“I’m afraid I do,” I replied. (For, really, I think almost all subtle and clever artists are bits of humbugs.)
“Very good, then!” exclaimed he, ridiculously hurt.
“What I mean is, that if you like anyone, your judgment is immediately prejudiced in their favour.”
“So you think I like you?”
“I am sure of it.”
“Well, you’re quite right. But, really and truly, you mustn’t call me, or even think me, the slightest bit of a humbug. You can call me impulsive, superficial, or anything horrid of that kind ... but insincere! Why, sincerity is the only real virtue I’ve got.”
And I believe he believed himself. But who is sincere?—at least, who is sincere except at the moment? Are not all of us who are artists swayed hither and thither, from hour to hour, by the emotion of the moment? Do we not say one thing now, and an hour later mean exactly the opposite? Are we not driven by our enthusiasms to false positions, and do not glib, untrue words spring to our lips because the moment’s mood forces them there?
I have not met Landon Ronald for four years, but the other day I heard him conduct, and I recognised in his interpretations the supreme qualities I have so often observed before. He himself is like his work—polished, highly strung, emotional, fluid, intense. His mind works with lightning-like quickness; he knows what you are going to say just a second before you have said it. And over his personality hangs the glamour that we call genius.
. . . . . . . .
Many well-known singers have I met, but very few of them inspire me to burst into song. They are a dull, vain crew. Among the few most notable exceptions is [238] ]Frederic Austin, a man with a temperament so refined, with a nature so retiring, that it is a constant source of wonder to me that he should be where he now is—in the front rank of vocalists.