This, then, was Pan Joseph Elsner, the ancestor of modern Polish music, the teacher of Chopin, the fine connoisseur and cautious guide of original talents.  For he does not do as is done only too often by other teachers in the arts, who insist on screwing all pupils to the same turning-lathe on which they themselves were formed, who always do their utmost to ingraft their own I on the pupil, so that he may become as excellent a man as they imagine themselves to be.  Joseph Elsner did not proceed thus.  When all the people of Warsaw thought Frederick Chopin was entering on a wrong path, that his was not music at all, that he must keep to Himmel and Hummel, otherwise he would never do anything decent—­the clever Pan Elsner had already very clearly perceived what a poetic kernel there was in the pale young dreamer, had long before felt very clearly that he had before him the founder of a new epoch of pianoforte-playing, and was far from laying upon him a cavesson, knowing well that such a noble thoroughbred may indeed be cautiously led, but must not be trained and fettered in the usual way if he is to conquer.

Of Chopin’s studies under this master we do not know much more than of his studies under Zywny.  Both Fontana and Sowinski say that he went through a complete course of counterpoint and composition.  Elsner, in a letter written to Chopin in 1834, speaks of himself as “your teacher of harmony and counterpoint, of little merit, but fortunate.”  Liszt writes:—­

Joseph Elsner taught Chopin those things that are most difficult to learn and most rarely known:  to he exacting to one’s self, and to value the advantages that are only obtained by dint of patience and labour.

What other accounts of the matter under discussion I have got from books and conversations are as general and vague as the foregoing.  I therefore shall not weary the reader with them.  What Elsner’s view of teaching was may be gathered from one of his letters to his pupil.  The gist of his remarks lies in this sentence:—­

   That with which the artist (who learns continually from his
   surroundings) astonishes his contemporaries, he can only
   attain by himself and through himself.

Elsner had insight and self-negation (a rare quality with teachers) enough to act up to his theory, and give free play to the natural tendencies of his pupil’s powers.  That this was really the case is seen from his reply to one who blamed Frederick’s disregard of rules and custom:—­

Leave him in peace [he said], his is an uncommon way because his gifts are uncommon.  He does not strictly adhere to the customary method, but he has one of his own, and he will reveal in his works an originality which in such a degree has not been found in anyone.

The letters of master and pupil testify to their unceasing