I am in hopes, therefore, my dear
young pupil, that your violin will occupy your attention at just
those very times when, if you were immoral or dissipated, you would
be at the grogshop, gaming-table, or among vicious females. Such a
use of the violin, notwithstanding the prejudices many hold against
it, must contribute to virtue, and furnish abundance of innocent and
entirely unobjectionable amusement. These are the views with which I
hope you have adopted it, and will continue to cherish and cultivate
it."
CHAPTER II
There is no bard in all the choir,
. . .
Not one of all can put in verse,
Or to this presence could rehearse
The sights and voices ravishing
The boy knew on the hills in spring,
When pacing through the oaks he heard
Sharp queries of the sentry-bird,
The heavy grouse's sudden whir,
The rattle of the kingfisher."
EMERSON'S Harp.
Now began an era of infinite happiness, of days that were never long
enough, of evenings when bedtime came all too soon. Oh, that there
had been some good angel who would have taken in hand Anthony Croft
the boy, and, training the powers that pointed so unmistakably in
certain directions, given to the world the genius of Anthony Croft,
potential instrument maker to the court of St. Cecilia; for it was
not only that he had the fingers of a wizard; his ear caught the
faintest breath of harmony or hint of discord, as
"Fairy folk a-listening
Hear the seed sprout in the spring,
And for music to their dance
Hear the hedge-rows wake from trance;
Sap that trembles into buds
Sending little rhythmic floods
Of fairy sound in fairy ears.
Pages:
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31