“Meanwhile, M. Larinski entered, and I retained the two gentlemen to dinner. In the evening they again gave me a concert. Why was Antoinette not there? I fancied I was at the Conservatoire. Then we conversed, and the abbe, who never can let go his idea, said, without any reserve, to the count: “‘My dear count, have you reflected? If you go to London, we could hope to see you often; and, besides, the salary--well, as this terrible word has been spoken, listen to me; I will do all in my power to obtain conditions for you in every way worthy of your merit, your learning, your character, your position.’ “He was not permitted to finish the list; the count reared like the horse in Horace, exclaiming, ‘O Mozart! what a horrid subject of conversation!’ Then he added, gravely: ‘M. l’Abbe, you are a thousand times too good, but the place offered to me in Vienna seems to me better adapted to my kind of ability; I would make, I fear, a detestable professor, and the salary, were it double, would in my opinion have but little weight.’ “The abbe still insisted. ‘In our century,’ said he, ‘less than any other, can one live on air.’ “‘I have lived on it sometimes,’ replied the count, gaily, ‘and I did not find it bad. My health is proof against accidents. Ah! where money is concerned, you have no idea how far my indifference goes. It is not a virtue with me, it is an infirmity; it is because of my nationality, because I am my father’s son. I feel myself incapable of thinking of the future, of practising thoroughly French habits of economy. If my purse is full, I soon empty it; after which I condemn myself to privations--no, that does not express it--I enjoy them. According to me, there is no true happiness into which a little suffering does not enter. Besides, I have a taste for contrasts. At times I believe myself a millionaire, I have the pretensions of a nabob; I give full scope to my fancies; the next day, my bed is hard and I live on bread-and-water, and am perfectly happy. In short, I am a fool once in the year, and a philosopher the rest of the time.’ “‘The trouble is,’ returned the abbe, ‘that one day of folly will sometimes suffice to compromise forever the future of a philosopher.’ “‘Oh, reassure yourself,’ replied he; ‘my extravagances never are very dangerous. There was method in Hamlet’s madness, and there is always a little reason in mine.’ “While making this declaration of principles, he had seated himself at the piano, and idly began running his fingers over the keys. Suddenly he began to sing a German song, which I got Abbe Miollens to translate for me, and which is not long. The hero of the song is an amorous pine, standing on the summit of a barren mountain of the north. He is alone; he is weary; the snow and ice wrap him in a white mantle, and he spends his dreary hours of leisure in dreaming of a palm, which in days of yore he met, it seems, in his travels.