"'That I will not hear; I don't know it, and don't wish to,' he answered, with increased satire and suppressed scorn.
"I felt that I was playing a pitiful part—doing penance, perhaps, for others, for Parisians; but I said to myself, the more I looked at this young man, that this Parisian (for such he seemed to be by his whole appearance) must be a genius, and I would not without further skirmishes be beaten off the field. I went with modest but firm step to the piano standing nearest to me.
"'Not that one,' cried Liszt, without in the least changing his half reclining position on the sofa; 'there, to that other one.'
"I stepped to the second piano. At that time I was absorbed in the 'Aufforderung zum Tanz'; I had married it for love two years before, and we were still in our honeymoon. I came from Riga, where, after the unexampled success of the 'Freischütz,' we had reached the piano compositions of Weber, which did not happen till long after in Paris, where the Freischütz was called Robin des Bois(!). I learnt from good masters. When I tried to play the first three A-flats of the Aufforderung, the instrument gave no sound. What was the matter? I played forcibly, and the notes sounded quite piano. I seemed to myself quite laughable, but without taking any notice I went bravely on to the first entry of the chords; then Liszt rose, stepped up to me, took my right hand without more ado off the instrument, and asked:
"'What is that? That begins well!'
"'I should think so,' I said; 'that is by Weber.'
"'Has he written for the piano, too?' he asked with astonishment. 'We only know here the Robin des Bois.'
"'Certainly he has written for the piano, and more finely than any one!' was my equally astonished answer. 'I have in my trunk,' I added, 'two polonaises, two rondos, four sets of variations, four solo sonatas, one which I learned with Wehrstaedt, in Geneva, which contains the whole of Switzerland, and is incredibly beautiful; there all the fair women smile at once. It is in A flat. You can have no idea how beautiful it is! Nobody has written so for the piano, you may believe me.'
"I spoke from my heart, and with such conviction that I made a visible impression on Liszt. He answered in a winning tone: 'Now, pray bring me all that out of your trunk and I will give you lessons for the first time in my life, because you have introduced me to Weber on the piano, and also were not frightened at this heavy instrument. I ordered it on purpose, so as to have played ten scales when I had played one. It is an altogether impracticable piano. It was a sorry joke of mine. But why did you talk about Kalkbrenner, and a sonata by him for the left hand? But now play me that thing of yours that begins so seriously. There, that is one of the finest instruments in Paris—there, where you were going to sit down first.'
"Now I played with all my heart the 'Aufforderung,' but only the melody marked wiegend, in two parts. Liszt was charmed with the composition. 'Now bring that,' he said; 'I must have a turn at that!'