Chapter 30

HOW I EMPLOYED MY TIME

Nevertheless, the fact that that summer I developed a passion for
music caused me to become better friends with the ladies of our
household than I had been for years. In the spring, a young fellow
came to see us, armed with a letter of introduction, who, as soon
as ever he entered the drawing-room, fixed his eyes upon the
piano, and kept gradually edging his chair closer to it as he
talked to Mimi and Katenka. After discoursing awhile of the
weather and the amenities of country life, he skilfully directed
the conversation to piano-tuners, music, and pianos generally,
and ended by saying that he himself played--and in truth he did
sit down and perform three waltzes, with Mimi, Lubotshka, and
Katenka grouped about the instrument, and watching him as he did
so. He never came to see us again, but his playing, and his
attitude when at the piano, and the way in which he kept shaking
his long hair, and, most of all, the manner in which he was able
to execute octaves with his left hand as he first of all played
them rapidly with his thumb and little finger, and then slowly
closed those members, and then played the octaves afresh, made a
great impression upon me. This graceful gesture of his, together
with his easy pose and his shaking of hair and successful winning
of the ladies' applause by his talent, ended by firing me to take
up the piano. Convinced that I possessed both talent and a
passion for music, I set myself to learn, and, in doing so, acted
just as millions of the male--still more, of the female--sex have
done who try to teach themselves without a skilled instructor,
without any real turn for the art, or without the smallest
understanding either of what the art can give or of what ought to
be done to obtain that gift. For me music (or rather, piano-
playing) was simply a means of winning the ladies' good graces
through their sensibility. With the help of Katenka I first
learnt the notes (incidentally breaking several of them with my
clumsy fingers), and then--that is to say, after two months of
hard work, supplemented by ceaseless twiddling of my rebellious
fingers on my knees after luncheon, and on the pillow when in
bed--went on to "pieces," which I played (so Katenka assured me)
with "soul" ("avec ame"), but altogether regardless of time.

My range of pieces was the usual one--waltzes, galops,
"romances," "arrangements," etcetera; all of them of the class of
delightful compositions of which any one with a little healthy
taste could point out a selection among the better class works
contained in any volume of music and say, "These are what you
ought NOT to play, seeing that anything worse, less tasteful,