The Wandering Minstrel:An Eighteenth-Century Fiction?

Patricia Howard

Of all the various productions of the press, none are so eagerly received'" as the writings of travellers."t Travellers' tales formed one of the

most popular genres of eighteenth-century literature. The fact that travelitself was becoming easier and safer stimulated rather than quenched thethirst for descriptions of serious scientific inquiries, accounts of the GrandTour, quests for romantic landscape, and investigations into the curiousmanners and customs of societies near and far. Travel books were publishedin proliferation, widely read, and frequently referred to by other travellers,so that a chain of reception can often be established. A seminal text, JosephAddison's Remarks on Several parts of Italy (1705)2 shaped the aims andambitions ofmany travellers embarking on their own tours, Boswell amongthem: "I shall certainly take Addison's Travels with me, as you hint. Ishall read them abroad, with high relish."3 Almost as influential, and not

I Ralph Griffiths, Monthly Review 38 (March 1768), 174.

2 Nine further editions were published in London between 1718 and 1767, in addition to editions inGlasgow (1755) and Dublin (1773). It was also translated into French (1722) and Dutch (1724).

3 Boswell to John Johnston, 23 July 1763, in The Correspondence of James Boswell and JohnJohllSton of Grange, ed. Ralph S. Walker (London: Heinemann, 1966), p. 98. Addison's readersare discussed in Charles L. Batten, Pleasllrable Instruction: Form and Convention in Eighteenth­Centlll}' Travel Literatllre (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978); and Percy G. Adams,Travel Literatllre and the Evoilltioll of the Novel (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1983).

EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY FICTION, Volume 13, Number I, October 2000

42 EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY FICTION

only with musicians, were Charles Burney's two journals, The PresentState ofMusic in France and Italy (1771) and The Present State ofMusicin Germany, the Netherlands, and United Provinces (1773). Such workswere read throughout Europe, and national pride was often wounded bythe readiness of authors to pronounce on the countries and customs theyvisited so fleetingly. Johann Friedrich Reichardt, who wrote accounts ofhis own musical journeys, twice attacked Burney's imperfect knowledgeand faulty judgment, declaring that "I would state openly that Mr Burneyis a poor observer of things musical." (Burney's reply was more subtlyphrased: "Reichardt is an animated and rapid writer and composer ... apatriotic and decisive critic.")4

The classification of Addison's Remarks and Burney's tour-journals asnon-fiction is unproblematic, but the boundary between travel fact andtravel fiction was often muddied, sometimes deliberately SO.5 Practicalguide books with no literary pretensions, such as Thomas Taylor's Gen­tleman's Pocket Companion for Travelling into Foreign Parts (1722) orJoachim Nemeitz's Sejour de Paris (1727), lie at one end of a spectrum,which encompasses both blatant fraud-for example, William Symson'sNew Voyage to the East Indies (1715), a totally fictitious work by an inven­ted author, purporting to be a true record of a journey-and narratives inwhich "every fact hath its foundation in truth," as Fielding declared of hisJournal of a Voyage to Lisbon (1755). Novels with travel as a theme ex­tended the genre into imaginative fiction, and, as with travel journals, theborderline between fact and fiction is sometimes indistinct. While no oneis likely to take Candide (1758) as a record of Voltaire's own adventures, toread Smollet's Expedition ofHumphry Clinker (1771) as equally fictitiousis to miss important biographical clues. 6 Andjust as we can trace factual ex­periences in novels, some narratives claiming to be true accounts can befound to bear the imprint of a well-read rather than a well-travelled au-

4 "leh sagte es doch unverholen--daB Herr Burney ein schlechter musikalischer Beobachter is!."Johann Friedrich Reichardt, Brie.fe eines al!flllerksalllen Reisenden die Musik betre.ffend (Frankfurtand Leipzig, 1776), vol. I, letter 3, p. 65; see also vol. 2 (Frankfurt and Breslau, 1776), letter 9, p.123. Charles Burney, A General HistOl)' ofMusic (London, 1786-89), ed. Frank Mercer (1786-89;London and New York, 1935; reprinted, New York: Dover, 1957), vol. 2, p. 960.

