To pronounce judgment upon Paganini, it was necessary to hear him in his own especial style--that which most characterized his talent. In his concerts in Paris, he thought it necessary to flatter the national feeling by playing a concerto by Kreutzer and one by Rode--but he scarcely rose above mediocrity in their performance. His secretary, Mr. Harrys, tells us the opinion Paganini formed of himself as regards these attempts. He said to him, “I have my own peculiar style; in accordance with this, I regulate my composition. To play those of other artists, I must arrange them accordingly: I had much rather write a piece in which I can trust myself entirely to my own musical impressions.” The unfavourable impression he made in Paris, with these two pieces, was a lesson to him; he never played from that time any music but his own. Paganini’s art did not apply to any species of composition--his was a specialty, of which he alone could be the interpreter--an art born with him, the secret of which he has carried with him to the grave. I have used a word he often repeated--for he frequently insisted that his talent resulted from a secret discovered by him--and which he would reveal before his death, in a “study for the Violin,” that should only contain a small number of pages, but that should cause the utmost consternation to all violinists. He cited, in support of the infallibility of his secret, the experiment that he had made at Naples, upon a violoncellist of little talent, named Gaetano Ciandelli, who, by the revelation of the mystery, became transformed in one morning into a _virtuoso_. Apart from the study of mechanism--for which there is no substitute--no secret can exist from talent, but that which nature implants in the heart of the artist; there is, however, something astounding and mysterious in the faculty which Paganini possessed, of invariably overcoming the almost unheard-of difficulties, without ever touching the Violin except at concerts and rehearsals. Mr. Harrys, who was his secretary, and did not leave him for more than a year, never saw him take his Violin from its case. Be it, however, as it may, death has not permitted the secret, of which Paganini spoke, to be divulged. Many notices of the life and talent of this great artist have been published, either in collections or separately; the most important are the following:--