each day to learn English grammar, and another hour to improve his writing and orthography! He was impatient of whatever interfered with his favourite pursuits; and the fact is too strikingly characteristic not to be mentioned, that he separated from his wife not many years after his marriage, because she, convinced that he would starve his family by scheming when he should have been shaving, broke some of his experimental models of machinery.

Arkwright was a severe economist of time; and, that he might not waste a moment, he generally travelled with four horses, and at a very rapid speed. His concerns in Derbyshire, Lancashire, and Scotland, were so extensive and numerous as to show at once his astonishing power of transacting business, and his all-grasping spirit. In many of these he had partners, but he generally managed in such a way that, whoever lost, he himself was a gainer.

So un

bounded was his confidence in the success of his machinery, and in the national wealth to be produced by it, that he would make light of discussions on taxation, and say that he would pay the national debt! His speculative schemes were vast and daring; he contemplated entering into the most extensive mercantile transactions, and buying up all the cotton in the world, in order to make an enormous profit by the monopoly; and from the extravagance of some of these designs, his judicious friends were of opinion that, if he had tried to put them in practice, he might have overset the whole fabric of his prosperity."

THAT most of those who are now by universal consent numbered among the benefactors of the human race reaped little benefit from their genius, however actively exerted, is a melancholy truth not to be disputed, and seldom more strongly exemplified than in the instance of the great composer who is the subject of this memoir. He to whom all the really civilized parts of the world are so deeply indebted for the increase, to an almost incalculable amount, of the stock of an intellectual and innocent pleasure, scarcely ever enjoyed a moment's respite from ill-requited labour and corroding anxieties: few, not in a state of actual want, ever suffered more from the evils of poverty; and he who left so valuable a treasure to mankind had not, in the hour of death, the

consolation of feeling that he had been able to secure against the miseries of dependence an affectionate wife and her helpless offspring.

JOHANN CHRYSOSTOMUS - Wolfgang - GotTLIEB MOZART was born at Salzburg, January 26, 1756. His father, Leopold, was sub-chapelmaster, or organist, to the Prince-Archbishop of Salzburg, and a skilful performer on the violin, a valuable treatise on which instrument he published, in quarto, under the title of Violinschule,' in 1769. Whatever time the duties of his office left at his disposal he devoted to the education of his two children, and he began to give his daughter, who was four years older than her brother, instructions on the harpsicord, when the latter had scarcely completed his third year. The boy's strong disposition for music then immediately developed itself; his delight was to seek out thirds on the instrument, and his joy was unbounded when he succeeded in discovering one of these harmonious concords.

In

When Wolfgang had attained his fourth year, says M. Schlichtegroll, his father began, though hardly in earnest, to teach him a few minuets and other short pieces of music. It took the child half an hour to learn a minuet, and proportionately more time to master compositions of greater length. less than two years he had made such progress, that he invented short pieces of music, which his father, to encourage such promising talent, committed to writing. It is to be regretted that not one of these curious manuscripts, if preserved, has ever been produced. Before he began to manifest a predilection for music, his amusements were like those of other children; and so ardent was he in the pursuit of them, that he would willingly have sacrificed his meals rather than be interrupted in his enjoyment. His great sensibility was observable as soon as he

could make his feelings understood. Frequently he said to those about him, "Do you love me well?” and, when in sport he was answered in the negative, tears immediately began to flow. He pursued everything with extraordinary ardour. While learning the elements of arithmetic, the tables, chairs, even the walls, bore in chalk the marks of his calculations. And here it will not be irrelevant to state,-what we believe has never yet appeared in print,—that his talent for the science of numbers was only inferior to that for music: had he not been distinguished by genius of a higher order, it is probable that his calculating powers would have been sufficiently remarkable to bring him into general notice.

When under six years of age Mozart surprised his father, though well accustomed to these premature manifestations of musical genius, by the production of a concerto for the harpsichord, written in every respect according to rule, the only objection to which was its difficulty of execution. This circumstance at once determined Leopold Mozart to let the youthful prodigy be seen at some of the courts of Germany. He therefore carried his whole family, as soon as Wolfgang had completed his sixth year, to Munich, where they were received by the Elector in so flattering a manner, that the party returned to Salzburg to prepare for other visits. In 1762 they proceeded to Vienna, and performed at court. Here Mozart, when sitting down to play, said to the emperor Francis I.,-" Is not M. Wagenseil here? he ought to be present; he understands such matters." The emperor sent for M. Wagenseil. "Sir," said the child to the composer, "I shall play one of your concertos, you must turn the leaves for me." About the same time, a small violin was purchased for him, merely for his amusement; but, while it was supposed to be little more than a toy in his

hands, he made himself so far a master of the instrument, that when Wenzl, the violinist, brought his newly-composed trios to Leopold Mozart for his opinion, Wolfgang supplicated to be allowed to take the second violin part, and accomplished the task as much to the satisfaction of the composer as to the wonder of all.

In 1763 the Mozart family commenced an extended tour, giving concerts in the principal cities through which they passed. In Paris they continued five months, and Wolfgang performed on the organ in the chapelle du roi, in presence of the whole court. There he composed and published his first two works, which, compared with other productions of the day, are by no means trivial. In April, 1764, the party arrived in London, where they remained till the middle of the following year. Here, as in France, the boy exhibited his talents before the royal family, and underwent more severe trials than any to which he had before been exposed, through which he passed in a most triumphant manner. So much interest did he excite in London, that the Hon. Daines Barrington drew up an account of his extraordinary performances, which was read before the Royal Society, and declared by the council of that body to be sufficiently interesting and important to form part of the Philosophical Transactions, in the seventieth volume of which it is published. But, some suspicions having been entertained by many persons that the declared was not the real age of the youthful prodigy, Mr. Barrington obtained, through Count Haslang, then Bavarian minister at the British court, a certificate of Wolfgang's birth, signed by the chaplain of the Archbishop of Salzburg, which at once dispelled all doubts on the subject.

In 1765 the family returned to the continent. At the Hague, where Mozart published six sonatas,