied man whose course was run,
Its record written on his brow,
Are brothers now.

Brothers!--the music of the sound
Breathes softly through my closing strain;
The floor we tread is holy ground,
Those gentle spirits hovering round,
While our fair circle joins again
Its broken chain.

MAY 25th, 1864.

MEYERBEER.

"Thou knowest not the day nor the hour." Scarcely two years ago the great composer, whose recent death involves so irreparable a loss to the world of musical art, was accosted, while in a Paris coffee-house, by a friend recently arrived from Berlin.

"What do they say of me there?" asked Meyerbeer, after the first salutations.

"They say, with regret, that you are just now as reticent as Rossini."

"Indeed!"

"Yet, after all, they add that you are busier than Rossini, for he is doing nothing, and you, at least, have an opera in your portfolio."

"Ah! I see you are hinting about the 'Africaine'."

"Yes, I refer to the 'Africaine'."

"Bah! bah! The Parisians are in a great hurry about it. I am not dead yet, and some fine day I will astonish them in a way they will remember."

Providence decreed that this harmless boast, this careless prediction, should come to nought. While he was yet working on the "Africaine", the hand of death interposed, and, at the cold touch, the pen was laid aside, the music-paper dropped unheeded on the floor, the piano was silent, and the composer left forever the scene of his labors and his triumphs. Few men might, at the last hour, be more justified in pleading, with earnest anxiety,--"Not now!--not now!"

Biographers already differ about the date of Meyerbeer's birth, some asserting that it took place in 1791, while the majority agree that the day was September 5, 1794. Born of a rich family of Jewish bankers, he was, at an early age, stimulated to honorable exertion by the success in other pursuits of his brother William, the astronomer, and Michael, the poet,--successes which, however, at this day, are chiefly remembered from their association with the name made really famous by the composer. His parents encouraged the talent of the youth, who, at as early an age as Mozart himself, manifested plainly the possession of genius; and when only five years old, the boy was placed under the instruction of Lanska, a local celebrity of Berlin. Two years later, little Jacob was a fair performer on the piano-forte, or such an instrument as at that time served for the Erard, the Chickering, the Steinway of the present day. He played, as a prodigy, at the most fashionable amateur-concerts given at the Prussian capital; and a faded old copy of a Leipsic paper, which bears the date of 1803, yet survives the destruction awarded to all old newspapers, simply because it mentions the youthful prodigy--then nine years old--as one of the best pianists of his native city.

One of those charming old musical enthusiasts who nowadays are met with only in Germany--and but seldom there--about this time visited Berlin. He heard little Jacob play, and at once predicted that the boy would "one day become one of the glories of Europe," To take lessons in the theory of music was the advice of this old enthusiast, the Abbe Vogler.

So the lad was transferred from the tuition of Lanska to that of Bernard Anselm Weber, a former pupil of old Vogler, and at that time director of the orchestra at the Berlin opera; and from this master the boy learned the art of instrumentation and harmony, to a certain degree at least. Weber was very fond of his pupil, and sent one of his fugues to Vogler, to show the old man that he was not the only one able to turn out accomplished scholars. Two months passed without any answer, and Weber attributed the silence to jealousy, until, one day, a large roll arrived at his house. It contained a complete "Treatise on the Fugue," written entirely by the hand of the old master, and containing also a critical analysis of little Jacob's work, exposing its errors, adding example to precept, by contrasting with it a fugue written by the Abbe on the same theme, and also subjecting the two compositions to a severe and logical criticism, which only proved the superiority of the masterly hand over the inexperienced.

Little Jacob was less mortified by this incident than was his poor teacher, Weber. He took the manuscript, and, after a faithful study of its contents, wrote another eight-part fugue, which he sent himself to Vogler. The result was precisely as he desired: he became a pupil of the old musician.

Among the central towns of Germany, few are more pleasing, and, perhaps, none at all more utterly neglected, than Darmstadt. The capital of a duchy, it contains a harmless, quiet little court, to which are attached a court-church and a court-theatre, alternately attracting the attention of the courtiers. The palace is a quaint old affair, on one side as precise and finished as a modern Italian villa, but taking its revenge by indulging on the opposite side in a series of wild irregularities as incomprehensible as they are picturesque,--old towers, romantic gateways, broken battlements, running ivies, and gay, green foliage, uniting, in charming confusion, to form the most pleasing picture in the dear, lazy old town.

A year or two ago, the quiet, neglected little Darmstadt came temporarily to the surface, and was seen of men. The Princess Alice of England married the heir to the Duchy, and the event aroused (in England especially) a natural curiosity as to the young lady's future home,--a curiosity which has since quite died away. Darmstadt, about twenty years ago, was also somewhat talked of in a distant Northern land; for from the dull old Ducal palace went forth a pretty, delicate-looking girl, who is now the wife of Alexander II, and the Empress of all the Russias.

