He rarely wrote fugues, and when he did they were not
particularly good ones, either technically or intrinsically.
He was too much of a performer to care much about the con-
ventional ingenuities of fugue, and too much of a free lance to
put his thoughts in so elaborate a form ; though he often
makes a beginning as if he was going to write a serious fugue,
and then goes on in a different manner. The harmonic
principle of design came to him most naturally, and, as far as
they go in that respect, his movements are singularly lucid
and definite. But they are not operatic. They are genuine
representatives of a distinct branch of art ; and the expres-
sion of ideas in terms exactly adapted to the instrument by
means of which they are to be made perceptible to the human
mind.
