the master in the latter's presence, and when he had
finished, Reinken seized him by the hand, and as he shook it exclaimed
with emotion, 'I thought that this art was dead, but I see that it
still lives in you!' This was the last meeting between Bach and the
organist from whose playing he had derived so much profit, for shortly
afterwards Reinken died at the age of ninety-nine, holding his post up
to the last.

His life at Coethen was largely devoted to composition. His only pupils
appear to have been his wife and his sons, in whose musical education
he evinced the deepest interest, and for whose benefit he wrote many
works, including several books of studies and his famous 'Art of
Fugue.'[1] Another of his great works, the 'Wohltemperirte Klavier'
(Well-tempered Clavichord), better known in England under the title of
'The Forty-eight Preludes and Fugues,' was begun at this time. It is,
perhaps, the most popular of all Bach's works, and the idea of writing
it is said to have occurred to him whilst staying at a place where no
musical instrument of any kind was available. That he should have sat
down to write the first part of this monumental work (the second part
was not completed until twenty years later) in a place where from
sheer force of circumstances his fingers would otherwise have been
condemned to idleness is not surprising when we consider the mental
activity by which Bach's character was distinguished. He could not, in
fact, be idle. When not playing, or composing, or teaching, he would
often be found hard at work engraving his compositions on copper, or
engaged in manufacturing some kind of musical instrument--at least two
instruments are known to have been of his own inventing. The one idea
which seems to have pervaded his whole life from beginning to end was
to be of the greatest use to the greatest number of his
fellow-creatures, and it was this noble purpose which was urging him
at this time to discover a wider sphere of work. The Coethen post,
while it gave him abundant leisure for composition, did not satisfy
his longing to be of greater use in the furtherance of his art--a
longing which can only be appreciated when we study the works which at
this period were occupying his mind. Moreover, the Prince, who had
recently married, no longer showed the same devotion to music as
heretofore--a change of feeling that necessarily produced a
corresponding slackening of the ties of friendship and interest which
h