He was less hearty in manner then, even towards me.
But then would come times when the music-stand would remain in the corner.

He would sit for a long time looking straight before him, as if lost in thought, and then give expression to his feeling, on his violin, in all kinds of fantasies, which pleased my uncultivated ear far more than his so-called classical music.
He sometimes played a variety of small pieces, and then gradually sank into his own peculiar minor strain, and sometimes into a wonderfully sad melody.

I very seldom heard him play anything right through, and then always in a kind of self-forgetfulness.

At such times, I had a feeling that he was confiding to me something beautiful that he had lost, and over which he could never cease to mourn.
At a later period of our friendship he became, as I have said, more irregular in his habits, and was seldom to be found at home; he would sometimes talk ironically about his comrades, the professors and things in general, and his sarcasm was almost biting.
I was privileged to take my friend's key, and go into his room, even when he was not at home.

If his violin hung uncared for, I knew that something was wrong, and that his own condition answered to that of his instrument.