Franz had expressed his wish to hear their music, but for a while all was silent. Suddenly a strange, prolonged note vibrated through the air like a sigh from the supernatural world; another followed; then after a pause a majestic but sombre melody was developed. The sounds swelled like an immense choral, with incomparable purity and nobleness, fraught with memories of ruins and tombs, of lost liberty and love. Another pause, and some strophes of unbridled gayety burst forth; then again the principal phrase, detaching itself like a flower from its stem, among myriads of winged notes, clusters of vaporous sounds, long spirals of transparent _fioritures_. Still the violins grew bolder and more impetuous. Franz rose from his seat while watching these men standing with their violins pressed against their breasts, as if they were pouring their life's blood into them: he felt oppressed with anguish, when, by an ingenious inversion, the gloomy theme was transformed into a graceful, poetic melody. The sounds passed away rapidily like sparks, then were extinguished for a moment. A ferocious violence animated the last measures, and the gypsies laid down their bows. But, divining a sympathetic listener, they recommenced and played on till the night was far advanced. At length they ceased, and Franz left the camp, carrying with him the revelation of a hitherto unknown art. Three principal features (he tells us) determine the character of Tzigany music--its intervals, not used in European harmony, its peculiar rhythms, and its Oriental fioritures or grace-notes. In the minor scale the Tziganys take the fourth augmented, the sixth diminished and the seventh augmented. It is by the frequent augmentation of the fourth that the harmony acquires a wonderfully audacious and disquieting character. The educated musician at first thinks he hears false notes, but the law of their harmonies is to have no law. Their abundance is incalculable, and the solemn and intoxicating effects resulting from the rapid and beautiful transitions cannot be imagined. As for the grace-notes, they give to the ear a pleasure like that which Moorish architecture gives to the eye: the architects of the Alhambra painted on each of their bricks a graceful little poem; the gypsies adorn each note with melodious designs and luxuriant embroideries. But (we quote M. Franz throughout) who shall describe the impalpable flame of Tzigany sentiment, the strange, subjugating charm of which is a vital animation almost adequate to life itself? or the mysterious equilibrium which reigns in this undisciplined art between the sentiment and the form? Mystery of genius, which bears in itself its inexplicable power of emotion, and which science and taste in vain deny!