"Every year a man lives, he is worth less." This is what Manuel Garcia used to assert when he was drawing near to the completion of those three-score years and ten which have been set down as the natural span of human life. As far as his own career was concerned, however, the statement was singularly lacking in truth. His mode of living at the age of seventy has been well described by Hermann Klein, his pupil, friend, and collaborator in the final text-book, 'Hints on Singing,' published some twenty years later, when the veteran musician was over ninety years of age. Mr Klein has been kind enough to send over from New York some interesting reminiscences for insertion in this chapter. In the year 1874 Mr Klein's parents occupied a large house at the corner of Bentinck Street and Welbeck Street, Cavendish Square, and I will leave the sometime musical critic of 'The Sunday Times' to tell the story of the next few months. "I find by a letter of my mother's," he writes, "that Señor Garcia first called to see her at 1 Bentinck Street in November 1873, and took the rooms on the ground floor on a yearly agreement from the following March. He moved in punctually on Lady Day 1874, bringing with him his trusty Erard grand piano (which had even then seen considerable wear, but continued to serve him faithfully at 'Mon Abri' to the last); also the noble bust of Beethoven, which used to stand upon a marble ledge or shelf fixed permanently to the wall between the two windows. The piano stood in the middle of the room, and he always took care to place his pupils so that the light fell full upon their faces. I recollect my mother asking him if he would like another mirror besides the one over the mantelpiece. He replied, 'No, it is not necessary. I don't want my pupils to be looking at themselves all the time. They have to look at me.' "His lunch invariably consisted of the same simple fare--some sponge-cakes and a pint of milk, which would be fetched from a baker close by by my younger brother Charles. I asked Señor Garcia once if he did not feel hungry long before dinner, teaching as he did all day on such slender diet. 'No,' he answered, 'I don't feel half the discomfort from waiting that I should if I took a hearty meal in the middle of the day and then tried to teach immediately afterwards. Besides, I don't really need it. Most singers and teachers of singing eat more than they should. A man with moderate teeth, such as I have, can grow old on sponge-cake and milk!' And he lived for more than thirty years after that to prove the truth of his remark. [Illustration: Photo by Davis & Eickenmeyer. Handwritten signature: to M Sterling MacKinlay, esq. with Kindest regards of Hermann Klein New York, '06]