also visited, and he arrived at Vienna in November.  There he confidently expected a repetition of his former successes, but was disappointed.  Haslinger received him coldly and refused to print his variations or concerto unless he got them for nothing.  Chopin’s first brush with the hated tribe of publishers begins here, and he adopts as his motto the pleasing device, “Pay, thou animal,” a motto he strictly adhered to; in money matters Chopin was very particular.  The bulk of his extant correspondence is devoted to the exposure of the ways and wiles of music publishers.  “Animal” is the mildest term he applies to them, “Jew” the most frequent objurgation.  After all Chopin was very Polish.

He missed his friends the Blahetkas, who had gone to Stuttgart, and altogether did not find things so promising as formerly.  No profitable engagements could be secured, and, to cap his misery, Titus, his other self, left him to join the revolutionists in Poland November 30.  His letters reflect his mental agitation and terror over his parents’ safety.  A thousand times he thought of renouncing his artistic ambitions and rushing to Poland to fight for his country.  He never did, and his indecision—­it was not cowardice—­is our gain.  Chopin put his patriotism, his wrath and his heroism into his Polonaises.  That is why we have them now, instead of Chopin having been the target of some black-browed Russian.  Chopin was psychically brave; let us not cavil at the almost miraculous delicacy of his organization.  He wrote letters to his parents and to Matuszyriski, but they are not despairing—­ at least not to the former.  He pretended gayety and had great hopes for the future, for he was living entirely on means supplied him by his father.  News of Constantia gladdened him, and he decided to go to Italy, but the revolution early in 1831 decided him for France.  Dr. Malfatti was good to him and cheered him, and he managed to accomplish much social visiting.  The letters of this period are most interesting.  He heard Sarah Heinefetter sing, and listened to Thaiberg’s playing of a movement of his own concerto.  Thalberg was three years younger than Chopin and already famous.  Chopin did not admire him:  “Thalberg plays famously, but he is not my man...He plays forte and piano with the pedals but not with the hand; takes tenths as easily as I do octaves, and wears studs with diamonds.”

Thalberg was not only too much of a technician for Chopin, but he was also a Jew and a successful one.  In consequence, both poet and Pole revolted.

Hummel called on Frederic, but we hear nothing of his opinion of the elder man and his music; this is all the more strange, considering how much Chopin built on Hummel’s style.  Perhaps that is the cause of the silence, just as Wagner’s dislike for Meyerbeer was the result of his obligations to the composer of “Les Huguenots.”  He heard Aloys Schmitt play, and uttered the very Heinesque witticism that “he is already over