passionately troubled in mind, impudently cool in manner; he is brazen,
calm, shy, fluttered; all these things together. Sometimes in rapid
alternation, sometimes all together in the same moment; and in all this
he is perfectly consistent, he is always one and the same creature.
How does the playwright contrive to make us see all this? By means
of combinations of words expressing one or more of these various
characteristics, by subtle phrases woven out of different shades of
feeling, which glance in irridescent hues like a shot silk, which are
both one thing and another; by means also of various emotions cunningly
adapted to the exact situation, from the timid sentimentality before the
countess, down to the audacious love-making with the waiting-maid; by
means, in short, of a hundred tiny strokes, of words spoken by the page
and of the page, by means of dexterously combined views of the boy
himself, and of the reflection of the boy in the feelings of those who
surround him. Thus far the mere words in the book; but these words
in the book suggest a thousand little inflections of voice, looks,
gestures, movements, manners of standing and walking, flutter of lips
and sparkle of eyes, which exist clear though imaginary in the mind of
the reader, and become clearer, visible, audible in the concrete
representation of the actor.

Thus Cherubino comes to exist. A phantom of the fancy, a little figure
from out of the shadow land of imagination, but present to our mind as
is this floor upon which we tread, alive as is this pulse throbbing
within us. Ask the musician to give us all this with his mere pitch,
and rhythm and harmony and sonority; bid him describe all this in his
language. Alas! in the presence of such a piece of work the musician is
a mere dumb cripple, stammering unintelligible sounds, tottering through
abortive gestures, pointing we know not whither, asking we know not for
what. Passionate music? And is not Othello passionate? Coquettish music?
and is not Susanna coquettish? Tender music? and is not Orpheus tender?
Cool music? and is not Judas Maccabaeus cool? Impudent music? And is not
the snatch of dance tune of a Parisian grisette impudent? And which of
these sorts of music shall fit our Cherubino, be our page? Shall we
fuse, in wonderful nameless abomination of nonsense, all these different
styles, these different suggestions, or shall, as in a masquerade,
this dubious Cherubino never seen with his own face and