Leipzig will soon be able to show a Kalisz [Footnote:  An allusion to the encampment of Russian and Prussian troops and friendly meeting of princes which took place there in 1835.] as regards musical crowned heads.  Herr Mendelssohn has already arrived.  Herr Moscheles comes this week; and besides him there will be Chopin, and later, Pixis and Franzilla. [Footnote:  Franzilla (or Francilla) Pixis, the adopted daughter of Peter Pixis, whose acquaintance the reader made in one of the preceding chapters (p. 245).]

The details of the account of Chopin’s visit to Leipzig which I am now going to give, were communicated to me by Ernst Ferdinand Wenzel, the well-known professor of pianoforte-playing at the Leipzig Conservatorium, who died in 1880.

In the middle of the year 1835 the words “Chopin is coming” were passing from mouth to mouth, and caused much stir in the musical circles of Leipzig.  Shortly after this my informant saw Mendelssohn in the street walking arm in arm with a young man, and he knew at once that the Polish musician had arrived, for this young man could be no other than Chopin.  From the direction in which the two friends were going, he guessed whither their steps were tending.  He, therefore, ran as fast as his legs would carry him to his master Wieck, to tell him that Chopin would be with him in another moment.  The visit had been expected, and a little party was assembled, every one of which was anxious to see and hear the distinguished artist.  Besides Wieck, his wife, daughter, and sister-in-law, there were present Robert Schumann and Wieck’s pupils Wenzel, Louis Rakemann, and Ulex.  But the irascible pedagogue, who felt offended because Chopin had not come first to him, who had made such efforts for the propagation of his music, would not stay and welcome his visitor, but withdrew sulkily into the inner apartments.  Wieck had scarcely left the room when Mendelssohn and Chopin entered.  The former, who had some engagement, said, “Here is Chopin!” and then left, rightly thinking this laconic introduction sufficient.  Thus the three most distinguished composers of their time were at least for a moment brought together in the narrow space of a room. [Footnote:  This dictum, like all superlatives and sweeping assertions, will no doubt raise objectors; but, I think, it may be maintained, and easily maintained with the saving clause “apart from the stage.”] Chopin was in figure not unlike Mendelssohn, but the former was more lightly built and more graceful in his movements.  He spoke German fluently, although with a foreign accent.  The primary object of Chopin’s visit was to make the acquaintance of Clara Wieck, who had already acquired a high reputation as a pianist.  She played to him among other things the then new and not yet published Sonata in F sharp minor (Op. 11) by Schumann, which she had lately been studying.  The gentlemen dared not ask Chopin to play because of the piano, the touch of which was heavy and which