In the Darmstadt picture-gallery is an old painting of the city as it was just one century ago,--in 1764. It was a very little and a very shabby city then. People dressed in the most ridiculous of costumes, and the picture shows His Serene Highness, arrayed in scarlet and yellow, getting out of a very clumsy, gilded carriage, amid the adulation of bowing and wigged courtiers. When Meyerbeer was there, however, Darmstadt was much as it is to-day,--a city so quiet that you might almost pitch your tent in the middle of the principal street, and sleep undisturbed for a week at least.

The Abbe Vogler was organist of the cathedral, an ugly, clumsy old building, darkened by wide wooden galleries. Meyerbeer was a Jew, but his parents were liberal enough to send him to the fireside of a Christian, and the boy became an inmate of Vogler's house. For two years he studied faithfully, and by that time was initiated, as he had never been before, into the mysteries of counterpoint. For several years after this he remained with Vogler, studying, working, composing, and enjoying.

Indeed, the biographer who shall give us a permanent "Life of Meyerbeer" must recur to the composer's sojourn in Darmstadt as the most romantic phase of his existence,--when, away from the pleasures and temptations of a great capital, free from the demands of society, with nothing to distract his mind from Art, he consecrated his young life to her service. His few associates of his own age were devoted to the same cause, and all were certainly inspired by a mutual emulation. But only one of the little group, besides the subject of this sketch, has left a name to be remembered,--and that is Carl Maria von Weber. The other two may have had as noble aspirations, as untiring energy, as passionate ambitions; but Fate had decreed that Godefroy von Weber and Gaensbacher should never win the world's applause. Carl Maria and Meyerbeer were the "cronies" of the little school. They were constantly together; they built their air-castles with a view to future joint occupancy; they made their boyish vows of eternal friendship. Among the papers of Weber was found, after his death, one bearing the title, "Cantata, written by Weber for the Birthday of Vogler, and set to Music by Meyerbeer." The words of Weber, it is said, are better than the music of his friend.

All these boys loved their old master, the Abbe, and knew no greater pleasure than to enjoy his personal instructions. The duties of each day were regular, simple, and gladly performed. The Abbe, in his capacity of priest, began by celebrating a mass, at which Carl Maria von Weber assisted, as little boys do in these times at every mass throughout the land. Then, as a _maestro_, the Abbe apportioned to each of his pupils the task for the day,--the _Kyrie_, the _Sanctus_, or the _Gloria in Excelsis_. Vogler himself joined in the task, and the completed compositions were sent to the various church-choirs in the Duchy for performance. In the twilight hours, there were strolls about the quiet streets of Darmstadt, in the Ducal gardens, or among the tombstones of an old churchyard in the suburbs of the city. Outside the town there was really little to attract the pleasure-seeker, for Darmstadt lies in a flat, cultivated plain, and its surroundings are tame and monotonous. On Sundays they all went to the cathedral, where there were two organs. The Abbe played one, and as he finished some masterly voluntary or some scientific fugue, his pupils would in turn respond on the other instrument, at times playing fanciful variations, on some theme given out by their teacher, and again wandering in rich extemporaneous harmonies over the old yellow keys. Who knows but that, in this way, the quiet, phlegmatic congregation of the Darmstadt cathedral may have heard, unheedingly, from the hand of Weber, sweet strains which afterwards were elaborated in "Oberon" and "Der Freischuetz"? or have listened, with dreamy pleasure, to snatches of melody destined in future years to be woven by Meyerbeer into the score of "Robert" or the "Huguenots"?

Thus the quiet music life at Darmstadt passed on, each of the four boys living but for their art. Meyerbeer was the foremost in success; for, when but seventeen years old, he wrote a religious _cantata_, called "God and Nature," which, performed before the Duke, secured to him the title of Composer to the Court. In 1811 a still greater excitement disturbed the serenity of Meyerbeer's period of study. Vogler closed his school, and started with his scholars on a tour through the principal cities of Germany. Each of the young composers carried with him a portfolio of original compositions, though they were generous enough to consider a manuscript opera by Meyerbeer, called "The Vow of Jephthah," as the ablest work, and at Munich aided heartily in preparing it for the stage. In this critical Bavarian capital Meyerbeer made his first appeal to public favor as an operatic composer,--and failed. He was not hissed or ridiculed, but "The Vow of Jephthah" fell coldly on the audience, and was shortly withdrawn.

