throughout his life, painfully shy; yet he seems, strangely enough,
to have had, even then, the knack for imparting instruction, for
quickening the interest and stimulating the enthusiasm of those who
came under his guidance, which in later years made him so remarkable
a teacher.

In 1881 MacDowell applied for the vacant position of head piano
teacher at the Conservatory in the neighbouring town of Darmstadt,
and was engaged. He found it an arduous and not too profitable post.
He has described it as "a dreary town, where the pupils studied music
with true German placidity." They procured all their music from a
circulating library, where the choice of novelties was limited to
late editions of the classics and a good deal of sheer trash, poor
dance music and the like. His work, which was unmitigated drudgery,
consumed forty hours a week. For a time he took up his quarters in
Darmstadt; but he missed the attractions of Frankfort; so throughout
his term he travelled on the railroad twice daily between the two
towns. In addition to his regular work at the Conservatory, he
undertook private lessons, going by train once a week to the
Erbach-Fürstenau castle at Erbach-Fürstenau, a wearisome three-hour
journey. The castle was a mediæval _Schloss_, with a drawbridge and
moat. There his pupils were little counts and countesses,
discouragingly dull and sleepy children who spoke only German and
Latin, and who had the smallest interest in music. MacDowell gave
them lessons in harmony as well as piano-playing, and one day, in the
middle of an elaborately simplified exposition of some rudimentary
point, he heard a gentle noise, looked around from the piano, and
discovered his noble young pupils with their heads on their arms,
fast asleep. MacDowell could never remember their different titles,
and ended by addressing them simply as "mademoiselle" and "monsieur,"