5 See Percy G. Adams, Travelers aud Travel Liars: 1660-1800 (Berkeley: University of CaliforniaPress, 1962).

6 See Charles L. Batten, "HUlllplll)' Clinker and Eighteenth-Century Travel," Genre 7 (1974), 392­408.

THE WANDERING MINSTREL 43

thor. A case in point arises in a travel narrative from the life of the composerChristoph Gluck (1714-1787).7

The year 1774 was a high point in Gluck's life. At the age of sixty, after acareer of mixed fortunes in opera houses across Europe, he arrived in Parisan international celebrity, and began five of the most successful years of hiscareer. Between establishing himself at the Paris Opera and securing thepatronage of the dauphine Marie Antoinette,S he enjoyed the hospitalityof many illustrious hosts. On first arriving in Paris he was the guest ofDuke Christian IV of Zweibriicken, under whose aegis he was launchedinto the heart of Parisian society through his affiliation to one of the mostpowerful Masonic lodges in the capital, the Saint-Jean d'Ecosse du ContratSocial,9 He rapidly became a sought-after guest in many houses, numberingamong his hosts abbe Franc,,;ois Arnaud, count Franc,,;ois-Louis D'Escherny,abbe Andre Morellet, the Countess Stephanie de Genlis, and many othersalonnieres. 1O It is no accident that the travel narrative we are to examineis presented as reported speech. Gluck quickly acquired a reputation forvigorous and original conversation. D'Eschemy described the composer'sunique manner:

7 Christoph Willibald Gluck is best known as the composer of O/feo ed Euridice (1762), and as areformer of the baroque style of Italian heroic opera.

8 "Orphee alloit etre enseveli pour toujours dans ses enfers, lorsqu'a une de ses representations deuxbelles mains battirent et applaudirent a ses accens. II n'en fallut pas davantage pour l'en faire sortirglorieux et triomphant. Tout Paris en a ete enchante." Sara Goudar, Le Brigalldage de la musiqueitalielllle (Paris, 1780), p. 15.

9 Gluck's arrival at the Duke's hOtel is described in detail in the principal source on which this paperis based: Johann Christian Mannlich, "Histoire de rna vie," MS, in D-Mbs, Codex Gallicus 616­19; excerpted in Henrietta Weiss von Trostprugg, ed., "Memoires sur la musique a Paris a lafin du regne de Louis xv," La Revue musicale 15 (1934), July-Aug. 111-19; Sept.-Oct. 161­71; Nov., 252-62. For Gluck's wide circle of Masonic friends, see Gerardo Tocchini, I fratellid' O/feo (Florence: Olschki, 1998).

10 Amelie Suard, Essais de mel/wires sur M. SuaI'd (Paris, 1820), p. 97. D'Eschemy, MeLallges delitterature, d'histoire, de //lorale, et de la philosophie (Paris, 1811),2:366-67. Gluck's particip­ation at Morellet's famous artistic dinners is described by Dominique-Joseph Garat, Mel/wireshistoriques sur la vie de M. SuaI'd (Paris, 1820), 1:360--61. Mme de Genlis, Memoires illedits(Paris, 1825-26),2:216-17; Gluck's attendance in other salons is noted in Sophie Gay, Salollscelebres (Paris, 1837), passim.

44 EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY FICTION

Copy ofbust ofWillibald Gluck by Jean Antoine Houdon (1775). Reproduced by permissionof the Herzogin Anna Amalie Bibliothek, Weimar.

THE WANDERING MINSTREL 45

II parloit trois ou quatre langues sans en savoir aucune; illes estropioit egalementtoutes, ce qui donnoit it son eloquence une teinte originale et sauvage, qui seduisoit,qui entrainoit, plus que ne l'auroit fait des discours etudies. 11

