Extremes meet. Ole Bull was at once the most perfect cosmopolitan and the most zealous patriot. Having spent much of his time abroad in the various European countries and in America, he had thoroughly learned the peculiarities of all nationalities. He was a keen observer. Mastering quickly the various European vernaculars, and winning easily the hearts of the people, he became conversant with the political and social questions that agitate the different nations. He was earnest in proclaiming their merits, but usually silent as to their faults. His face would brighten at every evidence he found of progress toward freedom of thought and the establishment of liberal governments in the various monarchical countries of Europe.

Ole Bull’s best thoughts were given to his own country, to Norway. During all the years of conquest in his profession, and all the honors bestowed upon him in foreign lands, he never forgot his dear “Gamle Norge.” He ever talked with loving tenderness of Norway’s gray mountains. He was but four years old when the young Norway was born. When he went out into the world the names Norway and Norwegian were scarcely to be found in the European vocabularies, these terms having previously been absorbed by Denmark and Dane. With his fame and name, attention was everywhere called to the fact that Norway had cast off the yoke of Denmark, and asserted her right to exist as an independent nation; and when people saw Ole Bull they said, “A land that can foster such sons has an inalienable right to its independence.”

His name was now to become a household word through the length and breadth of the United States. At first circumstances seemed unfavorable. There were already two violinists in New York—Vieuxtemps, who was assisted by the famous singer Madame Damoreau, and Artot. The French, loyal to their countrymen, made a formidable opposition, and many difficulties had to be encountered. Ole Bull gave his first concert as early as the 23d of November. The contest between the parties continued with much vigor; the fact that not a Frenchman was present at the Norwegian’s first concert made it now a question between the French and Americans. The papers were filled with contributions in prose and in verse, witty epigrams, and cartoons. Victory soon inclined to Ole Bull. With his first concert, he won the good–will of the Americans, and ever afterwards held it. His audiences kept growing, until he was obliged to play in larger halls than were intended for concert purposes, and oftentimes many were unable to gain admission. The rapidity with which he traveled, and the frequency of his performances, were also remarkable. As an illustration of this, we will give a list of his concerts for the month of December, 1843. After appearing in New York again on the 29th of November, he gave the following concerts in December:—

December 1.Philadelphia.
„ 3.New York.
„ 5.New York.
„ 7.Philadelphia.
„ 9.Philadelphia.
„ 12.New York.
„ 15.Philadelphia.
„ 16.Philadelphia.
„ 18.New York.
„ 19.New York.
„ 21.Baltimore.
„ 23.Baltimore.
„ 25.Washington.
„ 26.Baltimore.
„ 27.Washington.
„ 28.Richmond.
„ 29.Petersburg.
„ 30.Richmond.

And up to 1879 many months of winter and spring, and sometimes nine months of a year, would show similar records of travel and work. It was not his fine physique alone that enabled him to bear the strain, but a rigid adherence to simple diet and habits, with an almost total abstinence from stimulants during the season of work, and constant exercise in the open air during the summer vacation in Norway. He doubtless traveled more miles and was heard by a larger number of people than any other man among his contemporaries.

Mrs. Child’s account of his New York concerts written for the Boston Courier, and published later in her “Letters from New York,” will be of interest. She did not speak from the judgment of a cultivated musical ear. She analyzed and expressed the effects of Ole Bull’s performance on the multitude.

In Mrs. Child’s first letter, she says:—

I have twice heard Ole Bull. I scarcely dare to tell the impression his music made upon me. But, casting aside all fear of ridicule for excessive enthusiasm, I will say that it expressed to me more of the infinite than I ever saw, or heard, or dreamed of, in the realms of Nature, Art, or Imagination.

They tell me his performance is wonderfully skillful; but I have not enough of scientific knowledge to judge of the difficulties he overcomes. I can readily believe of him, what Bettina says of Beethoven, that “his spirit creates the inconceivable, and his fingers perform the impossible.” He played on four strings at once, and produced the rich harmony of four instruments. His bow touched the strings as if in sport, and brought forth light leaps of sound, with electric rapidity, yet clear in their distinctness. He made his violin sing with flute–like voice, and accompany itself with a guitar, which came in ever and anon like big drops of musical rain. All this I felt as well as heard without the slightest knowledge of quartetto or staccato. How he did it, I know as little as I know how the sun shines, or the spring brings forth its blossoms. I only know that music came from his soul into mine, and carried it upward to worship with the angels.

Oh, the exquisite delicacy of those notes! Now tripping and fairy–like as the song of Ariel; now soft and low as the breath of a sleeping babe, yet clear as a fine–toned bell; now high as a lark soaring upward, till lost among the stars!