Walker-My_Musical_Ex.. - Walter Cosand

192 MY MUSICAL EXPERIENCES
written in the heat of great indignation at what I had
done, and great disappointment at his having failed
to win me for their school. Mr. Steinecke-Clarke
was, as I have before said, a burning enthusiast ; but
he was more than this—he was a fanatic who neither
would nor could recognise any possible salvation for
anyone who was outside his musical creed. His letter
(some expressions of which I shall quote as character-
istic of the earnest and downright nature of the man)
did not, however, in the least disturb or disquiet me,
for I could quite understand the way in which he
viewed the matter. I had, moreover, my own firm
conviction of being about to make the right start, and
I felt sure that when we again met, he would not be
able to refuse me some partial recognition of this.
Finally, the letter, from first to last, showed me that
he believed I had been actuated in my decision by
motives which were just as foreign to my nature as
they would have been to his own.
I had, he said, 'found a pearl of great price,' and
had passed it by for the sake of getting in amongst
people of rank and fashion; for he had, somehow,
like many others, got the notion that Henselt lived
en prince in St. Petersburg, and that he was in
constant intercourse with Eussian princes and prin-
cesses. Mr. Clarke had most absurdly taken it into
his head that I was to be introduced into these circles
as an Englishwoman of birth, and have my attain-
ments lauded and praised up to the skies. He said I