Evening journal., 1894-01-13
ENTRAACED BY MUSIC.
Remarkable Effect of a DAM
rosch Concert on a Youth.
WANDERED A WEEK IN A TRANCE.


Deluded with the sudden idea That He
Was a Great Musician. ue Wont to Bos-
tou--He Finally Returns Home to Tell q
Rambling story.
ELIZABETH, n. J., Jan. 13.-walter Per
oy Smith. the l6year.old boy who disap-
peared after leaving the Damrosch concert
In the Carnegie Music hall In New York on
Friday Of last week, has returned to his
home at 8 South Second street, Elizabeth.
He left the Elizabeth high school on Fri
day at noon alone, intending to celebrate
his sixteenth birthday by attending the
concert In the Carnegie Music hall. He
was TO take dinner in the evening with his
uncle, c. d. Smith Of the firm Of Baker,
Smith q Co., who lives in Fifty-seventh
street near Ninth avenue, New York, but
no never reached the house
His disappearance was reported to Gu
perlntendent Byrnes, but all efforts TO fnd
any trace of the missing boy after he left
the music hall proved fruitless. W. o.
smith, his father, who Is cashier OF the
hlizabethport Banking company, had
about given his son up for lost when Percy
returned.
The Music Overcnme Him.
The young man at first refused to say
anything about his strange disappearance.
lie said that he had been advised not to
talk Of it. But he finally told how he had
gone to the Carnegie hall and had been
completely overcome by the music IL
was music such as he had never heard be-
fore
Il don't know how Il was, ," said he. "but
as | sat there aud listened seemed to for
get everything but the music. ] don't re-
member anything for a long time except
listening TO that music / remember
vaguely OF getting up and going out when
the crowd went. When got on the street,
with all the brilliant carriages around me,
1 came to my senses in n way, but IN a
very queer way. ! was filled with great
longing to be musician and lead an or
chestra and make a name for myself.
when think Of it, / must have been
half crazy, foT believed that was a great
musician and that all had to do was TO
begin for myself have given a good deal
OF time 20 music, as far as / could In this
little town, and the great Symphony or
chcstra was a wonderful revelation. un-
| derstood that Boston was where all the
great musicians came from, and Thought
that all had 10 do TO be a great musician
was to go TO Boston. So, instead OF going
TO my uncle's for dinner, I went down to
the place where the boats leave and got on
a Norwich boat. So went to Boston"
Then the young man told a rambling
| story OF how he tried TO get position in
the orchestra at the Globe theater and az
several other places before he found that
he was not the great musician he Thought
he was. He had only a when he left New
York. That was about enough to pay his
way to Boston.
Went 60 Boston In a Dream.
lie said he was in a sort of dream all the
time, and remembers that he was hungry
and out all night, and that he met some
people who were very nice TO him, and who
finally put him on the Fall River line, by
which he got into New York early yester-
day morning lie had a faint idea thai
some one had gone TO Boston with him,
who kept urging him not TO 60 back home,
but TO persevcre in his attempt to become
a great musician.
81 don't know what to think of Il. % said
Cashier Smith. 81 know the boy didn't
have more than a with him when he left
home. lie has been studying hard and was
never very strong. / think the trouble Is
all here'-pninting TO his head. I'm his
extremely sensitive condition Of mind he
may have been led into a sort of dazed state
by the music Of which he is passionately
fond. That is what the doctor thinks.
know Of no other reason why he should
have gone OF i'm such n strange way. He
had no trouble here. lie says he didn't 20
away for any reason in particular, only
that he took il into his head to do It. /
have not pressed him to tell anything, nor
viii i do So
The doctor who Is attending Percy says
that il is perfectly plausible that he was
driven out Of his proper mind by the ecstasy
resulting from the music which so enrap-
tured him and that he wandered off in a
sort of dream. The church people and half
the town besides were in the home Of Cash
Ter Smith last night giving thanhs for tho