Our temporary fellowship with Liszt procured for us a delightful
participation in a tribute of admiration from the citizen workmen of
Coblentz, that was what the French call _saissant_. We were sitting
all in our hotel drawing-room together, the _maestro_ as usual
smoking his long pipe, when a sudden burst of music made us throw
open the window and go out on the balcony, when Liszt was greeted by
a magnificent chorus of nearly two hundred men's voices; they sang
to perfection, each with his small sheet of music and his sheltered
light in his hand, and the performance, which was the only one of
the sort I ever heard, gave a wonderful impression of the musical
capacity of the only really musical nation in the world.]