The Story of a Genius by Ossip Schubin — Read

Eleven years later, in the middle of May, Gesa came back to Brussels after a long absence. Alphonse de Sterny had known how to make practical use of the enthusiasm in Brussels society. Gesa had been sent on a government pension and supported, moreover, by the favor of several eminent persons, to study under one of the most famous violinists of the time, then settled in Paris.

He had studied a little, dissipated a great deal, then studied again; had been much admired, much envied; had learned to empty his champagne glass, and to distinguish in women between a coquette and one who will repel an impertinence. He had made his first professional tour, with a famous Italian staccato singer, and a still more famous Moravian impressario, had earned many laurels, had finally quarreled at Nice with the violincellist of the troupe on the singer's account, had challenged the cellist, and insulted the manager. The latter was a reasonable being, however, who did not stand on trifles of that sort, and two months later in Paris, when he was engaging a company for his American tour he made Gesa a brilliant offer. But the young violinist was rich in the possession of a few thousand francs that remained to him from his last enterprise, and he curtly declined the great Marinsky's proposal, saying "the career of a soloist bored him, he wished to devote himself to composition. " He was twenty-four years old. At that age many musicians have produced their greatest works. He had published nothing as yet, except a "Reverie" that appeared nearly seven years before, with a handsome vignette of the young composer on the title page, in all the pomp of a dilettante production, was bought by the whole Faubourg St. Germaine, and by hardly any one else. Since that time he had scribbled a great deal, but had finished nothing, -- and yet he felt so rich! He had only not willed it as yet. He needed quiet for composing. But quiet in Paris is an article of luxury that none but very great gentlemen can compel. Brussels rose in his memory, Brussels with her Gothic churches and crooked streets, her zealous Catholicism, her luxuriant vegetation and stagnant life. A sort of homesickness overcame him, -- he started for Brussels.