Page:Anecdotes of Great Musicians.djvu/126

114 Field smiled at this request, coming as it seemed, from some village tradesman who dabbled in music; but he sat down to the piano and played some of his own elegant compositions in his best style. The stranger warmly applauded and thanked him. Then Field, thinking to have some fun, asked the supposed rustic to take his turn at the piano; but Hummel declared he never played without his notes, that he only played a little on the organ now and then, and so on.

But Field insisted, and as his clumsy visitor sat down to the piano, Field leaned back to enjoy the fun. And he did enjoy it, but in a different way from what he expected. Hummel took one of the themes that Field had just finished playing, and developed it into a brilliant fantasia in which were displayed all the intricacies of technic and beauties of expression.

Field was thunderstruck. He sprang to his feet and, catching his visitor by the shoulders, he gave him a shake and then embraced him in the hearty European fashion, crying, "You can't fool me! You are Hummel. No other man in the world can improvise like that!"

With that introduction it is needless to say that the two pianists became fast friends.  

One of Ole Bull's favorite violins was a Joseph Guarnerius, called the "King Joseph," for the greatest violins of the old makers are known and named as individuals. It is not to be wondered that he was willing to brave a good deal to preserve this violin, for, irrespective of its worth as a producer of beautiful tones, there was some eight hundred pounds invested in it.

On one of the great violinist's concert trips in this country, he was a passenger on an Ohio river steamboat. In the fashion of those days the boiler burst, tearing away the forepart of the boat and setting the cabins on fire. Ole Bull found himself choking, 