Litchfield enquirer., 1873-05-08
From Every Saturday. EPISODES IM THE LIFE OF A Mu.
 Si0lAN.
I. THE FIRST EPISODE BEGINS.
BY M. BETHAM- EDWARDS

Twenty-Five years ago there was no mer- rier company in the world than the little knot of musicians gathered round the well-belOved OgLostro, court pianist and musical director to the smallest potentate magnitude, and his satellites were small moons by comparison; yet as the moons were all of size, and the planet enor- nous, no one seemed out of his proper place. There was everything to make able women, ease, and variety. All were contented with poverty from the sover- eign downwards, and. as luxuries, so call ed, were not to be had, superfuous means would only have been an incumbrance. Very likely things have changed by this time, and that bloom of virginal simplici- ty has been swept from the face of the lit tie capital forever; but twenty-five years ago the era of innovation had not set in. Then the world lived as it liked without getting into debt. Take our musician for example. His salary was exactly hun dred pounds year, and when he condo scended to receive money from his pupils, he accepted Prussian thaler for lesson, and no more. He gave choice little ban quets, reco1lected his friends birthdays, and never forgot the children's Christmas trees. He was always purchasing new music and new musical instruments. He smoked cigars from morning till night. And, over and above these current expen- ses, he found means of helping many a deserving pupil to London or Paris. This is what a generously disposed-nay, a rather extravagant-person could do up- on an income of not much more than a hundred year in this small German state, 8 quarter of century ago.
 This story opens in the height of the musical season-that Is to say, Ill the spring-when life was 'pre-eminently gay and busy in the little capital. An event was sure to happen at such tlmes;- either & new opera was brought out under the Maestro's auspices-for thus our beloved Ogliostro was called-or some prlma don- ma just alighted like a bird to sing away all hearts and then fly of, or the latest pro- duction of the musician himself enticed celebrated critics and connoisseurs to visit us. Each season seemed more attractive than the last, which was most likely to be accounted for in the fact that it was the fashion to be pleased.
 The Maestro was now thirty years old He looked much older, as 1t behooyed him to do, firstly, because the two youne princesses, daughters of the reignine house, were his pupils; and, secondly because he had sprinkling of sentimen tai young Poppenheimers among his ordi nary pupils, in whom he found it necessa " to inspire reverence as we'll as affection So, though a vain man, circumstances ob iged him to disfgure himself by wearing his hair long, coat of eccentric pattern and spectacles. In spite of these device! he was universally acknowledged to bt bewitchlng. And he was a little wild Hitherto his escapades had been of : harmless nature, but when man is be witching as well as wild, what may or ma. not be expected of him?
 So thought the Grand Duke, who, be ing 8 man of rigid morality, as we'll as al ardent lover of art, was at times almos distracted by anxiety concerning hls ia vorite. He prided himself upon hi Court being the seat of the domestic vir tues; and having a Duchess as rigid a himself, and a young family of Prince and Princesses growing up. he kept wig
 liant eye upon the Bohemia outside tn
 palace doors. Now the ruling spirit c
 this Bohemia was the Maestro, as tn