But in regard to your pursuits, dear, while I am at work in my studio, you can use the grand piano in the drawing-room when you please, as well as the little one in your own room; and you can improvise on the chapel organ as much as you like." I was delighted at this idea, and thanked her heartily.

She smiled thoughtfully.
"What happiness it must be for you to love music so thoroughly!" she said.

"It fills you with enthusiasm.

I used to dislike to read the biographies of musical people; they all seemed to find so much fault with one another, and grudged each other every little bit of praise wrung from the world's cold, death-doomed lips.

It is to me pathetically absurd to see gifted persons all struggling along, and rudely elbowing each other out of the way to win--what?
A few stilted commonplace words of approbation or fault-finding in the newspapers of the day, and a little clapping and shouting from a gathering of ordinary minded persons, who only clap and shout because it is possibly the fashion to do so.