Now, I hope you all think as they do, and will say yes, and delight
Yours (in the singular and plural),
Felix M. B.
This was the last note from the hand of Mendelssohn that Moscheles received. The days that the two friends should spend together on earth were numbered, but nothing foreboded the hour of separation that was so soon to strike. In Moscheles’s diary we find daily memoranda of the usual friendly intercourse with Mendelssohn.
So on the 3d of October:—“In the afternoon we treated ourselves to some Fugues and Gigues of Bach’s, and I was struck by Mendelssohn’s intimate acquaintance with them. Then he gave us an imitation on the piano of a certain Polka which had been inflicted on him daily by a band of street musicians in Frankfurt. The trivial as well as the serious is food to his mind, and his impressions on all sides are turned to account in his compositions.”
October 5.—“I spent the whole afternoon with Mendelssohn. He was pleased to see me, and we chatted confidentially on art and artists and Leipzig affairs generally. He played me a manuscript Quartet for string instruments in F minor, the four pieces of which are all in that sombre key. The impassioned character of the whole seems to me in keeping with his present frame of mind, shaken as he is to the heart’s core by the loss of his sister.”
October 7.—“Mendelssohn called to fetch me for a walk. In spite of the falling rain, we went to the Rosenthal, and time flew amid the most interesting conversations.”
October 8.—“Examination of pupils for reception at the Conservatorio. Mendelssohn, who took an active part in the proceedings, tested them in thoroughbass and wrote out examples on the blackboard. Whilst they were at work, he sketched the most delightful landscapes—ever a creative genius!... Passed a most interesting afternoon and evening with Mendelssohn. He played his Violoncello Sonata in D major with Rietz, and the two Beethoven Sonatas, Op. 102; then my Sonate Symphonique with me.”
On the following day, the 9th, another walk in the Rosenthal is recorded in the diary. It was a day not to be forgotten. Mendelssohn had much to tell of his last stay in England. He related the charming incidents of his visit to Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, and spoke of many mutual friends. At one o’clock he parted from the Moscheleses in the most cheerful mood; but it was only a few hours later that he was attacked by the illness from which he never recovered; and now followed days of anxiety and suspense, broken only by hopes that were not to be realized.