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STORIES OF
is related by our author in a very touching story. Only a few months after Sir Arthur Sullivan had accepted the post of Principal of the National Training School for Music, he received a severe blow in the death of his brother Frederick, whose talents as an actor will be remembered. For nearly three weeks he watched by the sick man's bedside night and day. One evening, when the end was rapidly approaching, the sufferer had for a time sunk into a peaceful sleep, and as his faithful attendant was sitting as usual by his bedside, it chanced that he took up some verses by the late Adelaide Anne Procter, with which he had for some time been impressed. Now in the stillness of the night he read them over again, and almost as he did so he conceived their " musical equivalent." A sheet of music paper was at hand, and he began to write. Slowly the music grew and took shape, until, becoming absorbed in it, he deter-mined to finish the song, thinking that even if in the cold light of day it should appear worthless, it would at least have helped to pass the weary hours, so he went on till the last bar was added. Thus was composed " The Lost Chord," a song of which the sale up to the present has exceeded a quarter of a million copies. There is a story connected with " Once Again," I believe, to the
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