The Angel Of Music

A passage from Gaston Leroux's The Phantom of the Opera.

" 'Little Lotte thought of everything and nothing. Her hair was gold as the sun's rays and her soul as clear and blue as her eyes. She wheedled her mother, was kind to her doll, took great care of her frock and her little red shoes and her fiddle, but most of all loved, when she went to sleep, to hear the Angel of Music...'

"While the old man told this story, Raoul looked at Christine's blue eyes and golden hair; and Christine thought that Lotte was very lucky to hear the Angel of Music when she went to sleep. The Angel of Music played a part in all of Daddy Daae's tales; and he maintained that every great musician, every great artist received a visit from the Angel at least once in his life. Sometimes, the Angel leans over their cradle, as happened to Lotte; and that is how there are little prodigies who play the fiddle at six better than men at fifty, which, you must admit, is very wonderful. Sometimes, the Angel comes much later, because the children are naughty and won't learn their lessons or practice their scales. And sometimes, he does not come at all, because the children have a wicked heart or a bad conscience.

"No one ever sees the Angel; but he is heard by those who are meant to hear him. He often comes when they least expect him, when they feel sad and discouraged. Then their ears suddenly perceive celestial harmonies, a divine voice, which they remember all their lives long. Persons who are visited by the Angel quiver with a thrill unknown to the rest of mankind. And they cannot touch an instrument or open their mouths to sing, without producing sounds that put all other human sounds to shame. Then people who do not know that the Angel has visited these persons say that they have 'genius.' "