22 NOVEMBER 1873, Page 21

CURRENT LITERATURE.

Life of Moseheles. By his Wife. Translated from the German by A. D. Coleridge. (Hurst and Blackett.)—These two volumes will interest lovers' of music. They are the very nicely written and excel- lently translated memoirs—taken partly from Moscheles's own diary and letters—of the very, exceptionally long and happy life of a composer and performer. The tone of them—as the tone of a wife's memoir is apt to be, and ought to be--is one of unmixed faith and belief in the perfections, Trofessional and private, of her husband ; but she has nowhere to fight the battles of a persecuted or even neglected musician, as is too often the gale with the biographers of members of that sensitive and jealous pro- fession. We fancy there is more true sympathy and artistic fellowship 'arnongst Gorman than amongst English or Italian musicians. Madame 3loseheles' book, at any rate, is the record of one long triumph—from -Vienna, where his course commenced, to Loipzie, where it ended—of ono almost uninterrupted spell of pleased success and simple happiness. As Herr Mosoheles say; " I am always the fortunate Prince, my de- tractors cannot do me any harm, so they are obliged at last to become my friends." And friends he had, from the poor music-master in his lodging to the Emperor on his throne. Though we do not find anything very important, we find many interesting details that are new about com- posers. and compositions and their reception; which will add something to the history of music in this century. Of Beethoven and Mendelssohn —whose early music-master Moscheles was—we have especially many interesting particulars.