THE MUSIC LESSON

"The Music Lesson" shows us part of a room in the house of some wealthy Dutch family. The floor is paved with squares of black and white marble, and the table is covered with a heavy Persian cloth. Far back, against the light gray wall, is a spinet with an inlaid case. A young lady stands before it; her hands rest on the keyboard of the instrument, and her head and shoulders are reflected in the mirror hanging above it. The music master, who is richly dressed in the fashion of the day, listens attentively to his pupil. He rests one arm upon the spinet, and in his other hand he holds the bow of his violoncello, which lies on the floor near by.

Vermeer of Delft painted many pictures like this one,quiet, little every-day scenes, which show the life of Holland at that time. The people in his pictures always seem to be really thinking about what they are doing. They are not posing for the artist.

Vermeer won his greatest success as a painter of light and sunshine. In his pictures the air and the light seem to move and quiver just as they do in nature. And so the important thing in "The Music Lesson" is the light which comes through the casement windows at one side. It falls upon the two people at the spinet and touches some parts of the room with radiance, leaving other parts in soft, dusky shadow.

VERMEER OF DELFT

(1632-1675)

Jan Vermeer was born at the city of Delft in Holland. As his name was a very common one he was called "Vermeer of Delft" to distinguish him from other Jan Vermeers. We know almost nothing about him except that he was at first extremely poor, that he became successful and prosperous, and that when he died he left a family of eight children. He was one of the very great painters of all time.

XVI

THE WRITING OF THE MARSEILLAISE You have heard of the brave young Marquis de Lafayette who aided the Americans during the Revolution. When the United States was at last free, Lafayette and the other French soldiers who had come to our assistance returned to France. They were full of admiration for the young republic which they had helped to set up, and they began to wonder whether France could not be made a republic also.

For the King and Queen of France, although they were good and kind, did not know how to rule their country well. The nobles were very selfish, while the common people were very poor, ignorant and discontented and were allowed no voice in the government. It is small wonder that many Frenchmen said: "Let us

set aside our King and Queen, and have a republic, like the Americans."

Gradually the feeling that France must have a different form of government grew stronger and stronger. The people began to demand their liberty. The Queen of France at that time was the beautiful Marie Antoinette. Before her marriage she had been an Austrian princess, and you may remember that she was kind to little Mozart when he was at the Austrian court. As soon as it became evident that Marie Antoinette and her husband, Louis XVI, were in danger of losing their power, the Austrians raised an army to go to their rescue. The Prussians joined the Austrians. So France declared war against both Austria and Prussia, and sent out a call to arms.

Just at this exciting time, when all the French were preparing to fight the foreign invaders, the Mayor of Strassburg (which was then a French city) gave a banquet in honor of the soldiers. In Strassburg the enthusiasm for the war was tremendous. There had been a religious ceremony at the cathedral, and a grand musical celebration in the open air, banquets for the aged poor people and for the orphans, and, last of all, Mayor Dietrich's great dinner of farewell. On the next day the officers and volunteers were to march away, and Dietrich's two sons would be among them.

Of course all the talk at the last great dinner was of battles and victories. Someone spoke of patriotic songs.

Mayor Dietrich said that he would offer a prize for a good war song which would rouse the men of France to fight for their country.

Suddenly a different idea occurred to him. He turned to one of his guests, Rouget de Lisle, a military engineer. This young man was already known as a poet, a novelist, a musical composer, and a writer of plays. None of his works had been very remarkable, but they showed promise. So Dietrich suggested that Rouget de Lisle should compose a song for the French soldiers.

De Lisle at first tried to excuse himself. But when the banquet was over and the guests were saying farewell, realizing that perhaps they might never meet again, De Lisle's patriotic enthusiasm rose to fever heat. He went to his lodgings near by, but he could not sleep. His violin lay on the table. Taking it up, he tried a few chords. It seemed as if a melody grew under his fingers, harmonizing with the patriotic words that came into his mind.

Sometimes he composed the melody before the words, sometimes the words before the melody, so that he himself could not tell whether the notes or the verses came first. He strummed on his harpsichord, he wrote and hummed, and spent many hours trying over the song and rearranging it. At last it was finished. He threw himself down on his bed and slept heavily. He did not know that in those few hours he had won undying fame.