The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-08-20
Dew Book ncWS


 its perfection of melody. Our Ameri- men and the women are divided like the sheep and the goats, enter and exit by different doors. most humor- ous sketch of the men singers across Is given, the row of tenors are boys who wear their hair pompadour and yell outrageously." Did you ever mo- tice the effect of a boy with pompa- dour opening his mouth very wide? It Is truly startling. The bass singers
 requires both dignity and experience. Most of them think 1t also requires full beard" Many also deem it neces- sary to dress out of old pictures with
 long hair, velvet jackets and flowing ties. The most profound basso our American has named "Reubenstein," so exactly has he made himself a copy of the masters portraits. The most
 interesting tenor-boy I call Beethoven. He wears big white collar into which
 he sinks his chin, and with deep, ear nest eyes under closely knit brows, gazes gravely out on frivolous world. The facile pen makes even dull eyes see and dull ears hear, what an ador- ably clear description of the distinctly modern opera Louise" by the French composer Charpentier. Opera comique crossing with mere securia motif. To American ears its realism is a little | too marked: "In the fourth scene of the first act, Louise (charmingly sung by Morena) with her father and mother sit around a table in the centre of the stage. for. fully five minutes without uttering a syllable. What do you think they are doing? Eating soup! Mean
 while the orchestra Is playing beauti- full music, elaborating a theme which l
 called motif du potage. To what are we coming next? Never to perfect na- | tional understanding and full apprecia- tion. What American has not asked l himself; Why? What does 1t mean? at moments even when almost carried out of oneself before the superb act ing of the divine Sarah?
 Though as Anglo Saxons and Ameri- cans we are nearer akin to the Germans | than to the Latins, yet here again is that national difference. that utter i'm possibility of understanding wholly, appreciating completely. The Ameri- can girl writes of her acceptation of the second act of Rheingold: Was at fault because when I first heard l the giant motif I smiled? Am I to be condemned because I had to smother | laugh when Mimi rolled over and over on the stage and shrieked forth a ridic- | ulous Augh. as in a fit of indigestion? And the giants were such withholding creatures with grotesque tufts of hair on the crown of their heads-should have taken them more seriously? Ap- parently, If I am to judge from the demeanor of the audience, who never
 changed their expression during the | entire opera. And, after all, there are a good many people at home who think | to regard one bar of Wagner without
 reverential seriousness Is sacrilege. Every page is interesting to the music student but any alert American girl can find interest in these gay re- | citals of Baron and Baroness keep | ing boarding house. giving a Thanks giving dinner out of compliment to the American. presenting a cake "Herzlich- en Guess" on the young Americans I birthday. keeping fite on the name-day of the Baroness herself There are car l nival balls and German officers danc- ing the polka prestissimi. German Christmas. joliity, and gift-gtving. New
 York festivals when all the world wishes each other Frende (joy) and Gluck Happiness Amusing accounts
 of shopping abroad are here for our diversion. And here Is the way Herr Schmidt shows temptingly at Christmas his Frankfurters: "Who ever associ- ated sausages with anything so idyllic as a waterfall7 Yet here you have a | wooden mill, high up on an improvised hill, and over the wheel flow down | streamers of sausages to mass in lake | below Who ever thought of connect | ing them with legends of the Middle Ages? Yet Herr Schmidt has con- ! struuted the most marvellous tower out | of sausages laid crisscross. with open ings for little windows, with turret on the very top, with a flag waving proudly on the highest peak, and most wonderful of all, with a drawbridge securely fastened over a moat of pars- ley"
 | The chief charm of the book is the | typical German love story that Is inter-
 woven with the students story of her year in Munich. Ffaulien Hortmann, 1 golden haired and fair, Is betrothed to 1 Lieutenant Blum The aunt. Frau von waldfel, has given the necessary din- ner, for a German officer may not mar " unless he can show that he has twelve thousand marks! Therefore
 many officers failing this, seek wives with the dower of twelve thousand marks. And the impecunious young lieutenants are run after by mamas and daughters, eagerly holding forth the
 necessary dover!
 Yet Fraulein Hartman is not happy and the story of her loves runs with
 plot and episode through boarding
 houses and carnival ball for all the
 world In its reality like novel writ
 ten to amuse folks. As the time fol
 the wedding approaches Fraulein, tired
 to the utmost, falls Ill. The aunt who
 helps watch and intercopts the letters 1 of Heinrich, that always present "othel man." Is called hastily away on busi-
 ness. lieutenant Blum calls daily
 asks more anxiously of the aunt's
 business than of Fraulelns fever
 Every day the Fraulein receives beauti'
 full blue flowers such as one finds ir the Isor-Thal If one looks carefully
 enough. The servants think they are
 the gift of her betrothed. but the
 poets wife and I know better. We have not seen Heinrich daily pacing tc
 and fro in the park opposite without learning many things" The aunt's losses swallow all the fortune and the twelve thousand mark dover, Lieuten' ant Blum releases his betrothed. The