To visitors at his house in Peterboro, he said one morning, on leaving
them, "I am going to the cabin to write some of my rotten melodies!"
He was sincerely distrustful concerning the worth of any composition
which he had finished; especially so, of course, concerning his more
youthful performances. He once sent a frantic telegram to Teresa
Carreño, upon learning from an announcement that she was to play his
early Concert Étude (op. 36) for the first time: "Don't put that
dreadful thing on your programme"; and for certain of his more popular
and hackneyed pieces, as the "Hexentanz" and the much-mauled and
over-sentimental song, "Thy Beaming Eyes," he had a detestation that
was amusing in its virulence. He regretted at times that his earlier
orchestral works--"Hamlet and Ophelia" and "Lancelot and Elaine"--had
been published; and he was invariably tormented by questionings and
misgivings after he had committed even his ripest work to his
publisher. Only the assurances of his wise and devoted wife at times
prevented him from recalling a completed work. Yet he was always
touched, delighted, and genuinely cheered by what he felt to be
sincere and thoughtful praise. To a writer who had published an
admiring article concerning some of his later music he wrote:

"MY DEAR MR.----:

"Your article was forwarded to me after all. I wish to thank you
for the warm-hearted and sympathetic enthusiasm which prompted
your writing it. While my outgivings have always been sincere, I
feel only too often their inadequacy to express my ideals; thus
what you speak of as accomplishment I fear is often but attempt.
Certainly your sympathy for my aims is most welcome and precious
to me, and I thank you again most heartily."