MOXA MOZART. 



MOXA ; a Chinese \vonl adopted into the Euro 

 peaii languages, signifying a lanuginous or cottony 

 substance, which is burned for tbe purpose, of cauter- 

 izing the skin. The Chinese and Japanese prepare 

 their moxa from the down of the mugwort (artemisia 

 Chincnsis). 



MOZAMBIQUE. See Mozambique. 

 MOZART, JOHN CHRYSOSTOMUS WOLFGANG AMA- 

 nEus ; the great German composer, born at Salzburg, 

 1756. At the age of four years, his father com- 

 menced teaching him some minuets and other small 

 pieces on the harpsichord. He only needed half an 

 hour to play a minuet with perfect correctness and 

 rase. From this period, he made rapid progress, 

 a; id, in his fifth year, composed little pieces, which 

 he played to his father, who wrote them down. He 

 had previously been so much delighted with all infan- 

 tile games, that he would forget his meals for the 

 sake of playing ; but from the time when he com- 

 menced learning music, lie lost all taste for the usual 

 amusements of childhood. Although he applied him- 

 self with energy and activity to all subjects in which 

 he received instruction, music was the occupation 

 which seemed completely to fill his soul. He ad- 

 vanced so rapidly as to surprise even his father, who 

 was constantly with him. A concert for the harpsi- 

 chord, which he wrote in his fifth year, perfectly ac- 

 cording to the rules of the art, was so difficult that 

 only the most practised performer could have played 

 it. In his sixth year, Mozart had already made such 

 progress, that his father was induced to take him and 

 his sister Maria Anna, who was also a musical genius, 

 to Munich and Vienna, where the little artists were 

 introduced at the emperor's court. The unequalled 

 execution of young Mozart excited universal surprise, 

 and the interest was heightened by the fact that he 

 was anxious only to please real connoisseurs, and 

 appeared little affected by the opinion of the multi- 

 tude. Thus he requested the emperor Francis to 

 send for Wagenseil ; this was done, and the child 

 then performed one of his concerts with surprising- 

 execution. Till this period, he had only devoted 

 himself to the harpsichord. In Vienna, he had a 

 little violin given him ; and when the family returned 

 to Salzburg, he had made such progress on this in- 

 strument, without the knowledge of his father, that, 

 to the surprise of all the auditors, he performed the 

 second violin in a trio, with the greatest precision. 

 It was now evident that the whole soul of young 

 Mozart was devoted to music ; his mind was absorbed 

 in it. Singular stories are told of his sensibility to 

 the finest differences of tones. Even at this early 

 period, he had the greatest aversion to discords and 

 rough, shrill tones, not softened by combination ; as, 

 for instance, the sound of the trumpet, which, on one 

 occasion, so affected him, that he fell to the ground, 

 pale, lifeless, and convulsed. This delicate sensibility 

 is apparent in all the works of Mozart. In 1763, 

 when young Mozart was seven years old, the family 

 made a journey beyond the borders of Germany, 

 which spread his fame universally. In November oi 

 the same year, they arrived in Paris, where they 

 remained six months, and were overwhelmed with 

 attention and applause. Here young Mozart published 

 his first sonatas for the harpsichord. In 1704, the 

 family proceeded to England, and performed at court, 

 the son playing on the king's organ with great suc- 

 cess. At a public concert, symphonies of his compo- 

 sition only were performed. Here, as well as 

 Paris, compositions of Bach, Handel, &c., were laid 

 before him, all of which, though exceedingly difficult, 

 he executed with the greatest truth at first sight. 

 During his stay in England, he composed six sonatas, 

 which were published in London, and which he dedi- 

 cated to the queen. In 1765, the family went, by 



ivay of the Netherlands, to Holland, where. Mozart 

 repeatedly performed on the organ in the cathedrals 

 and monasteries. In the Hague, he fell dangerously 

 sick. On his recovery, he published six sonatas, ami 

 dedicated them to the princess of Nassau. At the 

 beginning of the year 1766, he was again four weeks 

 in Amsterdam, and proceeded thence to the Hague, 

 to assist at the installation of the stadtholder. The 

 family next visited Paris, and after having been twice 

 at Versailles, proceeded, by way of Lyons, through 

 Switzerland to Munich, where the elector gave young 

 Mozart a theme, on which he composed in his pre- 

 sence without piano or violin, wrote down the music, 

 and, to the astonishment of all present, executed after 

 having finished it. In 1766, they returned to Salz- 

 burg, where they remained till 1768, and then made 

 a second journey to Vienna. The brother and sister 

 performed in presence of the emperor Joseph, who 

 commissioned young Mozart to write the music for a 

 comic opera La Finta Semplice. It was applauded 

 by Hasse, the master of the chapel, and Metastasio, 

 but was not performed. At the consecration of the 

 orphan's church, he composed the mass, the qfferto- 

 rium, and a concert for trumpets, and led the solemn 

 performance a boy of twelve years old in presence 

 of the imperial court. In 1769, Mozart, who had 

 been made master of the concerts at the court orches- 

 tra at Salzburg, commenced a journey to Italy, in 

 company with his father. In Rome, he undertook to 

 write down, on hearing it, the famous Miserere, an- 

 nually sung in the Sistine chapel, during the holy 

 week, and at that time kept very secret. He suc- 

 ceeded so well, that when he sang it in company to 

 the harpsichord, Christofori, who had sung it in the 

 chapel, expressed his wonder. In Naples, the 

 scholars of the conservatorio della pietd supposed that 

 the magic of his musical talent was in the ring which 

 he wore ; he took it off, and then their astonishment 

 increased. In Rome, the pope made him a knight 

 of the golden spur ; in Bologna, after having com- 

 posed, in half an hour, an antiphony for four voices 

 in a room in which he was shut up alone, he was 

 elected member and master of the chapel of the phil- 

 harmonic academy. As he had engaged to compose 

 the first opera for the carnival at Milan, he was com- 

 pelled to refuse similar offers from Bologna, Naples, 

 and Rome. He arrived at Milan at the end of Oct., 



1770, and there composed, in his fourteenth year, the 

 first opera, Mithridates, which was performed Dec. 

 26, and repeated more than twenty times in succes- 

 sion. In Verona, he also received a diploma as 

 member of the philharmonic society. Thus honoured, 

 he quitted Italy, where he was called il cavaliere 

 filarmonico. When Mozart returned to Salzburg, in 



1771, he found a letter, in which he was commissioned, 

 in the name of the empress Maria Theresa, to com- 

 pose the grand theatrical serenata Ascanio in Alia, 

 for the celebration of the nuptials of the archduke 

 Ferdinand. He undertook this commission, and, in 

 August, returned to Milan for some months, where, 

 during the festivities of the marriage, Mozart's sere- 

 nata, and an opera composed by Hasse, were both 

 performed alternately. In 1772, he composed, in 

 celebration of the election of the archbishop of 

 Salzburg, the serenata // Sogno di Scipionc. In the 

 winter of 1773, he composed there his opera Lucio 

 Silla, which was repeated twenty-six times in succes- 

 sion. After having completed a comic opera, called 

 La Finta Giardiniera (1775); two grand masses; 

 one serenata called // re Pastore ; and, in Paris, to 

 which he had been invited a second time, a grand 

 symphony for the concert spirituel, in that city, he 

 went to Vienna, in his twenty-fourth year, where he 

 engaged in the service of the emperor. He satisfied 

 the great expectations which were raised by his early 



