Here is the chronology of the nocturnes:  Op. 9, three nocturnes, January, 1833; op. 15, three nocturnes, January, 1834; op. 27, two nocturnes, May, 1836; op. 32, two nocturnes, December, 1837; op. 37, two nocturnes, May, 1840; op. 48, two nocturnes, November, 1841; op. 55, two nocturnes, August, 1844; op. 62, two nocturnes, September, 1846.  In addition there is a nocturne written in 1828 and published by Fontana, with the opus number 72, No. 2, and the lately discovered one in C sharp minor, written when Chopin was young and published in 1895.  This completes the nocturne list, but following Niecks’ system of formal grouping I include the Berceuse and Barcarolle as full fledged specimens of nocturnes.

John Field has been described as the forerunner of Chopin.  The limpid style of this pupil and friend of Clementi, his beautiful touch and finished execution, were certainly admired and imitated by the Pole.  Field’s nocturnes are now neglected—­so curious are Time’s caprices—­and without warrant, for not only is Field the creator of the form, but in both his concertos and nocturnes he has written charming, sweet and sane music.  He rather patronized Chopin, for whose melancholy pose he had no patience.  “He has a talent of the hospital,” growled Field in the intervals between his wine drinking, pipe smoking and the washing of his linen—­the latter economical habit he contracted from Clementi.  There is some truth in his stricture.  Chopin, seldom exuberantly cheerful, is morbidly sad and complaining in many of the nocturnes.  The most admired of his compositions, with the exception of the valses, they are in several instances his weakest.  Yet he ennobled the form originated by Field, giving it dramatic breadth, passion and even grandeur.  Set against Field’s naive and idyllic specimens, Chopin’s efforts are often too bejewelled for true simplicity, too lugubrious, too tropical—­Asiatic is a better word—­and they have the exotic savor of the heated conservatory, and not the fresh scent of the flowers reared in the open by the less poetic Irishman.  And, then, Chopin is so desperately sentimental in some of these compositions.  They are not altogether to the taste of this generation; they seem to be suffering from anaemia.  However, there are a few noble nocturnes; and methods of performance may have much to answer for the sentimentalizing of some others.  More vigor, a quickening of the time-pulse, and a less languishing touch will rescue them from lush sentiment.  Chopin loved the night and its soft mysteries as much as did Robert Louis Stevenson, and his nocturnes are true night pieces, some with agitated, remorseful countenance, others seen in profile only, while many are whisperings at dusk.  Most of them are called feminine, a term psychologically false.  The poetic side of men of genius is feminine, and in Chopin the feminine note was over emphasized—­at times it was almost hysterical—­particularly in these nocturnes.