130.—LISZT'S PLAYING AND HIS GENEROSITY.
Franz Liszt was the Paganini of the pianoforte. We can hardly realize at this day the excitement he created by his wonderful playing. Europe had seen many great players, among them Hummel, Herz, and Thalberg; but no one of them aroused the public to such a pitch of ecstatic enthusiasm as did Liszt. They conquered by their mere brilliancy of effects; he by his greatness of intellect and his poetry of conception, united with a technical skill that was beyond the limits of their comprehension.
He had a certain majesty of bearing, a commanding sway; he carried his audience by his strong personal magnetism. He would come on the concert stage with the step of a conqueror. Tearing his gloves from his hands, he would seat himself at the piano, run his fingers through his hair, and then attack the instrument with the mien of a commanding general. Whether it was because of his magnificent playing, or whether the surrounding excitement reacted on their sensitive natures, the feminine part of his audience would go wild with excitement. Ladies of high rank would throw their jewels at his feet, and perhaps faint in their ecstacy. After the concert there would be a wild rush for the stage to see Liszt, and even to touch the hem of his garment, and to contend for the pieces of broken piano strings that Liszt had shattered in his playing.
As Jenny Lind was noted among singers for her generosity, so was Liszt among pianists. A prominent instance of this was when thousands of his countrymen were rendered homeless by an inundation of the Danube. Though Liszt was in Italy, he hastened to Vienna the next morning after hearing the news, and there he began giving concerts for the benefit of the stricken people; and it was not for two months that he ceased, by means of his art, to pour a flood of gold into Hungary.
It is said that his direct contributions to charity, if added to the amounts which he raised by his concerts, would make a sum-total of millions. With his wonderful art, his extensive learning, his magnetic temperament, his kindness of heart, his broad sympathies, and his great beneficence, it is little to be wondered that he was worshiped by all who knew him.