Page:Notes of a Pianist.djvu/62

44 club in his hand, with the sacramental words of French robbers, "La bourse ou la vie." Gottschalk turned round and said, "My good man, I have very little in my pocket, but you are welcome to it; I will ask you but one favour, however; it is to take me to a cab-stand." The man assented, but Gottschalk desired him to walk in front. The man turning round, and looking very sad, said, "You need not fear; you did not resist, and I am a novice in the trade, driven to it by hunger." "Why," said G., "do you mean to say that you are hungry?" "Hungry!" replied the man, "I should think so; I had nothing to eat yesterday, and I have a family at home like myself, for I could find no work yesterday, to enable me to purchase bread for them." Gottschalk, handing him his purse, said, "I am sorry, my good man, I have no more than this," and proceeded until he reached the cab-stand.

The following May found him ready to leave France for Switzerland. Many friends, among others a Creole family residing at Grandson, had for a long time invited him to come, but his numerous engagements had hitherto prevented him from accepting their invitation. Finally, in May, his mother represented to him how beneficial it would be for his health to absent himself for some time from Paris, and he yielded.

The day preceding his departure, Mr. Leon Escudier came to him for the purpose of purchasing a piece of his composition; but how to come to terms? for, as the proverb says, perhaps vulgarly when applied to this circumstance, "in order to cook your hare you must first catch it." Gottschalk had nothing ready. The publisher was not willing to take a refusal; he must have a piece. "I will give you 500 francs if you will compose me one." At last Gottschalk consented, and, between midnight and five o'clock the next morning, composed a reverie, a veritable bijou, on 'C'est un songe qui s'achève,' taken from the opera of Ambroise Thomas's 'Le songe d'une nuit d'été,' which was written and ready to be given to Mr. Escudier, who called punctually at ten o'clock in the morning to get it, two hours after Gottschalk had left.

This journey had almost proved fatal to the young artist, for, whether owing to fatigue or to the humidity of the