During these years in Paris Gluck made a radical attempt to reconstructhis self-image. While previously his music had not lacked enthusiasticaudiences, his dramatic theories had attracted little attention. He had wona reputation for pragmatism, for narrow professional diligence, and forlittle else: "e'est un allemand grossier, un cheval qui ne voit pas plus loinque sa musique," was the verdict of the court at Parma, when he cobbledtogether a three-opera entertainment to celebrate a royal wedding (eventhough one of the operas revised was his revolutionary 01feo)Y In Parishe found an audience readier to discuss his artistic innovations and morelikely to accord him the status he craved. When he told the editor of theMemoires secrets that he was perfectly confident in the capacity of hismusic to succeed, if not at the first performance, then by the end of theseason, or the next year, or in ten years' time, the editor anticipated thecharge of arrogance and immediately deflected it: "Cette confiance, quiseroit ridicule et folledans un homme mediocre, doit etre regardee, dela part de ce grand homme, comme une conviction intime de son merite,comme cette noble audace du genie qui sent ses forces et sa valeur, et quise juge avec la meme impartialite que s'il etoit etranger alui-meme."13

Several autobiographical fragments stem from that first summer inParis. 14 The most extended of these narrates a journey to which Gluckattributed a substantive role in the formation of his character. The occa­sion was reported by Johann Christian Mannlich, court painter and fellowguest in Duke Christian's palace. The scene, according to Mannlich, was apicnic-one of those pseudo-pastoral idylls so popular among the middleand upper classes in eighteenth-century France:

Mme Gluck ... me proposa un diner au parc de Saint-Cloud. Nos vivres etoientetalles sur une serviette parterre, nous etions tous assis it l'entour. ... Gluck etoit

I I D'Eschemy, pp. 366-67.

12 Letter dated 15 May 1769, MS, in F-Pn Gluck leures autographes, no. 2; the signature is missing.

13 Mbnoires secrets pOllr servir ii I'lzistoire de la repllbliqlle des leltres en France depllis MDCCLXIl

jllsqll'ii Ilosjollrs (London, 1777-89), vol. 9, ed. Mathieu Fran~ois Pidansat de Mairobert, p. 105.

14 Other biographical anecdotes have been transmitted by Johann Friedrich Reichardt, who de­scribed his source as a "manuscript in French, received from the hand of a Viennese gentleman,"Mllsikaliscize Monatsclzrift 3 (1792),72-74. Mannlich is the most probable author of the manuscript.

46 EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY FICTION

de la meilleure humeur et but et mangea de bon appetit. "Vive la vie simple etindependante, libre, exempte de toute gene, de souds et de prevoyance!" nousdisoit-il. "Je I'ai toujours ambitionnee et dans rna longue carriere n'en ai joui quependant quinze jours; je ne les oublierai jamais." II ne se fit pas presser de nousles faire connoltre: c'etoit les renouveler que de lui fournir I'occasion d'en faireIe detail.

Mon pere, nous disoit-il, etoit maItre des eaux et forets it N.15 en Boheme; ilm'avoit destine it Ie remplacer un jour dans son poste. Dans mon pays tout Iemond est musicien; on enseigrie la musique dans les ecoles et dans les moindresvillages les paysans chantent et jouent des differens instrumens pendant la grand­messe dans leur~ eglises. Comme j'etois passione pour cet art, je fis des progresrapides. Je jouois de plusieurs instrumens, et Ie maItre, en me distinguant desautres ecoliers, me donna des le~ons chez lui dans ses moments de loisir. Je nepensois et ne revois plus qu'iila musique; I'art forestal fut neglige. Ce n'etoit pasIe compte de mon pere; il doubla rna besogne et en exigea severement l'executionpour me detourner (comme il disoit) d 'un metier qui ne pouvoit jamais me donnerdu pain. Ne pouvant plus m'exercer Ie jour, je voulois y employer les nuits; maiscela d6rangea Ie sommeil de mon pere et des autres habitants de la maison; mesinstrumens furent mis sous clef. Ne pouvant resister it rna passion pour la musique,je pris la Guimbarde ou Rebube16 et devins bient6t habile sur ce nouvel instrumentpur brouiant [peu bruyant]. Le dimanche iiI'eglise, j' etois au comble de mes vreux.Enfin, devore par Ie desir de me livrer entierement it rna passion, je conjurois monpere de m'envoyer it Vienne et de m'y faire etudier la musique; il fut inflexible etme mit au desespoir.

