“Who is the best teacher?” was my next ingenuous question.
She laughed.
“That depends upon what you want to learn. There are so many: violin, Clavier, that is piano, flute, ’cello, everything.”
“Oh!” I replied, and asked no more questions about music; but inquired if it were pleasant at Frau Steinmann’s.
She shrugged her shoulders.
“Is it pleasant anywhere? I don’t find many places pleasant, because I can not be a humbug, so others do not like me. But I believe some people like Elberthal very well. There is the theater—that makes another element. And there are the soldiers and Kaufleute—merchants, I mean, so you see there is variety, though it is a small place.”
“Ah, yes!” said I, looking about me as we passed down a very busy street, and I glanced to right and left with the image of Eugen Courvoisier ever distinctly if unconfessedly present to my mental view. Did he live at Elberthal? and if so, did he belong to any of those various callings? What was he? An artist who painted pictures for his bread? I thought that very probable. There was something free and artist-like in his manner, in his loose waving hair and in his keen susceptibility to beauty. I thought of his emotion at hearing that glorious Bach music. Or was he a musician—what Anna Sartorius called ein Musiker? But no. My ideas of musicians were somewhat hazy, not to say utterly chaotic; they embraced only two classes: those who performed or gave lessons, and those who composed. I had never formed to myself the faintest idea of a composer, and my experience of teachers and performers was limited to one specimen—Mr. Smythe, of Darton, whose method and performances would, as I have since learned, have made the hair of a musician stand horrent on end. No—I did not think he was a musician. An actor? Perish the thought, was my inevitable mental answer. How should I be able to make any better one? A soldier, then? At that moment we met a mounted captain of Uhlans, harness clanking, accouterments rattling. He was apparently an acquaintance of my companion, for he saluted with a grave politeness which sat well upon him. Decidedly Eugen Courvoisier had the air of a soldier. That accounted for all. No doubt he was a soldier. In my ignorance of the strictness of German military regulations as regards the wearing of uniform, I overlooked the fact that he had been in civilian’s dress, and remained delighted with my new idea; Captain Courvoisier. “What is the German for captain?” I inquired, abruptly.
“Hauptmann.”
“Thank you.” Hauptmann Eugen Courvoisier—a noble and a gallant title, and one which became him. “How much is a thaler?” was my next question.
“It is as much as three shillings in your money.”