"His theory,—oh, it was in this way! Strings first, of course, violet, indigo, blue,—violin, violoncello, double-bass,—upon these you repose; the vault is quite perfect. Green, the many-sounded kinds of wood, spring-hued flutes, deeper, yet softer, clarinetti, bassoons the darkest tone, not to be surpassed in its shade,—another vault. The brass, of course, is yellow; and if the horns suggest the paler dazzle, the trumpets take the golden orange, and the red is left for the trombones,—vivid, or dun and dusk."[3]
"Oh, my goodness! I don't wonder he said it was a dream!"
"It certainly would be dangerous to think of it in any other light!"
"And you a German!" I cried. "Did you think I meant it?"
"You would mean it," he retorted, "if you knew what lip-distorting and ear-distracting work it is practising this same trombone."
"But what is your reason, then, for choosing it, when you might choose mine?"
"Do you not know that Seraphael has written as no one else for the trombone? And he was heard to sigh, and to say, 'I shall never find any one to play these passages!'"
"Oh, Delemann! and that was the reason you took it up? How I love you for it!"