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SCHUBERTS DYING SONG. BY A. DE VBRVIN8. doctrines of Hegel, for in all the taverns of gay Deutschland all these things are found floating in an indescribable atmosphere. These two compositions caused him to be much talked about but, while snatching him from obscurity, they did not give him wealth, for he is seen soon afterward entering as professor of musio into the house of Count Esterhazy.

He had for a pupil a delightful girl of sixteen, who joined to all the charms of a rare beauty and exquisite grace all the attractions of a great name, a high position in society, and a princely fortune. When I speak of the attractions of fortune, I do not wish to imply that Schuberts soul was overcome by any thought of venality I only wish to recall that, because of the pomp which wealth implies in elegant society and the species of halo with which it surrounds those who possess it, all the prosaic details of life disappear, the simplest acts assume an elevated, almost solemn, and often poetical form, which adds (especially for a dreamer such as was the young composer) peculiar attractions to the charms which inhere in woman, such as God has made her. So long as they inhabited the Esterhazy palace, in Vienna, if Schubert loved his pupil, he did not know it the humbleness of his position and of his origin, the homage which surrounded Caroline Esterhazy, both in the city and at the court, caused him to see in 'her so superior a being that she could inspire him with only a sort of affectionate worship, mingled with veneration and humble respect. When the summer came, the Esterhazys went to their estate of Zelesz, in Hungary, and Schubert accompanied them. It was there, in the presence of the magnificence of nature, that the soul of the poet was completely developed, and that he learned to know his own heart.

The majesty and silence of the woods, the calm whioh brooded over the lakes and the limpidity of their waters, the noise of the cascades, the serenity of the starry nights, the splendors of the sunset, and the radiant up-blazings of the mornings, flooded his soul and submerged his brain in veritable oceans of harmony, which he exhaled in compositions that have remained immortal, because they are inimitable. Upon his return to the chateau, after his long rambles upon the mountains or in the forest, Schubert wrote the song which his enthusiasm for the beauties of nature, mingled with an adored image, had suggested to his heart. And when the evening came he recited his compositions in the great salon of the chateau, where they were admired by all, and often praised by Caroline so warmly that he was, perhaps, led thereby to think that, in a great soul, genius may sometimes outweigh fortune; that poetry being a nobility conferred by God Himself, a bard might well become the rival of a knight. Less surrounded with people than at Vienna, full of sympathetic admiration for the artist, Friiulein von Esterhazy was here more accessible. He saw her almost every hour, and the species of familiarity brought about by the necessities of country life almost led Schubert to a proposal.

One day they were alone in the drawing-room, and he had just played for her one of those melodies full of feeling which she delighted in, when she said, in a tone of mingled coquettishness and mild reproach: Why do you never dedicate anything to me? Schubert was homely his nose was largp, his lips were thick, there was about his features a certain roughness and heaviness which no care lessened, but his eyes were beautiful, deep, expressive, and sparkling with the fire of genius. He looked at the daughter of the Magyars, and, in a voice full of emotion, he said to her, Why should Is not all I write for you? And this cry of a burning heart was accompanied with a glance so full of sorrow and tenderness that it was impossible for the young girl not to see in it the avowal of a love which deeply wounded her pride. She blushed scarlet, not with love, but with anger, while the poor artist, frightened by what he had just said, and wounded as by a deadly shaft by the angry glance of her he loved so Sing it. Sire, my voice is rough and untrained. No matter sing 1 With a trembling but by no means unmusical voice the soldier obeyed the royal command and the King, with bent head and half-averted face, listened again to the melody of the song which had so deeply moved him forty years before.

With the last notes Piter looked up depreoatingly and half fearfully, and was amazed to see the change which had come over the features usually so haughty and stern they were now soft, tender, and dreamy as those of the youth who had first listened to the plaintive words nearly half a century before in Holland. Where did you learn the song, Piter? From my mother, sire. It was taught her by her grandmother, who composed it. Tell me your mothers history. Sire, she was born in Holland, where her mother kept an inn Was her name Van Tann Yes, sire Greta van Tann.

She lived at the inn until she married my father, with whom she was afterwards very unhappy. Why did she marry him Sire, it was to please her mother. My father was supposed to be very rich, and my grandmother had been unfortunate, and lost nearly all she possessed. For several years my mother refused all offers of marriage she could not forget a traveling musician who came once to the inn, and never cared for any one else. At last she sacrificed herself for her mothers sake but it was afterwards discovered that my father was not rich, as he had represented, besides whioh he drank immoderately, and ill-treated my poor mother shamefully.

