Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 5.djvu/838

Rh under Carpini, and at the age of fourteen wrote a mass which was performed in public and excited universal admira tion. About this time Beckford, the author of Vathek, per suaded dementi to follow him to England, where the young composer lived in retirement at one of the country seats of his protector in Dorsetshire up to 1770. In that year he first appeared in London, where his success both as a com poser and pianist was rapid and brilliant. In 1777 he was for some time employed as conductor of the Italian opera, but he soon afterwards left London for Paris. Here also his concerts were crowded by enthusiastic audiences, and the same success accompanied dementi on an artistic tour to Southern Germany and Austria which he undertook about 1780. At Vienna he was received with high honour by the Emperor Joseph II., in whose presence he met Mozart, and sustained a kind of musical duel with him. His technical skill proved to be equal if not superior to that of his great rival, who on the other hand infinitely surpassed him by the passionate beauty of his rendering. Such seems to have been the opinion of most of the witnesses of this remarkable meeting, and it is confirmed to some extent by the two musicians themselves. Apropos of the connec tion of these great men the fact may be mentioned that one of the finest of dementi s sonatas, that in B flat, shows an exactly identical opening theme with Mozart s overture to the Flauto Magico, also that at the concert given by the Philharmonic Society in commemoration of dementi s death, the German composer s Eecordare was the chief item of the programme. Soon after his meeting with Mozart, dementi returned to London, where he continued for the next twelve years his lucrative occupations of fashionable teacher and performer at the concerts of the aristocracy. He also started a pianoforte manufacturing firm of his own, and the commercial shrewdness characteristic of his nation greatly contributed to the lasting success of the business. Amongst his pupils on the pianoforte during this period may be mentioned John Field, the composer of the celebrated Nocturnes, In his company dementi paid, in 1804, a prolonged visit to the large cities of the Continent, including Paris, Vienna, St Petersburg, and Berlin. At the Prussian capital he made a prolonged stay, and there counted Meyerbeer among his pupils. He also revisited his own country after an absence of more than thirty years. In 1810 dementi returned to London, but refused to play again in public, devoting the remainder of his life to composition. Several symphonies belong to this time, and were played with much success at contemporary concerts, but none of them seem to have been published. His intellectual and musical faculties remained unimpaired up to his death, which took place at Evesham, Worcester shire, March 9, 1832. Clementi has been called the (&amp;lt; father of pianoforte playing,&quot; and it cannot be denied that the modern style of execution owes a great deal to his teaching and example. His technique is described as all but unequalled at his time, and remarkable even according to our present advanced notions. Moscheles, a pianist of a very different school, gives a vivid description of the effect produced by dementi s playing. At a dinner given in his honour in 1828 the composer was induced to play once more to a larger audience. &quot; Smart, Cramer (another of dementi s pupils), and I,&quot; Moscheles writes in his diary, &quot; conducted him to the piano. Every one s expectation is raised to the utmost pitch, for Clementi has not been heard for years. He improvises on a theme of Handel and carries us all away to the highest enthusiasm. His eyes shine with the fire of youth, those of his hearers grow humid dementi s playing in his youth was marked by a most beautiful legato, a supple touch in lively passages, and a most unfailing technique. The remains of these qualities could still be discovered and admired, but the most charming things were the turns of his improvisa tion full of youthful genius.&quot; Amongst his compositions the most remarkable are 60 sonatas for pianoforte, and the great collection of Etudes called Gradus ad Parnassum. As a work of instruction combining absolute artistic beauty with the highest usefulness for the purposes of teaching and self-practice the Gradus remains unrivalled.  CLEOBULUS, one of the Seven Sages, was son of Evagoras, and a native of Lindus, which town he ruled, though whether as monarch or as head of a republic is uncertain. He was distinguished for his strength and his handsome person, for the wisdom of his sayings, the acuteness of his riddles, and the beauty of his lyric poetry. Diogenes Laertius quotes a letter in which Cleobulus invites Solon to take refuge with him against Pisistratus ; and this would imply that he was alive in 560 B.C. He is said to have held advanced views as to female education, and he was the father of the wise Cleobuline, whose riddles were not less famous than his own.  CLEOMENES (KAeojaeV^s), the name of three kings of Sparta, the 16th, 25th, and 31st of the Agid line. The second of these does not call for particular notice.

succeeded as one of the two joint kings about 519 B.C. He led a Spartan force to Athens in 510 to aid the Alcmaeonids and their followers in the expulsion of Hippias. He was called in subsequently to support the oligarchical party there, headed by Isagoras, against the party of Clisthenes. He forcibly expelled from the city, on a technical charge of pollution, no less than 7000 families, and established an entirely new constitution, transferring the government from the old senate to 300 of the oligarchical party. Eventually, however, he and his small force were blockaded by their opponents in the. Acropolis, and forced to capitulate and to quit the city. On his return home he at once raised a force of Spartans and allies in order to avenge his failure, and to establish a despotism at Athens in the person of Isagoras. But when the expedition had reached Eleusis on its march, not only some of the subject-allies but also hisbrother-kingDemaratus (of the Proclid junior branch) refused to proceed further, and he had to return without effecting his object. When the Ionian colonies revolted from Persia, in 500, their leader Aristagoras came to seek aid from Sparta. Cleomenes was at first inclined to entertain the tempting offers of Asiatic conquest which the Ionian, in his eagerness to secure the alliance, laid before him. But when Aristagoras, in reply to his questions, was forced to confess that Susa, the Persian capital, was no less than three months journey inland from the sea, the king was startled, and bade his visitor quit Sparta before sunset. The Ionian then tried to bribe him ; and as his offers mounted higher and higher, his little daughter Gorgo, some eight or nine years old (afterwards the wife of Leonidas) said, &quot; Father, go away, or the stranger will corrupt you.&quot; Such at least is the story told by Herodotus, though Grote doubts its authenticity. During a local war between Sparta and Argos, Cleomenes by a stratagem defeated the Argive forces near Tiryns. Those who escaped from the battle took refuge in a consecrated grove, which was set on fire by order of Cleomenes, and no less than 6000 men, the flower of the Argive citizens, are said either to have been killed in the battle, or to have perished in the flames, a loss from which Argos was very long in recovering. For some reason he did not pursue his victory, but returned at once to Sparta, to the great dissatisfaction of his own people. One legend relates that the city of Argos was successfully defended against him by its women. When Darius (491) sent heralds to demand the sub mission of all the Greeks, and the inhabitants of ^Egina 