ime to time we note a change in
the depth of tone but we are unable to distinguish the pitch of the
chords.

I shall never forget the impression this _Tuba Mirum_ made on me when I
first heard it at St. Eustache under Berlioz's own direction. It
amounted to an absolute neglect of the author's directions. The
beginning of the work is marked _moderato_, later, as the brass comes
in, the movement is quickened and becomes _andante maestro_. Most of the
time the _moderato_ was interpreted as an _allegro_, and the _andante
maestro_ as a simple _moderato_. If the terrific fanfare did not
become, as some one ventured to call it, a "Setting Out for the Hunt,"
it might well have been the accompaniment for a sovereign's entrance to
his capital. In order to give this fanfare its grandiose character, the
author did not take easy refuge in the wailings of a minor key, but he
burst into the splendors of a major key. A certain grandeur of movement
alone can preserve its gigantesque quality and impression of power.

Granting all his good intentions, in trying to give us a suggestion of
the last judgment by his accumulation of brass, drums, cymbals, and
tam-tams, Berlioz makes us think of Thor among the giants trying to
empty the drinking-horn which was filled from the sea, and only
succeeding in lowering it a little. Yet even that was an accomplishment.

Berlioz spoke scornfully of Mozart's _Tuba Mirum_ with its single
trombone. "One trombone," he exclaimed, "when a hundred would be none
too many!" Berlioz wanted to make us really hear the trumpets of the
archangels. Mozart with the seven notes of his one trombone suggested
the same idea and the suggestion is sufficient.

We must not forget, however, that here we are in the midst of a world of
romanticism, in a world of color and picturesqueness, which could not
content itself with so little. And we must remember this fact, if we
would not be irritated by the oddities of _L'Hostias_, with its deep
trombone notes which seem to come from the very depths of Hell. There is
no use in trying to find out what these notes mean. Berlioz told us
himself that he discovered these notes at a time when they were almost
unknown and he wanted to use them. The contrast between these terrifying
notes and the wailing of the flutes is especially curious. We find
nothing analogous to this anywhere else.

The delightful _Purgatoire_, where the author sees a chorus of souls in
Purgatory, is much better.