She was chaste, benevolent, and sincere. Her mother had been a
singer of merit and celebrity, and she, the daughter, had both inherited
her musical talent, and had received one of those thorough musical
educations which alone make the possession of the art a pleasure and
resource. It must often occur to those who hear our young ladies sing
and play, that the accomplishment is little valued by them, save as an
outward social adornment.
Hence those ambitious and perfectly uninteresting performances with
which we are constantly bored in the fashionable musical world. It is
self-love which gives us those flat, empty _adagios_, those cold,
keen runs and embellishments. Love of the art has more modesty in the
undertaking, and more warmth in the execution. George says that she
has heard all the greatest singers of modern times, but that her
grandmother, in her old age, singing fragments of the operas of her own
time in a cracked and trembling voice, and accompanying herself on an
old harpsichord with three fingers of a palsied hand, always remained to
her a type of art above all others.
The first volume of these memoirs gives interesting notice of the
friendships which surrounded Madame Dupin during her married life.
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