character, there is in the finale actually a plain and full-toned C flat major scale.  What other work of the composer could be pointed out exhibiting the like feature?  Of course, Chopin is as little successful in entirely hiding his serpentining and chromaticising tendency as Mephistopheles in hiding the limp arising from his cloven foot.  Still, these fallings out of the role are rare and transient, and, on the whole, Chopin presents himself as a perfect homme du monde who knows how to say the most insignificant trifles with the most exquisite grace imaginable.  There can. be nothing more amusing than the contemporary critical opinions regarding this work, nothing more amusing than to see the at other times censorious Philistines unwrinkle their brows, relax generally the sternness of their features, and welcome, as it were, the return of the prodigal son.  We wiser critics of to-day, who, of course, think very differently about this matter, can, nevertheless, enjoy and heartily applaud the prettiness and elegance of the simple first variation, the playful tripping second, the schwarmerische melodious third, the merry swinging fourth, and the brilliant finale.

From Chopin’s letters we see that the publication of the Tarantelle, Op. 43, which took place in the latter part of 1841, was attended with difficulties and annoyances. [Footnote:  Herr Schuberth, of Leipzig, informed me that a honorarium of 500 francs was paid to Chopin for this work on July 1, 1841.  The French publisher deposited the work at the library of the Conservatoire in October, 1841.] What these difficulties and annoyances were, is, however, only in part ascertainable.  To turn from the publication to the composition itself, I may say that it is full of life, indeed, spirited in every respect, in movement and in boldness of harmonic and melodic conception.  The Tarantelle is a translation from Italian into Polish, a transmutation of Rossini into Chopin, a Neapolitan scene painted with opaque colours, the south without its transparent sky, balmy air, and general brightness.  That this composition was inspired by impressions received from Rossini’s Tarantella, and not from impressions received in Italy (of which, as has already been related, he had a short glimpse in 1839), is evident.  A comparison of Chopin’s Op. 43 with Liszt’s glowing and intoxicating transcription of Rossini’s composition may be recommended as a study equally pleasant and instructive.  Although not an enthusiastic admirer of Chopin’s Tarantelle, I protest in the interest of the composer and for justice’s sake against Schumann’s dictum:  “Nobody can call that beautiful music; but we pardon the master his wild fantasies, for once he may let us see also the dark sides of his inner life.”