We settled the business that very afternoon, walking over to Bermondsey. The landlord said I was very young, but if I could fiddle he did not mind that, only it must be remembered in the pay. So I was engaged to begin the next day. In the evening I went with Tom to the Dog and Duck where he played first fiddle in the Orchestra, and sat in the musicians' gallery. About this place more anon. At twelve o'clock the music ceased and I walked home with Tom. I remember, it was then a fine clear night in September: the wind blew chill across the marshes: it had come up with the flow of the river: the moon was riding high: a strange elation possessed my soul: for my independence was beginning: four guineas in my pocket: and a place with so many shillings a week to live upon: nothing to do but to work at music: and to live with the best-hearted man in the whole world.
We got home. Alice had gone to bed. Tom's wife was sitting up for us, the bowl of punch was ready for us, not too big a bowl, because Tom's weakness where punch was concerned was well known. He drank my success in one glass: my future operas and oratorios in the second: my joyful independence in the third: and my happy release in the fourth. That finished the bowl and we went to bed.
CHAPTER IV
LOVE AND MUSIC
You need not be told how I lived for the next three or four years. I took what came. Pride remained in pocket. I fiddled a wedding-party to church and home again. I fiddled the Company of Fellowship Porters through the streets when they held their yearly feast. I fiddled for sailors; I fiddled at beanfeasts; I fiddled for Free Masons; I fiddled in taverns; I fiddled here and there and everywhere, quite unconcerned, even though I was playing in the gallery of a City company's hall, and actually saw my cousin sitting in state among the guests at the feast below, and knew that he saw me and rejoiced at the sight, in his ignorance of the consolations of music.
Nothing in those days came amiss to me. One who makes music for his livelihood has no cause to be ashamed of playing for anyone. It does not seem an occupation such as one would choose, to spend the evening in a chair, stuck in a corner out of the way, in a stinking room, for rough fellows to dance hornpipes: the work does not lift up the soul to the level which Tom Shirley claimed for the musician. But this was only the pot-boiling work. I had the mornings to myself, when I could practise and attempt composition. Besides, at eighteen, the present, if one belongs to a calling which has a career, is of very little importance: the real life lies before: the boy lives for the future. I was going, in those days, to be a great composer like Handel. I was going to write oratorios such as his: majestic, where majesty was wanted: tender, where love and pity must be depicted: devout, where piety was called for. I would write, besides, in my ambition, such things as were written by Purcell and Arne: anthems for the church: songs and madrigals and rounds and catches such as those with which my patron Tom Shirley delighted his world.
The profession of music is one which can only be followed by those who have the gift of music. That is the definition of any Art: it can only be followed by those who have the gift of that Art. In any other calling a man may serve after a fashion, who hath not been called thereto. Many men, for example, are divines who have neither learning nor eloquence nor—the Lord help them!—religion. Many lawyers have no love for the law. Many merchants hate the counting-house. But in music no one can serve at all unless he is a musician born. He who, without the gift, would try to enter the profession breaks down at the outset, seeing that he cannot even learn to play an instrument with feeling, ease, or judgment. Nay, there are distinct ranks of music, to each of which one is raised by Nature, as much as by study. Thus, you have at the bottom, the rank and file, namely, those who can play a single instrument: next, those who can compose and make simple music for songs, in which all that is wanted is a tuneful and spirited air with an ordinary accompaniment: next those who understand harmony and can make music of a higher character, such as anthems, part-songs, and so forth. Lastly, you have the composer in whose brains lies the knowledge of every instrument in the orchestra. He is the King of musicians: from him come the noble oratorios which delight our age and lift our souls to Heaven: from him come the masses which are sung—I have the scores of several—in Cathedrals of Roman Catholic countries. It is not for an Englishman to admire aught that belongs to Rome: but we must at least concede to the Roman Catholic the possession of noble music.
This, then, was my ambition. For four years I continued to live with my friend Tom Shirley. I held no communication with my father or any of my own people. None of them made any attempt at reconciliation. I believe they were honestly ashamed of me. The new friends I made were good and faithful: musical people have ever kindly hearts, and are loyal to each other: they do not backbite: there is no room for envy where one man plays the fiddle and another the cornet: we are all a company of brothers.
The time came when it was no longer necessary for me to play at taverns for the sailors: when I was no longer compelled to attend weddings. I obtained, one after the other, two posts, neither of which was a very great thing, but both together made it possible for me to live in some comfort. The first was that of organist at St. George's in the Borough. I had to attend the service and to play the organ twice on Sunday: the week day services and the Gift Lectures were conducted without any singing. The Church contains, I believe, the most fashionable congregation of South London, and therefore the most critical. I do not think, however, that, while I sat in the organ-loft, they had any reason to complain either of music or of choir. There sat with me in the organ-loft, Alice, who possessed a sweet, clear, and strong voice: her brother Tom, who brought into the choir an excellent tenor: Mr. Ramage, one of my father's clerks, who lodged behind the Marshal-sea, gave us a bass of indifferent quality, though he was now past fifty. Half a dozen boys and girls from the Charity School, of no great account for voices, made up our choir. I believe it was better than the average, and I think that people came on Sunday morning on purpose to hear the organ and the singing.