Un beau jour, n'ayant que tres peu de monnoie sur moi, je quittois la maisonpaternelle et pour n'etre pas retrappe,je ne pris pas la route la plus courte pour merendre it Vienne. Voulant menager Ie peu d'argent que j'avois, je m'approchoisd'une maison de paysan, la famille etoit it table; tirois rna Guimbarde de rna pocheet les regalois de quelques airs. Me voyant proprement vetu, ils me firent entreret me donnerent place it leur table. Le soir, it l'entree de la nuit, me trouvant dansun autre village, rna Guimbarde me valent des oeufs, du pain, du fromage, qu'onme donnoit par les fenetres des maisons ou je m'etois fait entendre. Ala derniere[maison] je demandois l'hospitalite; on me la donna avec plaisir, et par dessus unbon souper en leur delivrant mes oeufs, mon pain et mon fromage. Mes h6tessesme choyerent comme I'enfant de la maison, tant rna Guimbarde et mes chansonsm'avoient gagne leur bienveillance. Le lendemain je continuois gayement rnaroute, apres bien d6jeune. C'est ainsi, grace it mon instrument portatif et rna voix,que sur d'une bonne reception partout ou je me presenterois, j'avan~ai gaiementet sans Ie moindre souci vers la capitale. Les fetes et dimanches je jouois toujourstant6t d'un instrument, tant6t d'un autre dans les eglises de villages. J'y passoispour un virtuose et Ie Cure me recevoit et me logeoit ordinairement chez lui. Ces

15 Gluck may have referred to Neustadt an der Waldknab, his father's birthplace to which AlexanderGluck returned from time to time throughout his life.

16 Jew's harp.

THE WANDERING MINSTREL 47

bons pasteurs etoient tous musiciens et me retenoient quelquefois plusieurs joursdans leur maison. La, faisant de la musique toutte la journee, bien vu, bien servi,libre et independent,j'etois Ie garc;on Ie plus heureux.

En approchant ainsi de Vienne, Ie dernier Cure auquel j'avois fait une demi­confidence me donna une lettre pour un de ses amis dans la capitale. En y arrivantje me presentois avec confiance chez lui, il me rec;u mais ne me cachoit pasqu'a Vienne il y avoit milliers de vituoses de mon calibre, et que je risquois demourir de faim avex mes talents si on ne me fournissoit pas [Ies moyens] pourme perfectionner dans mon art. II falloit lui avouer qui j'etois et d'ou je venois;il s'interessa a moi, ecrivit a mon pere et Ie persuada de ne plus s'opposer a monpenchant. II y consentit enfin et me donna des secours. Si d'un cote je perdoisl'independance, la liberte et les agremens d'une vie vagabonde et sans souci, jepouvois de l'autre me livrer a rna passion sans reserve, faire de la musique etcomposer du matinjusqu'au soir.

C'est ainsi que je suis devenu ce que je suis aujourd'hui, en regrettant toujours lesquinze jours passes dans I' independance par Ie simple secours de rna Guimbarde.

Gluck's account of a youthful journey, told some twenty years after theevent, deserves further scrutiny. The episode is not dated, but Gluck locatedit in his youth, before he embarked on a professional career. The startingpoint was his parent's home. Alexander Gluck moved several times duringGluck's childhood, but from 1727, when Gluck was thirteen, his fatherfinally settled in the village of Eisenberg (now Zelezny Brod), near thetown of Chomodau (Chomutov).17 Gluck claims to have walked from hisparents' house to Vienna (mentioned four times in the narrative). Theonly journey he is known to have made from his parental home was not,however, to Vienna but to Prague, where he entered the university in 1731.This fits well enough with Gluck's ambition to run away in order to pursuehis music-the classes in logic and mathematics in which he enrolled wereno more than an excuse to enjoy the opportunities for music afforded bythe churches and opera house in Prague. 18 There is, though, no record thathis father opposed his studies, and the venture lasted not two weeks butthree years. If Gluck's destination really was Vienna, the likeliest time forthe journey would be at the end of his university studies: in the winter of1734-35 he made the journey from Prague to Vienna. Now twenty years

17 Where Gluck may have attended the Jesuit college, though most biographers conclude this isunlikely. The college archives record the name of his younger brother, Franz Gluck, but notChristoph.

