CHAPTER IX.
O musician! art thou happy now? Thou art reinstalled at thy stately desk — thy faithful barbiton has its share in the triumph. It is thy masterpiece which fills thy ear — it is thy daughter who fills the scene — the music, the actress so united, that applause to one is applause to both. They make way for thee at the orchestra — they no longer jeer and wink, when, with a fierce fondness, thou dost caress thy Familiar, that plains, and wails, and chides, and growls, under thy remorseless hand. They understand now how irregular is ever the symmetry of real genius. The inequalities in its surface make the moon luminous to man. Giovanni Paisiello, Maestro di Capella, if thy gentle soul could know envy, thou must sicken to see thy Elfrida and thy Pirro laid aside, and all Naples turned fanatic to the Siren, at whose measures shook querulously thy
- ↑ As he did not wish that his charger (the hippogriff) should take any further excursions into the higher regions for the present, he bound him at the sea-shore to a green myrtle between a laurel and a pine.