Doubting whether he was destined to succeed as a composer, Meyerbeer went to Vienna, a city not unfrequently called by musicians Pianopolis, and there he heard Hummel play the piano. He had already taken a few lessons of Clementi, but no sooner did he listen to the former master than he recognized his own inefficiency, and saw work before him. He determined to unite in himself, as a pianist, the brilliancy of execution of Clementi, and the charm, the grace, and purity of Hummel's style. He succeeded, and made his _debut_ at a concert at Vienna with the most flattering applause. At this day the amateur would give much to hear exactly how such men as Meyerbeer, and Hummel, and Clementi played, and to compare them with Thalberg, Gottschalk, and Satter. It is impossible to say in what respects Meyerbeer may have fallen behind or surpassed these accomplished executants; but certain it is, that, in the beginning of the present century, and while scarce out of his teens, the favorite pupil of the Abbe Vogler was the favorite pianist of the Vienna public.

Yet, after all his triumphs in the concert-room, he yearned for the greater triumphs of the stage, and leaving the piano to his renowned successors, Chopin and Liszt, he turned again to composing. He wrote an opera called "The Two Caliphs," which, like his previous effort, was replete with strange harmonies, very sparing in melody, and met with the same (lack of) success. The celebrated Metternich--an authority in Art as well as in diplomacy--was present at the production of "The Two Caliphs," but only once ventured to applaud. The old master, Vogler, and the dearer friend, Von Weber, still encouraged the young composer with their approbation, and only blamed a stupid audience that would not discern the beauties appreciable by their sharper ears.

Meyerbeer had good sense, and with a modesty perhaps more unusual in a musician than in any one else, he was disposed rather to blame himself than the public. A prominent amateur composer of Vienna--Salieri by name--advised him to go to Italy; and to Venice, as the nearest point, he hastened without delay.

In these days of universal travel, when every tourist can talk glibly of the different theatres and composers of the Old World, it seems almost incredible that a young man of wealth and taste like Meyerbeer should not have visited Italy till almost forced to do so. Yet such was the case. Meyerbeer was a man of one idea, and that idea was music. No journey which had any other object possessed attractions for him. To the influences of history, to the grandeur of that land which should not be named without an almost holy veneration, he was quite indifferent. It was not the Caesars that drew him to Italy, nor the Popes, nor the Raphaels, nor the Michel Angelos,--it was Rossini and the modern opera.

At that time the composer of "Semiramide" was at the height of his popularity, and Meyerbeer heard "Tancredi," and for the first time felt the delicious fascination of Italian melody. He determined to transplant it into the rugged soil of his own masculine musical science; and three years after the Rossinian revelation at Venice, his first Italian opera, "Romilda e Costanza," was produced at that dismal old metropolis of necromancy, Padua, Signora Pisaroni taking the principal part. It pleased, as did his next work, "Semiramide Riconosciuta," produced at Turin, though neither was so successful as his "Emma di Risburgo," first heard at Venice, and for some time a rival in popularity to "Tancredi."

At this period Meyerbeer adopted the name of Giacomo,--the Italian translation of Jacob,--which he ever after retained. His true name was Meyer Liebmann Beer, but he suppressed the Liebmann, because that word in German, when joined with Beer, could by weak punsters be translated into "a philanthropic bear"; so he Italianized his pre-nomen, dropped his middle name, and joined the two other words in one,--the result of all these liberties in nomenclature being "Giacomo Meyerbeer."

Thus, doubly armed with an Italian name and an Italian reputation, he returned to Germany, but was coldly welcomed. Even Weber charged him with being a renegade to the cause of German Art, and, while "Emma di Risburgo" was played at one of the Berlin theatres, had "The Two Caliphs" revived at another. Meyerbeer thus could have heard his two styles of composition exemplified in the same night. Weber, indeed, always looked upon Meyerbeer's Italian operas as a sad falling away from grace, and in a letter written to his brother, Godefroy,--the fourth of the little group of Darmstadt students,--says,--

"Meyerbeer has promised on his return to Berlin to write a German opera. God be praised for it! I appealed strongly to his conscience in the matter."

Returning to Italy, Meyerbeer produced "Margherita d' Angiu" at La Scala, Milan, following it with "L'Esule di Granata"; and then in 1824 Venice saw and heard the "Crociato." This last opera made the tour of the world, carried the name of the composer to every place where musical art was cultivated, and won for Meyerbeer, from the distant Emperor of Brazil, the decoration of the Cross of the South.

