Page:Anecdotes of Great Musicians.djvu/175

Rh  hearers recalled her twenty times. It is little wonder that she fainted at the end of the performance.  

The deaf Beethoven and the blind Handel are pitiful pictures. For many years Beethoven could hear no note of music, yet in this time he put forth some of his mightiest works.

At the first performance of his immortal Ninth Symphony, Beethoven himself conducted. But he could not hear a single tone from the orchestra and chorus. When, at the close of the work, the audience loudly applauded, Beethoven was entirely oblivious of it until the lady who sang the alto solo part had turned him around facing the people, so he could see the clapping of hands. It was a touching sight, and the people were deeply affected by the condition of this grand old man, who had to see, instead of hear, the applause for his music.  

Ole Bull's favorite violin was one of old Caspar di Salo's creations.

Its history was so varied as to deserve mention. For a hundred and fifty years or so it had reposed in the museum at Innspruck, where it had been placed by a cardinal as being a fine example of the work of its maker. In 1809 the French soldiers sacked that place, and this valuable instrument was carried off by a soldier and subsequently sold to Herr Rhehazek, a Viennese official, who was a collector of violins, and who had put nearly all his wealth into his fine collection of instruments. When Ole Bull visited Vienna, in 1839, he saw this fiddle and determined to possess it. But no, Rhehazek would not part with it, and all Bull could get out of him was that if the violin were to be sold he