interest in his pursuit. But why has the acquirement of this technique
been usually unsuccessful?

1. Because you begin to acquire it too late. In order to gain facility
and flexibility of the fingers and wrist (which a child in the sixth or
seventh year, with a skilful teacher, may acquire in four lessons), from
fifteen to twenty lessons, according to the construction of the hand,
are necessary with persons from ten to fourteen years old. For other
reasons also, we must urge that the mechanical facility should usually
be acquired, or at least a complete foundation for it laid in childhood,
and not left to be formed by a course which is destructive of all
spirit, at an age when labor is performed with self-consciousness,--an
age when our ladies are talking a great deal of musical interpretations,
of tenderness and depth of feeling, of poetry and inspiration in
playing, to which they are led by the possession of our classical piano
compositions and immortal master-works, and by intellectual friends and
teachers aiming at the highest culture. You reply: "But even if your
mode of elementary instruction should meet with faithful disciples, how,
in such young pupils, are we to find perseverance and sense enough to
continue these severe exercises, even in your interesting manner?" My
dear ladies, children ought to do it merely from habit, although in many
cases, after the beginning, talent and correct musical instinct may make
their appearance. Uninterrupted enjoyment would indeed be unnatural, and
where you find it vanity will usually be its moving spring, and this
seldom bears good fruit. You may as well ask whether our great literary
men and artists always like to go to school, or whether they did not
delight in a holiday. Let this be the answer to the strange question, Do
your daughters like to play? Good heavens! After they are able to play,
and that without much effort, and a little at sight; when they can
master, with a musical appreciation, easy, graceful salon music, or even