In regard to our dear friends the Lucas, I am glad to state that it was our pleasure to associate with them in public concerts "in the cruel days of the prejudiced past;" and this is our testimony: that, in all our concertizing for thirty-five years, we never formed an alliance with any musical people with whom we fraternized so pleasantly, and loved so well, and who evinced so much real genuine talent in their profession, and such courtesy and Christian culture "in their daily walk and conversation." Our dear lamented Cleveland was a thoroughly educated pianist, and won the enthusiastic admiration of the scientific musicians in every city and town we visited. He executed most rapidly, at sight, any and all of the difficult and new compositions that were presented to him by his friends, to their astonishment and our mutual joy; and when the three brothers, "Alex.," John, and Cleveland, united their respective instruments and voices in one grand choral, the effect was intensely thrilling and electrical. In some of our concerted pieces, where they united with us, we carried our reformatory sentiments and songs to a successful termination; and, notwithstanding the then great and bitter prejudice of our audiences against us all for daring thus publicly to associate together, they cheered our combined efforts with loud applause and frequent encores.
And now that each of our bands are broken by death, still believing that the freed spirits of the departed loved ones are re-united in "singing the songs of the redeemed" in that realm of light, liberty, and love beyond, it is a great satisfaction to me, a poor lingering pilgrim, to revert to one of the sweetest experiences of our entire concert-life,—the acquaintance and fellowship of the Luca family.
Asa B. Hutchinson.
VII.
HENRY F. WILLIAMS,
COMPOSER, BAND-INSTRUCTOR, ETC.
"Thy purpose firm is equal to the deed."
"His lyre well tuned to rapturous sounds."