around him, including the beautiful countess, Delphine Potocka;
his cherished sister, Louise; his devoted friend and pupil, M.
Gutman, with the great Liszt himself, is full of tragic interest.

No pains have been spared by the translator to make the
translation acceptable, for the task was truly a labor of love.
No motives of interest induced the lingering over the careful
rendering of the charmed pages, but an intense desire that our
people should know more of musical art; that while acknowledging
the generosity and eloquence of Liszt, they should learn to
appreciate and love the more subtle fire, the more creative
genius of the unfortunate, but honorable and honored artist,
Chopin.

Perchance Liszt may yet visit us; we may yet hear the matchless
Pianist call from their graves in the white keys, the delicate
arabesques, the undulating and varied melodies, of Chopin. We
should be prepared to appreciate the great Artist in his
enthusiastic rendering of the master-pieces of the man he loved;
prepared to greet him when he electrifies us with his wonderful
Cyclopean harmonies, written for his own Herculean grasp,
sparkling with his own Promethean fire, which no meaner hand can
ever hope to master! "Hear Liszt and die," has been said by some
of his enthusiastic admirers--understand him and live, were the
wiser advice!

In gratitude then to Chopin for the multiplied sources of high
and pure pleasure which he has revealed to humanity in his
creations, that human woe and sorrow become pure beauty when his
magic spell is on them, the translator calls upon all lovers of