"Yes," said Schumann, warmly; "Goethe liked you because you were successful, and prosperous. Now Beethoven was poor: therefore Beethoven must first be loftily patronised and then contemptuously snubbed. I can never forgive Goethe for that. And as for poor Schubert, well, Goethe ignored him, and actually thought he had misinterpreted the Erl-king! It would be comic if it were not painful."

"Poor Schubert!" said Mendelssohn with a sigh; "he met always Fortune's frown, never her smile."

"Don't you think," said Bennett, "that his genius was the better for his poverty—that he learned in suffering what he taught in song?"

"No, I do not!" replied Mendelssohn warmly. "That is a vile doctrine invented by a callous world to excuse its cruelty."

"I believe there's something in it, though," said Bennett.

"There is some truth in it, but not much," answered Mendelssohn, his eyes flashing as he spoke. "It is true that the artist learns by suffering, because the artist is more sensitive and feels more deeply than others. But enough of suffering comes to all of us, even the most fortunate, without the sordid, gratuitous misery engendered by poverty."

"I agree with Mendelssohn," said Schumann. "To say that poverty is the proper stimulus of genius is to talk pernicious nonsense. Poverty slays, it does not nourish; poverty narrows the vision, it does not ennoble; poverty lowers the moral standard and makes a man sordid. You can't get good art out of that."

Painting by N. M. Price. THE MAYBELLS AND THE FLOWERS.
Click to [ENLARGE]
"Now I no more can stay at home.
The Maybells call me so.
The flowers to the dance all roam,
Then, why should I not go?"