" The _Anecdotes of Handel and Smith_ mention two occasions on
which he was said to have become engaged to be married, or nearly so, but
the writer is so reticent that little faith can be placed in his statement,
and in any case the _Anecdotes_, published in 1799, are not very reliable
as far as Handel is concerned.
It is not difficult to understand that there were two Handels, one
"excessively polite" (which, in the language of the eighteenth century,
does not mean that he was servile and cringing, but simply that he behaved
like a man of good breeding), as he appeared to such people as Mrs. Delany
and the Harris family, and the other as he showed himself at rehearsals,
or in the society of men friends of more or less his own standing--bluntly
outspoken and perhaps at times inconsiderate. The hostility of a large
number of social leaders may well have been aroused in the first instance
by some careless harsh word.
"The figure of Handel was large," says Burney, "and he was somewhat
corpulent and unwieldy in his motions; but his countenance, which I
remember as perfectly as that of any man I saw but yesterday, was full of
fire and dignity; and such as impressed ideas of superiority and genius. He
was impetuous, rough, and peremptory in his manners and conversation, but
totally devoid of ill-nature or malevolence; indeed there was an original
humour and pleasantry in his most lively sallies of anger or impatience,
which, with his broken English, were extremely risible.
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