86.—PLAYING ON A SHOE.
The following story places Paganini in a better light than this musical miser was accustomed to appear. And really one is led to wonder which is the true Paganini—the miser or the kind artist giving his talent to assist a poor servant girl. One morning the maid who waited on him in Paris came to him, weeping, and told how her lover had been conscripted and sent away to the war, and she, of course, was too poor to buy a substitute for him.
Paganini resolved to aid the girl and took a unique way to do it. He procured a wooden shoe and so fashioned it that it could be strung up and played like a fiddle. Then he advertised that he would give a concert and play five pieces on the violin and five on a wooden shoe. Of course, this strange announcement drew a good house. The violinist had given the girl tickets to the concert, and after it was over he went to her, and pouring twenty thousand francs into her lap, he told her that she could now purchase a substitute for her sweetheart and with the remainder set up housekeeping. He also gave her the wooden shoe that had brought her such good fortune and told her to sell it. Of course, this curious instrument brought her a goodly sum, which she added to the amount which was to bring her domestic happiness.