have been seen in the Crystal Palace, in that
department of the Exhibition which is devoted
to the productions of Guiana.

A MUSICIAN IN CALIFORNIA.

MR. HENRY HERZ, the distinguished pianist,
has returned to Paris, after a long tour in
America, which included a visit to California.
To his friend, M. Fiorentino, the famous
feuilletonist, he seems to have given an
account of his adventures; and that gentleman,
not being able to resist so tempting a
"subject," has enlightened the readers of one
of the French newspapers with an account of
the state and prospects of music in California.
From this source we draw the following
sketch of the musician's career in the
Western Dorado:—

Towards the end of February, 1850, the
American imagination was at its highest
degree of fever and delirium. People spoke,
dreamed, but of one thing—of gold mines
and California. Professional men—even the
most prosperous of the class—were not proof
against the contagion, nor was Henry Herz,
the celebrated pianist, an exception. We
accordingly find him leaving the disconsolate
dilettanti of the United States to manage as
they best could without him, and condemning
himself to the bad accommodation and worse
company of an emigrant ship. The ships that
convey emigrants to California, it should be
observed, are even worse than most of their
class. Dr. Johnson described a ship as " a
prison, with a chance of being drowned;"
but these particular ships are prisons, with
the chance not only of being drowned, but of
being starved, poisoned, or suffocated on the
voyage, and very likely murdered at your
journey's end. Our voyager, however,
fortunately escaped all these calamities, and on
entering the port of St. Francisco felt himself
somewhat recompensed, by the novelty of the
scene, for all the hardships he had undergone.
A forest of masts rising from vessels carrying
the colours of every nation of the earth;—an
agitation; a movement; a confusion of cries,
of languages, of orders crossing one another;
of merchandise being disembarked; of joyous
choruses and frightful oaths. Such was the
spectacle which presented itself. One would
have thought it the port of Liverpool or
Marseilles, at least, to judge by the great
display of wealth, the even greater display of
activity, and the ceaseless and bewildering
noise.

But the admiration which M. Herz had
conceived in the first place, diminished
sensibly with the first steps which he took in the
city. Most of the streets he found to be
impassable. What they call a road in San
Francisco is simply a canal of mud, through
which the traveller wades (so we are assured)
above his knees. If they had gondolas, as at
Venice, this would be endurable; but here
there is nothing of the kind. The footpaths,
less convenient than picturesque, were formed
of planks and empty boxes and barrels, nailed
together with every degree of insecurity. The
first performance—not in a musical sense—of
the pianist was to find out a lodging: by no
means an easy matter at San Francisco. The
hotels were detestable, and beyond all price.
After much wandering—or, rather, wading—
through the streets, he at last found an
intelligent plebeian who offered him accommodation,
in the only apartment which he had
vacant, for six dollars a day. The room, to
be sure, was not much larger than a sentry-box,
but M. Herz not being addicted to
"swinging cats "—as the phrase goes—found
it less inconvenient than would a gentleman
under the influence of that propensity. He
was, in the main, well satisfied; he was
certainly the first pianist who had penetrated
into those far-off regions; it would be curious
to try the power of music on the half-savage
people, who would probably bend their knees
before a piano, like the Americans described
by Columbus at the view of the first eclipse.

As he sat cherishing this flattering idea,
some one tapped at the door, which opening,
revealed a young man, whose long fair hair
and Germanic accent sufficiently indicated his
country. He believed he had the pleasure of
speaking to the celebrated Henry Herz;—
was he right? Certainly: but if he intended
to enter the celebrated man's room, it would
be necessary, in the first place, that the
celebrated man should himself withdraw through
the window, as the apartment was not
adapted to carrying double.

"That is precisely what brought me here,"
said the young man with the fair hair, "to
induce you to quit your lodgings. The
furniture is very beautiful, I admit, and the
house has a superb appearance; but it is
necessary to be on one's guard against these
houses at Francisco. They build them too
quickly; they economise their foundations,
and the soil not being very firm, it not
unfrequently happens that people who go to sleep
in the garret, awake in the cellar."

The musician opened his eyes, thanked his
informant for the advice given, and asked for
more. Where should he go to lodge?

"I came," said the young man, " to ask you
to lodge with me."

"You are, then, an hotel-keeper?"

"No, sir, I am a pianist."

"Pianist! " cried Henry, starting back.
Foreign pianists do not meet in such a place
as California, and pass one another with a lift
of the hat, like English gentlemen in the
desert. Everybody knows the story of the
Englishman who believed himself to be the
first who had climbed to the top of some
high mountain, and who, on putting his hand
into an opening in a rock, found the visiting
card of a countryman. Henry Herz was
about as much astonished at finding a brother
pianist in California.