it is far from trivial, and the passage 'si j'ai trouvé pour eux une fontaine claire' is even very felicitous; only it appears to me to give too decided an end to the lines immediately following the words 's'ils sont heureux.' I strongly advise you to keep as much as possible to this lightness and naturalness in your future compositions."
It is a curious fact that the author of this careful criticism (he was a man of business) had no technical knowledge of music, yet his ear was so exquisite and his taste so perfect, that his children, including Felix when at the height of his fame, always considered him as the highest authority upon their compositions.
Fanny's music, while she was yet a child, earned her two triumphs, of which she fully appreciated the value. Felix, when eleven years of age, spent some time at Weimar, where he was constantly in the society of Goethe, who became very fond of him, and listened every day to his playing. Sometimes he improvised, or played compositions of his own or Fanny's. In a letter to the family he says, after relating various bits of news:
"Now something for you, my dear coughing Fanny! Yesterday morning I took your songs to Frau von Goethe, who has a good voice and will sing them to the old gentleman. I told him that you had written them, and I asked him whether he would like to hear them. He said, 'Yes, yes, with pleasure.' Frau von Goethe likes them very much indeed, and that is a good omen. To-day or to-morrow he is to hear them."
Goethe was so pleased with the songs when he did hear them, that he at once composed a beautiful little poem for Fanny, wrote it down himself, and gave it to Zelter (her music teacher and her brother's) with the words:
"Take that to the dear child."
Her second success, although it won her no such honor as this, was perhaps even more gratifying in its results.