Finally he died, and was followed in the same year by my three brothers. My mother has worked hard ever since for her support, and, until she lost her health, was very comfortable. That, sire, is all there is to tell. Very well. To-morrow you shall hear from me, Piter elder.

The soldier was left in a half-stupefied state, wondering how soon he should awake from what could be nothing but a fantastic dream. With wide-opened eyes he gazed after the departing monarch slowly disappearing in the direction of the palace, who walked with his head bent low and his hands clasped behind his back, while upon his softened melancholy face was still visible the strange transformation which the memories awakened by a simple strain of musio had wrought. Piter could not see that his lips were moving, and the mournful words they formed were merely a breath floating away and lost on the perfumed air, When we meet again, we shall be old and cold old and oold. The next day Piter elder was handed two papers sealed with the royal seal. The first contained his leave of absence for a month, the second was the deed of a fine farm on the borders of Holland, with the words written beneath To the heirs of Mutter Van Tann, in payment for a venison rayoflJ.

Frederick. AN OCTAVE HIGHER. She was a crank on the subject of musio. A gentleman knookedather door and asked Does Mr. Smith live here? No, sir, his room is an octave higher in the next flat, she replied, in a pianissimo andante tone of voioe.

Mr. Josefu Bennett is collecting material for a comprehensive History of Musio during the Nineteenth Century. The work, when completed, will be in several volumes, but each volume will be issued as soon as it is ready. From such an experienced and accomplished writer we may expect a work of the greatest poeSb'e interest, while for purposes of reference it will be simply invaluably The work is to be published by Messrs. Novello.

Few men have left so touching a memory as Schubert, who was but thirty-one years of age at his death, and whose soul was, so to speak, exhaled in a plaint as sorrowful as a sob, yet as soft as a sigh of love, as sweet, poetical and fervent as a prayer, or the confession of faith of a martyr for his last song is less an Adieu than the last appeal of a Christian soul, inviting to eternal love, and to the unspeakable joys of Heaven, the sister-soul which it had met here below. It was just as he was about to cross the threshhold of the heavenly portals that he addressed to her whom he loved so much, the tenderest and most pathetic adieu ever expressed by a human tongue. It is the history of this last chef (f oeuvre of the master that we here undertake to relate. Franz Schubert was the son of an humble schoolmaster of Vienna; his childhood was that of poor children in a populous city but, from his earliest days he bore the mark of the unfortunates whom Providence appoints to the great struggles of genius misfortune during life and celebrity after death. As poorly clad as the other children of the common people, with whom he mingled, he was distinguished among them by the dreamy depth of his gaze, and by a sort of absent-mindedness in his games, and a certain oddity of manner which proved that he was not like the others.

At an age when all steady or profound study is a toilsome and unattractive task, he studied eagerly and had learned to think. Already he heard speaking within himself voices which seemed to him to come from above, and which threw him into a sort of ecstasy, which others did not understand, but whioh was full of delight for him. He was but fourteen years of age when he composed a grand mass musica di camera and compositions for the piano whioh are justly admired in our day, but which then attracted no notice whatever, since it is related that the poor child was often, through lack of the money wherewith to buy it, without the necessary paper whereon to write the admirable melodies which the inner voices, of which I have spoken, incessantly whispered in his ear. He was but sixteen years of age when he wrote two master-pieces, Erl Koenig and Serenade which compelled a recognition of their author, although he was even then far from the fortune and the glory to which his genius permitted him to aspire for he, whom Liszt was to call the most poetioal of musicians, died poor, and, like so many other great artists, was proclaimed illustrious only after his death. It is reported that he composed with marvelous facility; for instance, he wrote Erl Koenig in one hour, and without stopping, and this is how he composed the Serenade Being, one day, with a few rather hard companions in a common tavern in Vienna, called Diersack, he was abstractedly turning over the leaves of a volume of poetry, which one of the drinkers had brought with him one piece, among others, attracted his attention he remained in a reverie for a few minutes after having read it, and then he said: It seems to me that I could write something pretty on that.

Then his muse, sweet Inspiration, whose accents he has repeated for us so poetically in more than a thousand melodies, bent over him and whispered the divine song whioh we have mentioned above. Having no paper at command, he wrote it on the back of a bill of fare, upon a corner of a table soiled by the topers, in the midst of the smoke of porcelain pipes, of the nauseous perfume of German sausages, spilled beer and Limburg cheese, amid the hiccoughs of the drunkards who surrounded him, the cries of children, the coarse buffoonery and the formidable guffaws which the ebriety of the guests of this den caused to burst forth at those of the tables where the guests did not philosophize concerning the rights q( man, the sooial question or the.