"Liszt smote his breast thrice, and continued: 'I know a man (or is it indeed a human being?) who never quitted the sonorous coffin until the entire street in which he raged had emigrated. And yet he had only ten fingers on his hands, as you and I, and never did he use his toes. This monster, Holy Father, is at your feet!'
"Pius IX shivered with fright. 'Go on, my son, the mercy of God is unbounded.'
"Then Liszt accused himself:
"Of having by Sabbatic concerts driven the half of civilised Europe mad, while the other half returned to Chopin and Thalberg.
"('There's Rubinstein,' said Pius, and he smiled.) Liszt pretended not to hear him, and he continued:
"'My Father, I have encouraged the trade in shrill mahogany, noisy rosewood and shrieking ebony in the five parts of the acoustic world, so that at this very moment there is not a single ajoupa or a single thatched hut among savages that is without a piano. Even wild men are beginning to manufacture pianos, and they give them as wedding gifts to their daughters.'
"('Just as it is in Europe,' said the Pope.)
"'And also,' added Liszt, 'with instructions how to use them. Mea culpa!'
"Then he confessed that apes unable to scramble through a scale were rare in virgin forests; that travellers told of elephants who played with their trunks the Carnival of Venice variations; and it was he, Franz Liszt, that had served them as a model. The plague of universal "pianisme" had spread from pole to pole. Mea culpa! Mea culpa!
"Overcome with shame, he wished to finish his confession at the piano. But Pius IX had anticipated him. There was no piano in the Vatican. In all Christendom, the Pope was the only one without a boxed harp.