Chopin’s first visit was to Miss Pechwell, through whom he got admission to a soiree at the house of Dr. Kreyssig, where she was going to play and the prima donna of the Italian opera to sing.  Having carefully dressed, Chopin made his way to Dr. Kreyssig’s in a sedan-chair.  Being unaccustomed to this kind of conveyance he had a desire to kick out the bottom of the “curious but comfortable box,” a temptation which he, however—­to his honour be it recorded—­resisted.  On entering the salon he found there a great number of ladies sitting round eight large tables:—­

No sparkling of diamonds met my eye, but the more modest glitter of a host of steel knitting-needles, which moved ceaselessly in the busy hands of these ladies.  The number of ladies and knitting-needles was so large that if the ladies had planned an attack upon the gentlemen that were present, the latter would have been in a sorry plight.  Nothing would have been left to them but to make use of their spectacles as weapons, for there was as little lack of eye-glasses as of bald heads.

The clicking of knitting-needles and the rattling of teacups were suddenly interrupted by the overture to the opera “Fra Diavolo,” which was being played in an adjoining room.  After the overture Signora Palazzesi sang “with a bell-like, magnificent voice, and great bravura.”  Chopin asked to be introduced to her.  He made likewise the acquaintance of the old composer and conductor Vincent Rastrelli, who introduced him to a brother of the celebrated tenor Rubini.

At the Roman Catholic church, the Court Church, Chopin met Morlacchi, and heard a mass by that excellent artist.  The Neapolitan sopranists Sassaroli and Tarquinio sang, and the “incomparable Rolla” played the solo violin.  On another occasion he heard a clever but dry mass by Baron von Miltitz, which was performed under the direction of Morlacchi, and in which the celebrated violoncello virtuosos Dotzauer and Kummer played their solos beautifully, and the voices of Sassaroli, Muschetti, Babnigg, and Zezi were heard to advantage.  The theatre was, as usual, assiduously frequented by Chopin.  After the above-mentioned soiree he hastened to hear at least the last act of “Die Stumme von Portici” ("Masaniello").  Of the performance of Rossini’s “Tancredi,” which he witnessed on another evening, he praised only the wonderful violin playing of Rolla and the singing of Mdlle.  Hahnel, a lady from the Vienna Court Theatre.  Rossini’s “La Donna del lago,” in Italian, is mentioned among the operas about to be performed.  What a strange anomaly, that in the year 1830 a state of matters such as is indicated by these names and facts could still obtain in Dresden, one of the capitals of musical Germany!  It is emphatically a curiosity of history.