So the Rontgens have played you the new Brahms symphony! - another of my few musical joys taken from me! It always happens that when I have been specially counting on something of the sort as regards you, Fate snatches it away from me. I am ever too late! Not that I reproach the R’s for having played it to you, that would be too ridiculous, but I wish it had been I! Still I am delighted that you are so impressed and that the two movements you like best are my favourites.

 The Andante touches me as do few things in music, so restrained and, in spite of its tenderness, so virile - an exquisite product of matured power. When first I heard it I thought involuntarily of a giant holding his breath for fear of waking a child. How adorable and beautifully articulated the first theme is and the divine G major bit!

[ Excerpt from score ]

The man who can write that is not on the down-grade as Levi declares him to be; but Levi has become blind in that direction...