d "Mazurka Poetique;" the later (opus
48) is the more original, but the sweet geniality and rapturously
beautiful ending of opus 38 is purer music. "Les Papillons" is marked
with a strange touch of negro color; it is, as it were, an Ethiopiano
piece. Its best point is its cadenza. Smith has a great fondness for
these brilliant precipitations. They not only give further evidence
of his fondness for older schools, but they also partially explain the
fondness of concert performers for his works. His fervid "Love
Sonnet," his "Polonaise de Concert," full of virility as well as
virtuosity, and his delicious "Mill-wheel Song," and a late
composition, a brilliant "Papillon," rich as a butterfly's wing, are
notable among his numerous works. Possibly his largest achievement is
the three concert-transcriptions for two pianos. He has taken pieces
by Grieg, Raff, and Bachmann, and enlarged, enforced, decorated, and
in every way ennobled them. But to me his most fascinatingly original
work is his "Arabesque," an entirely unhackneyed and memorable
composition.

Smith's experience in teaching has crystallized into several pedagogic
works. His "Scale Playing with particular reference to the
development of the third, fourth, and fifth fingers of each hand;" his
"Eight Measure," "Octave," and "Five Minute" studies, have brought the
most unreserved commendation from the most important of our teachers.
A late and most happy scheme has been the use of a set of variations
for technical and interpretative instruction. For this purpose he
wrote his "Themes Arabesques," of which numbers one and eighteen not
only have emotional and artistic interest, but lie in the fingers in a
strangely tickling way.

What might be called a professorial simplicity is seen in many of
Smith's songs. The almost unadorned, strictly essential beauty of his
melodies and accompaniments is neither neglect nor cheapness; it is
restraint to the point of classicism, and romanticism all the intenser
for repression. Take, for example, that perfect song, "If I but
Knew," which would be one of a score of the world's best short songs,
to my thinking. Note the open fifths, horrifying if you thump them
academically, but very brave and straightforward, fitly touched.

There is something of Haydn at his best in this and in the fluty
"Shadow Song," in "The Kiss in the Rain," and "A Sailor's Lassie," for
they are as crystalline and direct as "Papa's" own immortal
"Schaeferlied."