MAX MrLLER.
[To THE EDITOR OP THE "SPECTATOR."] SIR,—In your notice of Professor Max Miiller's Life in the Spectator of February 28th the writer says : "Dr. Elwes, organist of New College, abused him to his face for intro- ducing 'such flimsy music as Mendelssohn's Hymn of Praise." I presume he means Dr. Elvey, who was organist at that time. I knew him well as conductor of the University Amateur Musical Society, of which I was a member. He was a noted Handelian ; for the music of Mendelssohn and his imitators he had a dislike almost amounting to contempt. But Handel he almost worshipped. I remember once, after we had sung through the chorus in Samson, "Then round about the starry throne," which concludes with the words, "And triumph over death and thee, 0 Time," Elvey paused awhile, and looking up to a portrait of the composer that hung just over his pianoforte, be exclaimed: "Triumph over death"; he has done it, he has done it!" Perhaps the two are together
now; who knows P—I am, Sir, &c., C. S. JERBAX.
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