insolent reclame, the security of intercourse with
him, and the exquisite delicacy of his manners,
making him a friend equally serious and agreeable.
To tear Chopin away from so many gdteries,
to associate him with a simple, uniform, and constantly
studious life, him who had been brought up on the
knees of princesses, was to deprive him of that
which made him live, of a factitious life, it is true,
for, like a painted woman, he laid aside in the evening,
in returning to his home, his verve and his energy,
to give the night to fever and sleeplessness; but
of a life which would have been shorter and more
animated than that of the retirement and of the
intimacy restricted to the uniform circle of a single
family. In Paris he visited several salons every
day, or he chose at least every evening a different
one as a milieu. He had thus by turns twenty
or thirty salons to intoxicate or to charm with
his presence.
Chopin in his social relations: His predilection
for the
fashionable salon society (accounts
by Madame Girardin and
Berlioz); his neglect of the
society of artists (Ary Scheffer,
Marmontel, Heller, Schulhoff, the
Paris correspondent of the
musical world); aphorisms by Liszt
on Chopin in his social
aspect.—Chopin’s friendships.—George
sand, Liszt, Lenz, Heller,
Marmontel, and Hiller on his
character (irritability, fits of
anger—scene with Meyerbeer—gaiety
and raillery, love of
society, and little taste for
reading, predilection for things
polish).—His polish, German,
English, and Russian friends.—The
party made famous by Liszt’s
account.—His intercourse
with
musicians (Osborne, Berlioz, Baillot,
Cherubini, Kalkbrenner,
Fontana, Sowinski, Wolff, Meyerbeer,
Alkan, etc.).—His
friendship with Liszt.—His
dislike to letter-writing.
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