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aware of its weakness, incompleteness and faults, but every bar went through me like a heart tremor. I did not know whether this music was good, but I knew that it was my own music, born and experienced within me and never heard anywhere else before.
    Downstairs in the coffee room, motionless and with hair as white as snow, there sat year in year out the innkeeper’s father, who was over eighty years old. He never said anything and only gazed around him attentively through peaceful-looking eyes. It was a mystery whether the solemn, silent man possessed more than human wisdom and stillness of spirit, or whether his mental powers had deserted him. I went down to that old man that morning, my violin under my arm, for I had observed that he always listened attentively to my playing and indeed to all music. As I found him alone, I stood before him, tuned my violin and played my first movement to him. The old man directed his peaceful-looking eyes, the whites of which were yellowish and the eyelids red, toward me and listened. Whenever I think of that music, I see the old man again, his immobile face and his serene eyes watching me. When I had finished, I nodded to him. He winked knowingly and seemed to understand everything. His yellowish eyes returned my glance; then he averted his gaze, lowered his head a little and returned to his former motionless state.
    Autumn began early at that height, and as I made my departure one morning, there was a thick mist which fell in fine drops as cold rain, but I took with me the sunshine of the good days and also, as a thankful remembrance, courage for my next path in life.

Chapter Three
    D URING MY LAST TERM at the School of Music, I made the acquaintance of the singer Muoth, who had quite a creditable reputation in the town. He had finished his studies four years before and immediately obtained a position at the Opera House, where he was at present still taking lesser roles and, compared to older and better-liked singers, did not shine. Many people, however, considered him to be a future celebrity whose next step must lead him to fame. I had seen him on the stage in a number of roles and he had strongly impressed me, although not always favorably.
    We became acquainted in the following way. After my return to the School of Music, I took my violin sonata and two songs that I had composed to the teacher who had showed such kind sympathy toward me. He promised to look through the work and give me his opinion about it. It was a long time before he did so, and meantime I could detect a certain feeling of embarrassment on his part whenever I met him. Finally, he called me to his office one day and returned the manuscript to me.
    â€œHere is your work,” he said, visibly uncomfortable. “I hope you have not built too many hopes upon it. There is something in it, without any doubt, and you may yet achieve something. To be quite honest, I thought you were already more mature and tranquil. I did not really credit you with such a passionate nature. I expected something quieter and more pleasing, something more technically correct which could have been judged technically. But your work is not good technically, so I can say little about that. It is an audacious attempt, the merit of which I am unable to judge, but as your teacher I cannot praise it. You have put both less and more in it than I expected and thus place me in an embarrassing position. I am too much of a schoolmaster to overlook stylistic mistakes, and whether you will be able to outweigh them with originality, I should not like to say. I will therefore wait until I see more of your work. I wish you luck. You will go on composing in any event. That much I have noticed.”
    I then went away and did not know what to make of his verdict, which was no real criticism. It seemed to me that one should be able to look at a piece of work and see immediately whether it was done as a game and pastime, or whether it arose from necessity