Page:Notes of a Pianist.djvu/49

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FAREWELL CONCERT.
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room could seat. On the evening of the performance the hall was crowded, and there was hardly standing room to be found. The young artist played several pieces, hut the one which was most successful was the 'Lucie' by Hertz. When he came to the most difficult passage of the piece, the enthusiasm was at its height, and the last note was hardly struck when the young executant was carried off in triumph.

Everything being arranged for Moreau's departure, in April, 1842, at the request of his father's friends, he gave a farewell concert. At the head of the patrons of the concert was Mr. David, the French consul. The expected day, awaited with so much impatience by all the musical amateurs, and by the curious whp had never heard the young musician, at last arrived. Never, perhaps, had the splendid ball-room St. Louis been filled with so large and brilliant an assemblage. All the élite of the city were there. At the conclusion of the concert, Mr. David stepped upon the stage and presented to the young artist a monstrous bouquet. Moreau thought but of one thing, his mother, and, turning to the stage-box where she was seated, screamed out, "Mamma, it is for you!"

On the evening of the concert, the little pianist went to the hairdresser, Mr. Barraud, to have his hair dressed. "Ah! I see," said the hairdresser, "you are going to the concert of little Moreau Gottschalk! I also should like to have gone, but I cannot spare so much money at once!" "Would you like to go?" asked Moreau. "To go! indeed I should." "Very well, then, I can give you a ticket; I am Moreau Gottschalk." Great was the surprise of the hairdresser, and Moreau had that evening one more admirer.




CHAPTER III.


In May, 1842, Moreau left New Orleans on the Taglioni, a sailing vessel, bound for Havre, under the command of Captain Rogers, a friend of Mr. Gottschalk, in whose charge