daughter her life. On their recovery, they played before the Prince of
Orange, and Wolfgang composed some variations on a national air, which
was, just then, sung, piped, and whistled throughout the streets of
Holland. The organist of the cathedral in Haerlem waited upon the
Mozarts, and invited the son to try his instrument, which he did the
next morning. Mozart senior describes the organ as a magnificent one, of
sixty-eight stops, and built wholly of metal, "as wood would not endure
the dampness of the Dutch atmosphere." Upon the return of the family to
Salzburg, Mozart enjoyed a year of quiet and uninterrupted study in the
higher walks of composition. Besides applying to the old masters, he was
indefatigable in perusing the works of Emanuel Bach, Hasse, Handel, and
Eberlin, and by the diligent performance of these authors, he acquired
extraordinary brilliancy and power in the left hand. On the 11th of
September, 1767, the whole family proceeded on their way to Vienna; but
as the small pox was raging there, they went to Ollmütz instead, where
both the children caught that disorder. At Vienna, Mozart wrote his
first opera, by desire of the emperor. Though the singers extolled their
parts to the skies, in presence of Leopold Mozart, they formed in secret
a cabal against the work, and it was never performed. The Italian
singers and composers who were established in this capital did not like
to find themselves surpassed in knowledge and skill by a boy of twelve
years old, and they therefore not only charged the composition with a
want of dramatic effect, but they even went so far as to say, that he
had not scored it himself. To counteract such calumnies, Leopold Mozart
often obliged his son to put the orchestral parts to his compositions in
the presence of spectators, which he did with wonderful celerity before
Metastasio, Hasse, the Duke of Braganza, and others. The injurious
opinion of the nobility, which these people hoped to excite against
the young musician, had no success; for he composed a Mass--an
Offertorium--and a Trumpet Concerto for a Boy--which were performed