18 While in Prague, Gluck played the organ in the Tyn church and possibly also in the church of StFrantisek. He would also have attended operas, open to the public, given in the private theatre ofCount Franz Anton von Spark.

48 EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY FICTION

old, Gluck would have seen this as a very different expedition from thechildhood escapade described in Mannlich's narrative, though he mighthave associated the conclusion of his journey with a loss of freedom andindependence, since on arriving in Vienna he was taken into the householdof his father's employers, the Lobkowitz family, and it is possible that hisfather intervened to beg this patronage.

It ought to be possible to establish Gluck's destination by calculatingthe distances involved. Eisenberg to Prague is some sixty miles, a journeythat could be comfortably accomplished on foot in the course of the twoweeks Gluck spent at large. Eisenberg to Vienna is more than two hundredmiles, which surely rules it out. The two-week duration of Gluck's travelsis mentioned twice, but the details remain vague. It could not, for example,have included the period spent at the last house, where Gluck remainedlong enough for letters to travel to and from Eisenberg. And Gluck almostseems determined to throw biographers off the scent by his comment thathe avoided taking the direct route. A passage in the earliest full-lengthbiography of the composer suggests a third time and place for the journey.More than sixty years after the composer's death, Anton Schmid, whoderived his information from Gluck's brothers and their children, wrote thatin his university vacations, Gluck journeyed "from village to village andfrom one place to another; he entertained the inhabitants with his playingand singing, often earning by his performances in the villages nothing morethan eggs, which he exchanged elsewhere for bread."19 Schmid's accountappears plausible as a foundation for Gluck's tale of a boyhood escapade,transferred by the composer from an undergraduate holiday to a (moreromantic) boyhood bid for freedom from parental control.

Gluck's journey may well have been a real event, casually remembered,or imperfectly transcribed, but that is not the only possible interpretation.The tale is, after all, a familiar one: a wandering minstrel, travelling forhis own amusement or improvement, and supporting himself by his abilityto offer musical entertainment along the way. Precedents in fact and fic­tion abound, and one of these, known to Gluck, may have stimulated his

I9 "Von Dorf zu Dorf, und von einem Flecken zum andem, unterhielt die Bewohner mit Spiel undGesang, und emte fur seine Leistungen in den Dorfen oft nichts als Eier, die er an anderen Ortengegen Brad vertauschte." Anton Schmid, Christoph Willibald Ritter VOIl Gluck (Leipzig, 1854), p.22.

THE WANDERING MINSTREL 49

artist's desire to construct a romantic legend around his childhood, at thesame time expressing the sense of rebellion that inspired his career as a re­forming composer. A few years before telling his own story, Gluck readthe following passage:

I was now too far from home to think of returning; so I resolved to go forward.I had some knowledge of music, with a tolerable voice, and now turned whatwas once my amusement into a present means of subsistence. I passed amongthe harmless peasants of Flanders, and among such of the French as were poorenough to be very merry; for I ever found them sprightly in proportion to theirwants. Whenever I approached a peasant's house towards nightfall, I played oneof my most merry tunes, and that procured me not only a lodging, but subsistencefor the next day.20

Goldsmith's account, in The Vicar ofWakefield, of an episode from GeorgePrimrose's continental travels is uncannily similar to Gluck's narrative.Furthermore, it lay to hand, ready to playa part in shaping Gluck's story.In 1767, the year after its publication, Goldsmith's novel was publishedin Lei,pzig, translated into German by Johann Gellius as Der Landpriestervon Wakefield. Gluck read it-there is a good deal of evidence to establishhim as a voracious reader throughout his life-and read it closely enoughto refer to an obscure sentence from the book a few years later: on ashort visit home to Vienna, the composer, obsessed with planning his nextoperatic activity in Paris, wrote fretfully of the restrictions of his officialpost in the imperial capital: "but if M. de Vismes [the director of the Opera]cannot secure me the empress's permission, I shall stay at home and thinklike Goldsmith's lad."2l We need to recall the ponderous resignation ofthe words of Moses Primrose to decipher Gluck's reference: "Howeverdark the habitation of the mole to our eyes, yet the animal itself finds theapartment sufficiently lightsome."22

