maintained that he had copied all of them.
Niecks does not credit him altogether, for there are letters in which
several of the Preludes are mentioned as being sent to Paris, so he
reaches the conclusion that "Chopin's labors at Majorca on the Preludes
were confined to selecting, filing and polishing." This seems to be a
sensible solution.

Robert Schumann wrote of these Preludes: "I must signalize them as most
remarkable. I will confess I expected something quite different,
carried out in the grand style of his studies. It is almost the
contrary here; these are sketches, the beginning of studies, or, if you
will, ruins, eagles' feathers, all strangely intermingled. But in every
piece we find in his own hand, 'Frederic Chopin wrote it.' One
recognizes him in his pauses, in his impetuous respiration. He is the
boldest, the proudest poet soul of his time. To be sure the book also
contains some morbid, feverish, repellant traits; but let everyone look
in it for something that will enchant him. Philistines, however, must
keep away."

It was in these Preludes that Ignaz Moscheles first comprehended Chopin
and his methods of execution. The German pianist had found his music
harsh and dilettantish in modulation, but Chopin's originality of
performance--"he glides lightly over the keys in a fairy-like way with
his delicate fingers"--quite reconciled the elder man to this strange
music.

To Liszt the Preludes seem modestly named, but "are not the less types
of perfection in a mode created by himself, and stamped like all his
other works with the high impress of his poetic genius. Written in the
commencement of his career, they are characterized by a youthful vigor
not to be found in some of his subsequent works, even when more
elaborate, finished and richer in combinations; a vigor which is
entirely lost in his latest productions, marked by an overexcited
sensibility, a morbid irritability, and giving painful intimations of
his own state of suffering and exhaustion."

Liszt, as usual, erred on the sentimental side. Chopin, being
essentially a man of moods, like many great men, and not necessarily
feminine in this respect, cannot always be pinned down to any
particular period. Several of the Preludes are very morbid--I purposely
use this word--as is some of his early music, while he seems quite gay
just before his death.

"The Preludes follow out no technical idea, are free creations on a
small basis, and exhibit the music