hangs on my hands without you. I cannot exactly explain my feelings.
There is a void that pains me; a certain longing that cannot be
satisfied, hence never ceases, continues ever, aye, grows from day to
day. When I think how happy and childlike we would be together in
Baden and what sad, tedious hours I pass here! I take no pleasure in
my work, because I cannot break it off now and then for a few words
with you, as I am accustomed to. When I go to the piano and sing
something from the opera ["The Magic Flute"], I have to stop right
away, it affects me so. _Basta_!--if this very hour I could see my way
clear to you, the next hour wouldn't find me here." In another letter
written at this time he kisses her "in thought two thousand times."

When Mozart first met Constance, she was too young to attract his
notice. He had stopped at Mannheim on his way to Paris, whither he was
going with his mother on a concert tour. Requiring the services of a
music copyist, he was recommended to Fridolin Weber, who eked out a
livelihood by copying music and by acting as prompter at the theatre.
His brother was the father of Weber, the famous composer, and his own
family, which consisted of four daughters, was musical. Mozart's visit
to Mannheim occurred in 1777, when Constance Weber was only fourteen.

[Illustration: Mozart at the age of eleven. From a painting by Van der
Smissen in the Mozarteum, Salzburg.]

Of her two older sisters the second, Aloysia, had a beautiful voice and
no mean looks, and the young genius was greatly taken with her from the
first. He induced his mother to linger in Mannheim much longer than
was necessary. Aloysia became his pupil; and under his tuition her
voice improved wonderfully. She achieved brilliant success in public,
and her father, delighted, watched with pleasure the sentimental