.

When the lights were lit, seeing myself in this.
array in the midst of people all extensively got up, I began to be ill at ease; I asked myself if I were in my proper place, if I were properly dressed, and, after a few moments' disquietude, I answered yes, with an intrepidity which arose perhaps more from the impossibility of getting out of it than from the force of my arguments.

After this little dialogue, I plucked up so much, that I should have been quite intrepid if there had been any need of it.

But, whether it were the effect of the master's presence or natural kindness of heart, I observed nothing but what was obliging and civil in the curiosity of which I was the object.
I was steeled against all their gibes, but their caressing air, which I had not expected, overcame me so completely, that I trembled like a child when things began.

I heard all about me a whispering of women who seemed to me as beautiful as angels, and who said to one another below their breath, 'This is charming, this is enchanting: there is not a note that does not appeal to the heart.' The, pleasure of causing emotion in so many lovable persons moved me myself to tears." The emotions of the eighteenth century were vivid and easily roused; fastening upon everything without any earnest purpose, and without any great sense of responsibility, it grew as hot over a musical dispute as over the gravest questions of morality or philosophy.