Books › Famous violinists and fine violins : historical notes, anecdotes, and reminiscences, 1896 › scan 65
Scan 65
Famous violinists and fine violins : historical notes, anecdotes, and reminiscences, 1896
8 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. Printed page 45. See the scan on archive.org.
1shipping office, that it is necessary to persevere and to push oneself forward to secure success, or even a decent living. There was a certain amount of cunning also in his character; and that he took advantage of every opportunity that offered was manifest already in his youth, when he was easily induced, not only to forsake the modest paternal roof, but to try his hand at the gaming-table as well as in the concert room.
3Add to these attributes of Paganini the fact that he was well instructed when quite a young boy in the rudiments of music, compelled by his relentless father to work hard at his exercises—too hard, indeed, for it injured his health and moral character—and, later, that he had some of the best lessons in harmony and composition that Italy could afford in his day, and we find much to account for his wonderfully successful career and the £80,000 that he left to his only son.
5But beyond all this, we have been assured by more than one writer that Paganini carried with him to the grave an important secret which alone would explain, if not the whole of his success, at least nine-tenths of it.
7The late Professor Fétis, of the Brussels Conservatoire, who had some knowledge of the violin, and was a most ardent admirer of Paganini, whom he did not quite understand, believed that no such secret could possibly exist. We shall see! He
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