In Paris alone--Paris, which afterwards made such an idol of the composer--did the "Crociato" fail to meet with immediate success. In nonsense and folly it may be truly said of the Parisians that "a little child shall lead them"; and so it happened on this occasion. In the admirable quartette of the second act a child is introduced, as in "Norma," to awaken the sympathies of an untractable tenor papa. This juvenile, by no means a young Apollo, took not the slightest interest in the music, and was so indifferent to the publicity of the situation, so utterly _blase_, (and sleepy,) as to yawn during the most affecting passages. At the first yawn, the audience smiled; the _prima donna_, proceeding with her part, exclaimed in tragic Italian, "Restrain thy tears!"--and the child gaped again for the second time, while the audience grinned. "Heaven will comfort thee!" shrieked the singer,--whereat the child gave such a prodigious yawn that the house burst into laughter, and the vocalist could not finish the piece.

In 1827 Meyerbeer married, and retired from public life for a while. Two of the children born to him died, their loss casting so deep a shade on his soul that for nearly two years he composed only religious music to words selected from the Book of Psalms, or written by Klopstock. He also wrote a collection of melodies, among them an elegy entitled "At the Tomb of Beethoven." But erelong the glorious old instinct for operatic composition returned. On the seventeenth of September, 1829, M. Lubbert, then director of the opera, received a letter couched in these terms:--

"_17 Septembre, 1829_.

"J'ai l'honneur de vous prevenir, Monsieur, que par decision
de ce jour j'ai accorde a M. Meyerbeer, compositeur, ses
entrees a l'Academie Royale de Musique....

"L'Aide-de-Camp du Roi,

"Directeur-General des Beaux-Arts,

"VICOMTE DE LAROCHEFOUCAULD."

And two years later, on the twenty-first of September, 1831, Dr. Veron, the successor of Lubbert, opened his doors for the first performance of "Robert le Diable." This wonderful and popular opera was written in French, to a _libretto_ sent to Berlin by Scribe, and was at first intended for the Opera Comique, but its three acts were subsequently increased to five, and its destination changed to the Grand Opera. Meyerbeer himself had to bear much of the expense of preparing the stage-appointments, though not to such an extent as on the production of his "Romilda" in Italy, when he bought the _libretto_, gave the music gratis, paid the singers, and provided the costumes.

Dr. Veron, in his Memoirs, gives an amusing account of the accidents which attended the first production of "Robert." In the third act, a chandelier fell, and the _prima donna_ Dorus had a narrow escape from being hit by the falling glass; after the chorus of demons, a cloud, rising from the cave to hide the stage, reached a certain elevation, and then, giving way, tumbled on the boards, nearly striking Taglioni the dancer, who, as _Elena_, was extended on her tomb, ready for the next scene; and in the last act, Nourrit, the _Robert_ of the evening, in the excitement of the moment, leaped down the trap-door by which Levasseur (the _Bertram_) had just disappeared. This last event received different interpretations. On the stage there was alarm and weeping, because it was then thought Nourrit in his leap had been killed or maimed; by the audience it was supposed that the author intended _Robert_ should share with _Bertram_ the infernal regions; while _under_ the stage Levasseur greeted the tenor with mingled surprise and disgust:--"_Que diable faites vous ici? Est ce qu'on a change le denouement?_" Luckily, Nourrit was unhurt, the curtain was raised again, the singers made their conventional acknowledgments, and the names of the authors were announced amid the wildest enthusiasm.

After that night Meyerbeer had to pay no more money to get his operas on the stage. The tables were so completely turned that he thenceforth could command almost any price he chose to ask. To follow his career more minutely, after this period of his emergence into the bright light of fame, would be but to recount a story with which almost every one is familiar.

The "Huguenots" was the next opera, and it was produced only after infinite delays; indeed, just before the rehearsal, Madame Meyerbeer fell ill, and her husband decided to convey her to Italy. He took the music from the orchestra desks, forfeited a fine of thirty thousand francs, and a few hours later he and his "Huguenots" were on the way to Nice. When finally produced at Paris, this opera was as well received as the "Robert." It appears, that, after the first general rehearsal, Nourrit, the tenor, found fault with the sublime music of the fourth act. Meyerbeer returned home in a very unpleasant frame of mind, and told his troubles to the friend with whom he lodged. "If I only had," said he, "a few stanzas to arrange as an _andante_ and _duo_, all would be right. But I cannot ask Scribe to add more verses." The friend immediately called a literary acquaintance, Emile Deschamps, who was playing cards in a neighboring _cafe_, explained to him the situation, and in a few minutes the verses were written. It was about midnight, and the composer, seating himself at the piano with the words before him, in a fever of inspiration threw out the splendid _duo_ between _Raoul_ and _Valentine_ which closes the act, and which always equally enchants performers and audience; and when this music was performed at the next rehearsal, the orchestra, players, and vocalists carried the composer in triumph on the stage to receive their spontaneous plaudits and congratulations, while Nourrit embraced him with tears of delight.