"Mendelssohn arranged it with trombone accompaniment. When the opening words, 'Fatherland! within thy Confines broke the dawning Light,'--so the opening ran, if my memory is correct,--were heard in the Music Hall at the first rehearsal, the heartiest applause arose among the performers as well as the invited guests. Nothing so simple, powerful, joyous, and unconstrained had been heard for a long time.... Many will remember how, on the very day of the public performance, the slight form of Mendelssohn was seen moving nervously around to find just the right place for the trombonists, and how nearly he came to a fall from the platform. During that performance the singers were divided into two choirs, which sat at some distance from each other; one of them was conducted by David, and the other by Mendelssohn." The cantata opens with a stately chorale ("With solemn Hymn of Praise") set to the old tune "Honor to God alone," followed by the song in memory of Gutenberg ("Fatherland! within thy Confines"), which has been separately arranged and printed as a solo. The third number is a quick, spirited movement for tenors ("And God said, 'Let there be Light'") followed by another effective chorale ("Now, thank God all"), which brings the work to a close. On the afternoon of the same day Mendelssohn's much more important work, "The Hymn of Praise," was given. A sketch of this has already appeared in the "Standard Oratorios." Lauda Sion. The "Lauda Sion," or sequence sung at High Mass on the Feast of Corpus Christi, was chosen by Mendelssohn as the subject of one of his most beautiful cantatas, for four solo voices, chorus, and orchestra. The majestic rhythm of Saint Thomas Aquinas's verses loses none of its stateliness in this musical setting. The work was composed for the celebration of this Festival by the Church of St. Martin at Liège, and was first performed there June 11, 1846. Chorley, the English critic who accompanied Mendelssohn on that occasion, has left us in his "Modern German Music" an interesting sketch of its first production. He says:-- "The early summer of 1846 was a great year for the Rhine Land and its adjacent district; since there the Lower Rhenish Festival at Aix-la-Chapelle was conducted by Mendelssohn, and starred by Mlle. Jenny Lind; and within a fortnight afterwards was celebrated at Liège the 'Fête Dieu,' for which his 'Lauda Sion' was written....