"The small hall of the Mendelssohn Glee Club was crowded to listen to
the polished playing of the Boston Squintet Club last night. It was a
graciously inclined audience, and after

Haydn, Grieg, and Brahms had been disclosed, it departed in one of
those frames of mind that the chronicler of music events can safely
denominate as happy. There were many reasons, which may not be
proclaimed now why this should be thus. The first quartet, one of the
blithest, airiest, and most serene of Papa Haydn's, was published
with absolute finish, if not with abandon. Its naive measures were
never obsessed by the straining after modernity. The Grieg is hardly
strict quartet music. It has a savor, a flavor, a perfume, an odor,
even a sturdy smell of the Norway pine and fjord; but it is lacking
woefully in repose and euphony, and at times it verges perilously on
the cacophonous. Mr. Casnoozle and his gifted associates played a
marvelous accord and slid over all the yawning tonal precipices, but,
heavens, how they did perspire! The Brahms Quartet--"

"I protest," said Mr. Blink, hastily rising. "I've been insulted ever
since I entered the building. Why, the very name of the institution is
an insult to modern musicians! Brahms! why, good heavens, Brahms is only
a whitewashed Hummel! And to think of these young minds being poisoned
by such antique rot as Brahms' music!"

In a moment the committee was on its legs howling and jabbering; poor
Mr. Quelson vainly endeavoring to keep order. After ten minutes of
rowing, during which the class sang _The Night That Larry Was
Stretched_, Dr. Nopkin was pushed over the piano and fell on the treble
and hurt his lungs. The noise brought to their senses the irate men, and
then, to their consternation, they discovered that the class had sneaked
off during the racket, and on the blackboard was written: "Oh, we don't
know, you're not so critical!"

"My Lord," groaned Mr. Quelson, "they have gone to that infernal
Gregorian chant-cricket match; wait till I get hold of that Palestrina
McVickar!"

The committee left in a bad humor on the next train, and the principal
of Brahms Institute gave his class a vacation. Hereafter he will do his
own examining.

XX

A WONDER CHILD

A recent event in the musical world of Laputa has been of such
extraordinary moment as to warrant me in making some communication of
same to your valuable sheet, a