V---- at the opera in Vienna. Abroad, I scarcely cared
for anything in comparison with music. In many respects the Old World
disappointed my hopes; Society was, in essentials, no better, nor
worse, than at home, and I too easily saw through the varnish of
conventional refinement. Lions, seen near, were scarcely more
interesting than tamer cattle, and much more annoying in their gambols
and caprices. Parks and ornamental grounds pleased me less than the
native forests and wide-rolling rivers of my own land. But in the
Arts, and most of all in Music, I found all my wishes more than
realized. I found the soul of man uttering itself with the swiftness,
the freedom and the beauty, for which I had always pined. I easily
conceived how foreigners, once acquainted with this diverse language,
pass their lives without a wish for pleasure or employment beyond
hearing the great works of the masters. It seemed to me that here was
wealth to feed the thoughts for ages. This lady fixed my attention by
the rapturous devotion with which she listened. I saw that she too had
here found her proper home. Every shade of thought and feeling
expressed in the music was mirrored in her beautiful countenance.
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