In 1798 he escaped, with his father's tardy consent, to Lucca, where a musical festival in honour of St. Martin was going on. He there gave frequent concerts, and was everywhere .met with applause, and, what was more to the purpose, with money. Surrounded by men of inferior talents, a mere inexperienced boy, without education, without knowledge of the world, with nothing but ambition and his supreme musical genius, he now broke wildly away from all wise restraints, and avenged himself upon his father's severity by many youthful excesses. He gambled he lost he was duped by his companions; but he made money so fast, that he soon owned about 1,000.