But what of Goldsmith's sources for Primrose's travels? The foggyboundaries between fact and fiction are again at issue. George Primrose'stravels were based on Goldsmith's own adventures: in the winter of 1754­55, the writer left his studies at Leyden University23 to set off on a tour

20 Oliver Goldsmith, The Vicar of Wak~field, ed. Stephen Coote (1766; London: Penguin Books,1986), p. 129.

21 "Wan aber Mr. de Vismes mir die Erlaubnis von der Kaiserin nicht auBwirkt, so bleib ich zu HauBe,und dencke wie goldschmits junge." Letter dated 29 July 1778, facsimile in Georg Kinsky, GlucksBri~fe an Franz Krutho.ffer (Vienna: Strache Verlag, 1927), p. 32.

22 Goldsmith, p. 58.

23 Nominally medicine, but Goldsmith probably spent most of his time studying French.

50 EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY FICTION

of France, Switzerland, and Italy. But Goldsmith's journey was in its turninspired by the youthful adventures ofBaron Ludvig Holberg, whom Gold­smith met at Leyden, and from whom Goldsmith may well have receivedat first hand the account he gives in An Enquiry into the Present State ofPolite Learning in Europe:

The late famous baron Holberg, upon the death of his father, being left entirelydestitute, though only a boy of nine years old, he still persisted in pursuing hisstudies, travelled from school to school, and begged his learning and his bread.... Without money, recommendations or friends, he undertook to set out upon histravels, and to make the tour of Europe on foot. A good voice, and a trifling skillin music, were the only finances he had to support an undertaking so extensive;so he travelled by day, and at night sung at the doors of peasants' houses to gethimself a lodging.24

Goldsmith himself set off on his travels with "a flute and one clean shirt,"25and gives some account of his experiences in "The Traveller" where:

How often have I led thy sportive choir,With tuneless pipe, beside the murmuring Loire ...And haply, though my harsh touch, faltering still,But mock'd all tune, and marred the dancers' skill,Yet would the village praise my wondrous power,And dance forgetful of the noontide hour.26

Goldsmith followed an established tradition when he took the eminentlyportable flute on his travels. But Gluck claimed to have played a jew'sharp, and this unusual option again has a literary precedent. HumphryClinker, who has claims to be called another wandering musician, made thesame choice: "1 know something of single-stick, and psalmody, (proceededClinker) 1 can play upon the Jew's-harp, sing Black-ey'd Susan, Arthuro'Bradley, and divers other songs."27 We do not have direct proof that Gluckread Smollett's novel, but his taste for English novels has been established,and the publication of a German translation of Humphry Clinker in 1772seems timely.28 The jew's harp continues the tantalizing puzzle of fact or

24 Oliver Goldsmith, An Enquil)' into the Preselll State ofPolite Learning in Europe (1759), CollectedWorks ofOliver Goldsmith, ed. Arthur Friedman, 5 vols (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1966), 1:284.

25 A. Lytton Sells, Oliver Goldsmith: His Life and Works (London: Allen and Unwin, 1974), p. 50.

26 Oliver Goldsmith, "The Traveller," lines 243-50.

27 Tobias Smollett, The Expedition ofHumphry Clinker, ed. Lewis M. Knapp and Paul-Gabriel Bouce(1771; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984), p. 84.

28 Humphry Klinkers Reisen, trans. Johann Joachim Christoph Bode (Leipzig, 1772).

THE WANDERING MINSTREL 51

fiction. There is no other record of Gluck ever playing the instrument,and it appears in some respects to be unsuitable for the task. A folk­instrument, widely used in Europe and the Middle East, its structure wasprimitive.29 Since the notes available were limited to the harmonic seriesabove a single fundamental, its melodic capacity was no greater than, forexample, a bugle, so Gluck would have been severely restricted in thetunes he could play-perhaps his audience was as undiscriminating asGoldsmith's. He plausibly claimed to have chosen the instrument for itsquiet volume: Curt Sachs describes it as "a quaint instrument, pleasingto the player because of its clear though tiny sound, almost inaudible toa listener."3o This would have met his need to practise without disturbinghis family, but appears less suitable for entertaining a whole household.3l

