He knew a smattering of it scientifically, enough to follow up subjects and to a certain extent to recognize chords.

There occurs in one of his letters to me the following passage, which I venture to quote.

He is speaking of the delight of pure sound as apart from melody: "I remember once," he writes, "being with a great organist in a cathedral organ-loft, sitting upon the bench at his side.

He was playing a Mass of Schubert's, and close to the end, at the last chord but two--he was dying to a very soft close, sliding in handles all over the banks of stops--he nodded with his head to the rows of pedal stops with their red labels, as though to indicate where danger lay.

'Put your hand on the thirty-two foot,' he said.