As one in whom these characteristics predominate we should mention François Joseph Gossec, familiar to us as the writer of _opéras comiques_, but also important as a composer of trio-sonatas (of the usual kind), some for orchestral performance (like those of Stamitz, _ad lib._), and several real symphonies, all of which are clearly influenced in manner by Stamitz and the Mannheimers. Gossec was, in a way, the centre of Paris musical life, for he conducted successively the private concerts given under the patronage of La Pouplinière, those of Prince Conti in Chantilly, the _Concert des amateurs_, which he founded in 1770, and, eventually, the _Concerts spirituels_, reorganized by him. The _Mercure de France_, in an article on Rameau’s _Castor et Pollux_, calls Gossec France’s representative musician among the pioneers of the new style. Contrasting his work with Rameau’s the critic refers to the latter as being _d’une teneur_ (of one tenor), while Gossec’s is full of _nuance_ and contrast. This slight digression will dispose of the ‘Paris school’ for the present; we shall now proceed to the chief _Italian_ representative of Mannheim principles. In placing Boccherini before Haydn in our account of the string quartet we may lay ourselves open to criticism, for Haydn is universally considered the originator of that form. But, as in almost every case, the fixing of a new form cannot be ascribed to the efforts of a single man. Although Haydn’s priority seems established, Boccherini may more aptly be taken as the starting point, for, while Haydn represents a more advanced state of development, Boccherini at the outset displays a far more finished routine.