We got to the church only twenty minutes before service began, and I confess I was rather daunted as I saw the swarms of people not only going in but coming out, hopeless of getting into the church. However, I determined to push on and see what the chances were, and with great difficulty we got up stairs. There is a lobby that runs all around the church, just as in the Boston Music Hall. All the doors between the gallery and the lobby were open, and each was crammed full of people. I thought the best thing we could do would be to stand there until we got tired, and listen to the music, and then go. Finally, the sexton came along, and A. asked him if he could not give us two seats; he shrugged his shoulders and said, "Yes, if you choose to pass through the crowd." We boldly said we would, although it looked almost hopeless, and then made our way through it, followed by muttered execrations. At last the sexton unlocked a door, and gave us two excellent seats, and there was plenty of room for a dozen more people; but I don't doubt he frightened them away just as he would have done us if he could. He locked us in, and there we sat quite in comfort.
At ten the choir began to sing a psalm. They sit directly over the chancel, and a gilded frame work conceals them completely from the congregation. They have a leader who conducts them, and they sing in most perfect time and tune, entirely without accompaniment. The voices are tender and soft rather than loud, and they weave in and out most beautifully. There are a great many different parts, and the voices keep striking in from various points, which produces a delicious effect, and makes them sound like an angel choir far up in the sky. After they had finished the psalm the organ burst out with a tremendous great chord, enough to make you jump, and then played a chorale, and there were also trombones which took the melody. Then all the congregation sang the chorale, and the choir kept silence. You cannot imagine how easy it is to sing when the trombones lead, and the effect is overwhelming with the organ, especially in these grand old chorales. I could scarcely bear it, it was so very exciting.
There was a great deal of music, as it was Easter Sunday, and it was done alternately by the choir and the congregation; but generally the Dom choir only sings one psalm before the service begins, and therefore I seldom take the trouble to go there. The rest of the music is entirely congregational, and they only have trombones on great occasions. We sat close by the chancel, and the great wax candles flared on the altar below us, and the Lutheran clergyman read the German so that it sounded a good deal like Latin. I was quite surprised to see how much like Latin German could sound, for it has these long, rolling words, and it is just as pompous. Altogether it made a strange but splendid impression. I thought if they had only had their choir in the chancel, and in white surplices, it would have been much more beautiful, but perhaps the music would not have sounded so fine as when the singers were overhead. The Berlin churches all look as if religion was dying out here, so old and bare and ill-cared for, and so few in number. They are only redeemed by the great castles of organs which they generally have; and it is a difficult thing to get the post of organist here. One must be an experienced and well-known musician to do it. They sing no chants in the service, but only chorales.
To-night is the last Royal Symphony Concert of this season, and of course I shall go. This wonderful orchestra carries me completely away. It is too marvellous how they play! such expression, such élan! I heard them give Beethoven's Leonora Overture last week in such a fashion as fairly electrified me. This overture sums up the opera of Fidelio, and in one part of it, just as the hero is going to be executed, you hear the post-horn sound which announces his delivery. This they play so softly that you catch it exactly as if it came from a long distance, and you cannot believe it comes from the orchestra. It makes you think of "the horns of elf-land faintly blowing."
Tausig is expected back this week, and he has indeed been gone long enough. He is going to give a lesson every Monday to the best scholars who are not in his class, and as I stand at the head of these I hope to have a lesson from him every week. This would suit me better than two, as he is so dreadfully exacting, and it will give me time to learn a piece well. Then I should have my regular lesson beside from Mr. Beringer, or whoever he appoints to take Ehlert's place. Beringer, who is a young man about twenty-five years old, has turned out a capital teacher, and I am learning much with him. He plays beautifully himself, and is a great favorite of Tausig's. He has been with him so long that he teaches his method excellently, and gives me pieces that he has studied with him. I believe he is to come out at the Gewandhaus, in Leipsic, in October, and after that he will settle in London.
CHAPTER V.
The Thier-Garten. A Military Review. Charlottenburg.
Tausig. Berlin in Summer. Potsdam and Babelsberg.
BERLIN, June 5, 1870.
We've had the vilest possible weather this spring, but Berlin looks perfectly lovely now. There are a great many gardens attached to the houses here. Everything is in bloom, and is laden with the scent of lilacs and apple blossoms. The streets are planted with lindens and horse chestnut trees, and on the fashionable street bordering on the Thier-Garten, all the houses have little lawns in front, carpeted with the most dazzling green grass, and rising out of it are solid banks of flowers. The shrubs are planted according to their height, close together, and one behind the other, and as they are all in blossom you see these great masses of colour. It is like a gigantic bouquet growing up before you.
The Thier-Garten is perfectly beautiful. It is so charming to come upon this unfenced wood right in the heart of an immense city, with roads and paths cut all through it, and each over-arched with vivid green as far as the eye can reach. When you see the gay equipages driving swiftly through it, and ladies and gentlemen glancing amid the trees on horseback, it is very romantic.