Although the young musician remarks that these were compliments, he cannot help confessing that he likes to hear them; and of course one who likes to hear them does not wholly disbelieve them, but considers them something more than a mere flatus vocis.

"Nobody here," Chopin writes exultingly, "will regard me as a pupil." Indeed, such was the reception he met with that it took him by surprise.

"People wonder at me," he remarked soon after his arrival in Vienna, "and I wonder at them for wondering at me." It was incomprehensible to him that the artists and amateurs of the famous musical city should consider it a loss if he departed without giving a concert.

The unexpected compliments and applause that everywhere fell upon his ear, together with the many events, experiences, and thoughts that came crowding upon him, would have caused giddiness in any young artist; Chopin they made drunk with excitement and pleasure.

The day after the second concert he writes home: "I really intended to have written about something else, but I can't get yesterday out of my head." His head was indeed brimful, or rather full to overflowing, of whirling memories and expectations which he poured into the news--budgets destined for his parents, regardless of logical sequence, just as they came uppermost.