If your soul be not too _drony_, Haste, to hear renowned Masoni! Scarce Napoleon (nick-named Boney) Was more wondrous than Masoni! ‘Pollo’s pet, Euterpe’s crony, Is the exquisite Masoni. All the sweets that live in honey Are concentred in Masoni! Fiddlers _should_ be rich and _toney_— This—and _more_, is great Masoni. Swifter, far, than hare or poney, Run the triplets of Masoni— And Astonishment bends _low_ knee To the flights of high Masoni! Utterly _himself_ unknown he Should be, who _not_ knows Masoni. Dead must be the heart, and _stony_, That is moved not by Masoni! Money, without ceremony, _Shower’d_ should be on Masoni! E’en from Greece Colocotroni Well might come, to hear Masoni! So, again I tell ye, _on’y_ Go, and listen to Masoni! The length to which these notices of the artists of Italy has already extended, is one of the reasons precluding detail with respect to some others of the later names belonging to that country. Paganini, however, is neither to be thus dismissed, nor to be here briefly treated of at the end of a chapter. To him, as standing alone in the history and practice of his art, and as forming an object of very widely-diffused curiosity, I propose devoting a separate notice in the ensuing chapter. I cannot, in the mean time, omit wholly to advert to the name of Spagnoletti, whose taste and refinement, in the conspicuous situation which he filled for so many years in London, rendered him a highly valued model for the attention of our own cultivators of the instrument. Who is there amongst those who were frequenters of the King’s Theatre, during his time of office, that will not recollect, with feelings of interest, the delicate grace of Spagnoletti’s playing—his obviously intense, yet not obtrusive, enthusiasm—and his oft-repeated sidelong depressions of the head, as if to drink in more fully, at the left ear, the delicious tones which he enticed from his own instrument? His peculiar sensitiveness under the impression of a false note, and his liberality of spirit, and readiness to speak commendingly of his brethren of the bow, are among the further traits which denoted him to those who had the opportunity of closer observation. Spagnoletti’s original name is said to have been Paolo Diana. I have heard an anecdote which, if it may be depended on, exemplifies his quickness of temper. It was to the effect that Spagnoletti, having chanced to quarrel one morning with Ambrogetti, challenged him on the spot; and that the singer put aside the abrupt invitation, by the phlegmatic remark that he had _not breakfasted_! CHAPTER III. PAGANINI. “Natura il fece, e poi ruppe la stampa.”—_Ariosto._ “The glory, jest, and riddle of the world.”—_Pope._