"Do you expect to see Langhetti when you reach England?" asked Brandon, abruptly.
The character of Beatrice unfolded more and more every day, and every new development excited the wonder of Brandon.
She said once that music was to her like the breath of life, and indeed it seemed to be; for now, since Brandon had witnessed her powers, he noticed how all her thoughts took a coloring from this. What most surprised him was her profound acquirements in the more difficult branches of the art. It was not merely the case of a great natural gift of voice. Her whole soul seemed imbued with those subtle influences which music can most of all bestow. Her whole life seemed to have been passed in one long intercourse with the greatest works of the greatest masters. All their works were perfectly well known to her. A marvelous memory enabled her to have their choicest productions at command; and Brandon, who in the early part of his life had received a careful musical education, knew enough about it to estimate rightly the full extent of the genius of his companion, and to be astonished thereat.
Her mind was also full of stories about the lives, acts, and words of the great masters. For her they formed the only world with which she cared to be acquainted, and the only heroes whom she had power to admire. All this flowed from one profound central feeling--namely, a deep and all-absorbing love of this most divine art. To her it was more than art. It was a new faculty to him who possessed it. It was the highest power of utterance--such utterance as belongs to the angels; such utterance as, when possessed by man, raises him almost to an equality with them.
Brandon found out every day some new power in her genius. Now her voice was unloosed from the bonds which she had placed upon it. She sang, she said, because it was better than talking. Words were weak--song was all expression. Nor was it enough for her to take the compositions of others. Those were infinitely better, she said, than any thing which she could produce; but each one must have his own native expression; and there were times when she had to sing from herself. To Brandon this seemed the most amazing of her powers. In Italy the power of improvisation is not uncommon, and Englishmen generally imagine that this is on account of some peculiar quality of the Italian language. This is not the case. One can improvise in any language; and Brandon found that Beatrice could do this with the English.