Throughout his life, however, Gluck demonstrated a taste for unusualinstruments, and interestingly, Francis Gilpin classifies the jew's harp inthe same category as an instrument on which Gluck was known to havegiven recitals, the glass harmonicaY

The navy, the circus, and music are traditionally professions to be ap­proached by running away from home. Gluck's escapade has some parallelswith the early lives of two composers who were among his intimate friends.Florian Leopold Gassmann (1729-1774), born in Most, near Eisenberg andChomodau, may have attended the same Jesuit college that is mentionedin connection with Gluck. In his late teens he ran away from home in theface of parental opposition to his musical ambitions, and supported him­self by singing and playing his harp as he travelled towards Italy.33 Gluck

29 "A mouth-resonated instrument consisting of a flexible tongue, or lamella, fixed at one end to asurrounding frame.... The player places the free end of the lamella in front of his mouth cavityand sets it in vibration manually; the resulting oscillation produces a sound of constant pitch, richin overtones.... By various movements of the tongue and larynx the player is able to regulatethe frequency of the air in the mouth cavity ... to produce a wide variety of sonorous and musicaleffects." The New Grove Dictionary ofMlIsicalInstrulllents, ed. Stanley Sadie (London: Macmillan,1984).

30 Curt Sachs, The History ofMlisicailnstrulllents (New York: Norton, 1940), p. 58.

31 A celebrated exponent, Charles Eulenstein, gave concerts on the jew's harp in London, Bath,and Scotland from 1827, but he had 16 instruments, differently pitched, and by changing rapidlybetween them was able to playa wide repertoire. The New Grove DictionQ/Y (!{ Music andMusicians.

32 Francis Gilpin, Old English Instruments ofMusic (London: Methuen, 1965), p. 194. Gluck gaverecitals on the glass harmonica in London (1746), Copenhagen (1749), and Naples (1751).

33 Franz Kosch, "Florian Leopold Gassmann als Kirchenkomponist," Stlldien zur MlIsikwissenschaft14 (1927), 215.

52 EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY FICTION

knew Gassmann well, and the latter eventually succeeded him as com­poser of ballets in Vienna; news of the younger composer's death wouldhave reached Gluck only a few months before he told his own story in StCloud. Another of his Viennese colleagues told a similar tale, though CarlDitters von Dittersdorf (1739-1799) is less useful as an icon of independ­ence and rebellion: at the age of twenty he fled from Vienna to Prague forno more elevated reason than to escape his gambling debts;34 he travelled,moreover, by coach: the authentic wandering minstrel always travelled onfoot.

The character of the wandering minstrel was a familiar one foreighteenth-century readers. He (and the minstrel is always male, thoughin fiction he may be accompanied by a female, as Mignon accompan­ied the harpist in Goethe's Wilhelm Meisters Lehrejahre) inhabits bothfact and fiction. The similarities between the accounts are striking: Gass­mann, Holberg, Goldsmith, Smollett, and Gluck appear to have been livingand writing to a common formula. Contrary to all the unwritten rules oftravel writing,35 the focus of the narrative, whether in fact or fiction, is en­tirely on the traveller. Unlike the elevated cultural inquiries of Addison andBurney, these travellers' tales are dominated by the getting of food, drink,and lodging, and the convention requires that these are of the simplest:eggs, bread, and milk, and accommodation in rustic cottages. Little mu­sical skill is involved, and the villagers are represented as an uncriticalaudience. The criterion for choice of instrument is portability: the voice,the jew's harp, the flute, with Gassmann's harp coming in as the most un­wieldy option. The aim of the journey is not the acquisition of knowledgebut a bid for personal freedom. There is a clear line of literary influ­ence connecting some of these accounts, but the thread constantly crossesthe line between fact and fiction. It seems certain that Gluck enjoyed someexperience of life as a wandering minstrel, but it is impossible to disen­tangle the event from the web of romance he himself spun around it. Otherwriters and musicians absconded, but none have made so merry a tale of itas Gluck.

The Open University

34 The Autobiography of Karl von Dittersdorf, trans. A.D. Coleridge (London: Bentley, 1896), pp.93-95.

35 See Batten, PleaSlirable Instruction, pp. 13-15.