now.[2]

'Did you sit together on Wednesday over the egg-punch? Write to me about it and anything else.[3]

'The publishers here, especially Spina and Levi, have been pressing me for things since the quartet, but much pleases me better in North Germany and particularly the publishers, and I would rather go without the two or three extra Louis-d'ors that these would perhaps pay.

'Does Avé often go to see you? Has he told you anything particular about Stockhausen?

'How about the photograph of the girls' quartet? Am I not to have it? N.B. Every time I write I forget to ask about Fritz.... Is he very industrious? He ought to make up his mind to give Trio concerts in Hamburg next winter. I would help him in every way....

'Write soon and have love

'from your

'Johannes.

'Hearty greetings to Herr Marxsen, and do not forget about Börsendorfer.'[4]

The two Pianoforte Quartets were despatched to Simrock, and were published by the firm early in 1863—the first one in G minor, being dedicated to Baron Reinhard von Dalwigk, Court Intendant to the Grand-Duke of Oldenburg, a really musical amateur and a warm supporter of Brahms; and the second, in A major, to Frau Dr. Elisabeth Rösing of Hamm, in whose house it was written.

The tone of the above extracts tells how lovingly the composer's thoughts turned to his home at the moment he was feeling conscious of a real success; and the question about Stockhausen may be taken as an indication of the clinging wistfulness with which he was bringing himself to resign the hope of being able to settle near his family as conductor of the Philharmonic—a position he would at the time have been proud to accept. The decision of the committee was now almost a foregone conclusion, though it was not formally arrived at till the following year. What it was may be told in the following extract from a letter written to Avé Lallement on January 31, 1863, by Joachim, whose influence with the committee had been energetically exerted in favour of his Johannes:

'... What can I say further about your plan with Stockhausen? You know how highly I esteem his talent, and he is certainly the best musician among the singers, but how anyone, having to choose the director of a concert institution between him and Johannes, can decide for the former, I, with my limited musical understanding, cannot comprehend! It is precisely as a man upon whom one can rely that I regard Johannes so highly, with his gifts and his will! There is nothing he cannot undertake, and, with his earnestness, overcome! You know that as well as I, and if all of you in the committee and orchestra had met him with confidence and affection (as you, his friend, always do in private) instead of with doubt and airs of protection, it would have removed the asperity from his nature; whereas it must constantly make him more bitter, with his touching, almost childlike patriotism for Hamburg, to see himself put second. I dare not dwell on the thought, it would make me too unhappy, that his narrow compatriots have deprived themselves of the means of making him more contented and gentle, and happier in the exercise of his genius. I should like to give the committee a moral cudgelling (and a bodily one too!) for having left you in the lurch with your plan. The slight to Johannes will not be forgotten in the history of art! But basta!'[5]

To the advertisement of the Hamburg Philharmonic programme of March 6, 1863, the words were added, 'Herr Julius Stockhausen has kindly undertaken to conduct the second and third numbers'; and a fortnight later Stockhausen's appointment as capellmeister to the society for the following season, 1863-64, was announced.

Meanwhile Johannes in Vienna may still, in the beginning of November, 1862, have clung to hope in view of the forthcoming performance of his serenade at the Gesellschaft concert of the 14th under Herbeck. The reception of the work proved, in fact, as favourable as might reasonably have been expected. It was listened to with respect by public and critics, and some of its parts, notably the first minuet, were greeted with manifestations of decided approval.

'The serenade, a fine, interesting, and intellectual work, deserved warmer acknowledgment,' wrote Speidel in the Wiener Zeitung. Hanslick, in the Presse, pronounced it one of the most charming of modern orchestral compositions, but took exception to the first subject of the opening movement, as he had objected to that of the A major Quartet, as being workable rather than original or significant.

'The first minuet seems to us the pearl of the work and perhaps the prettiest movement as yet written by Brahms. The instrumental colouring and the grace of the melody give it the characteristic of night music, and it is full of moonlight and the scent of lilac.'

A remarkable review—remarkable from its admirable appreciation of Brahms' creative personality—was despatched to Leipzig by the Vienna correspondent of the Neue Zeitschrift, who signs himself 'S.,' and appeared in the Vienna résumé contained in the paper's issue of March 23:

'As regards Brahms' serenade which has been favourably received, albeit in my opinion too severely criticised, only thus much; it is one of the most charming examples, not only of the class of composition from which it has sprung, but of all that has followed Beethoven up to the comprehensive conquests, as to contents and form, of the rising New Germany.

'It is fresh and rich in themes of which nearly every one is pervaded by a rare grace, and a brightness of tone becoming every day more unusual. The score convincingly exhibits, moreover, one of the most prominent sides of Brahms' musical individuality. I would call this a power of refashioning, in the best spirit of the present day, the contrapuntal forms of canon and fugue and of their degenerate and inferior representatives. Brahms succeeds in this, as in the majority of his works, in reconsecrating and carrying on the spiritual treasure inherited from Bach, Beethoven and Schumann, in the light of modernity. This fundamental characteristic is still more striking in a second great work of the composer, for the hearing of which opportunity is promised. I will therefore go on to remark on the orchestral colouring of the serenade, which, without being exaggerated, is, throughout, fresh and significant of youthful power. I should find it very difficult to express a preference for either of the six movements, whilst to speak of either of the several parts of this, in its way, masterly whole as inferior in excellence to others, appears to me utterly impossible. The vox populi, however, with which the principal journals here coincide on this occasion, has pronounced in favour of the first minuet and scherzo and the certainly wonderfully tender