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THE LIFE OF LUDWIG VAX BEETHOVEN
VOLUME III
The Life of
Ludwig van Beethoven
By Alexander Wheelock Thayer
Edited, revised and amended from the original English manuscript and the German editions of Hermann Deiters and Hugo Rieinaim, eon- eluded, and all the documents newly translated
By Henry Edward Krehbiel
Volume III
Published by
The Beethoven Association
New York
SECOXD PRIXTiyG
Copyright, 1921, By Henry Edward Krehbiel
From the press of G. Schirmer, Inc., New York Printed iu the U. S. A.
MU31C
library
Contents of Volume III
PACJE
Chapter I. The Year 1819 — Guardianship of Beethoven's Nephew Karl — Mother and Uncle in a Legal Struggle — The Lad's Education — Conversation Books— A Wed- ding Song — In Travail with the Mass in D — The Commission for an Oratorio from the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde — Visits from Zelter and Friedrich Schneider — Creative Work of the Year 1
Chapter II. End of the Litigation over the Guardianship of the Nephew — A Costlv Victory — E. T. A. Hoffmann — An Analytical Programme — Beethoven's Financial Troub- les- Adagios and English Hymn -Tunes — Stieler's Portrait — Arrested as a Vagrant — Negotiations for the Mass in D begun with Simrock — The Last Pianoforte Sonatas —Compositions of the Years 18*20 and 18-21 24
Chapter III. The Year 1822 — The Mass in D — Beethoven and His Publishers — Simrock — Schlesinger — C. F. Peters -Phantom Masses — Johann van Beethoven : His Appearance and Character — Becomes His Brother's Agent — Meetings with Rochlitz and Rossini — Franz Schuberi 'The Consecration of the House" — Revival of "Fidelio" — Madame Schroeder-Devrient — The Bagatelles — A Commission from America 51
CHAPTEB IV. The Year 1823 — The Roman Ritual and
the Mass in D — Subscriptions Asked from Royal
Courts Incidents of the Appeal — Goethe and Cheru- hini Enlisted as Agents — A Medal from the King of Prance Further Negotiations with Publishers and Societies Operatic Projects Consideration of Grill- parzer's "Melusine" The Diabelli Variations -Summer Visitors An Englishman's Story — Weber and Julius Benedict Ries and the Ninth Symphony — Franz Liszt
and Beethoven's Kiss 89
[v]
vi Contexts of Volume III
Chapter V. The Year 1824— The Symphony in D Minor — Its Technical History — The Choral Finale and Schiller's "Ode to Joy" — First Performance of the Work and Portions of the Mass — An Address to Beethoven — Laborious and Protracted Preparations for the Concert — A Financial Failure — Beethoven's False Accusations against Friends and Helpers Drive Them from the Dinner-Table 144
Chapter VI. Incidents and Labors of the Year 1824 — A Truce with the Hated Sister-in-Law — The Gesell- schaft der Musikfreunde's Oratorio — Bernard's Li- bretto— The Society Forgives Beethoven His Debt and Elects Him an Honorary Member — Book of "The Victory of the Cross" — Summer Sojourn at Penzing Interrupted by Curious Visitors — The London Phil- harmonic Society Receives the Symphony in D Minor — Further Negotiations for the Mass — New Publishers — Probst — Schott and Sons — A Visitor from London — Beethoven's Opinion of His Predecessors — The Quartet in E-flat, Op. 127 — Trip to England Deter- mined Upon 170
Chapter VII. The Year 1825. The Invitation from the Philharmonic Society of London — The Ninth Symphony Performed at Aix-la-Chapelle — Mass and Symphony Delivered to Schott and Sons — Unpleasant Results of an Attempted Joke on Haslinger — Beethoven and a Copyist — The String Quartet in E-flat Taken Away from Schuppanzigh after a First Performance — Karl Holz — Beethoven Authorizes Him to Write the His- tory of His Life — Early Biographers — Visits of Rellstab, Kuhlau, Smart and Others — Sir George Smart's Recol- lections— Dedication of the Mass in D — Stephan von Breuning — Wegeler asks Beethoven to Defend the Honor of His Mother— The Quartets in A Minor and B-flat 186
Chapter VIII. A Year of Sickness and Sorrow — The Last String Quartets — Wolfmayer Commissions a "Requiem" and Pays in Advance — Many Works in petto — Controversy with Prince Galitzin and His Son— The Fugue in the B-flat Quartet —"Muss es sein?" — Dedication of the Ninth Symphony — The King of Prussia and His Gift of a Dubious Diamond — Abbe
Contents of Volume III vii
Stadler — Beethoven Defends M<»/art'> ''Requiem" — Friedrich Wieck Beethoven (iocs to His Brother's Summer Home Life at Gneixendorf Relations with His Brother's Family Young Oxen Thrown into a Panic Fear The Quartet in F and a New Finale for the Quartet in B-flat -The Year L826 Beethoven's Last ( lomposil ions i l s
Chapter IX. Karl vau Beethoven — A Wayward Ward and an Unwise Guardian — Beethoven and Jli^ Graceless Nephew- An Ill-advised Foster-father — A Profligate Youth — Effect of the Guardianship on Beethoven's Character An Unsuccessful Attempt at Self-destruc- tion— Karl is Made a Soldier ^-i?
Chapter X. The Last Days at Gneixendorf — A Brother's Warning — Beethoven and His Kinspeople — The Fate- ful Journey to Vienna — The Fatal Illness — The Physi-
dans and Their Treatment — The Nephew Exonerated from a Slanderous Accusation — Schindler's Disingenu- ousness — Dr. Malfatti Forgets a Resentment Harbored for more than a Decade— Beethoven and Handel's Scores — A Gift of 100 Pounds Sterling from the London Philharmonic Society — Eventual Disposition of the Money — .Metronome Marks for the Ninth Sym- phony— Death and Burial of Beethoven — His Estate -2<i?
General Index 315
Index to Composition- 344
Chapter I
The Contest for the Guardianship <>f Nephew Karl -Tin1 Conversation Hooks — A Wedding Song — In Travail with the Mass— The War 1819.
THE key-note for much that must occupy lis in a survey of the year 1819 is sounded by A New Year's Greeting to Arch- duke Rudolph. Beethoven invokes all manner of blessings
on the head of his pupil and patron and, begging a continuant- <>t" gracious benevolences for himself, sets forth a picture of his un- happy plight.
A terrible occurrence has recently taken place in my family affairs which for a time robbed me of all my reasoning powers; and to this must Ik- charged the circumstance that 1 have not called upon Y. R. II. in person nor made mention of the masterly Variations of my highly honored and exalted pupil, the favorite of the Muses. I do not dare to express either by word of mouth or in writing my thanks for the surprise and favor with which I have been honored, inasmuch as I occupy muck ton humble a position, nor dare I, much as I would like and ardently as I lom,' to do so, reunite like with like.
A little boy of eleven years runs away from his uncle to bis indulgent mother whom he, for months at a time, has not been allowed to see, although both live within the same city limits. What else could be expected than that this should now and then occur? What should be thought of the child's heart if it did not? And when it did, who but Beethoven would have felt more than a passing disturbance of bis equanimity at an offense so natural under the circumstances? But to him it was a "terrible occur- rence" which for a space robbed him of his reason. No one of
ordinary sensibilities can read the story without strong feelings of
compassion for him not that the boy's freak was in any sense in itself a grievous misfortune, but because the uncle's sufferings occasioned by it were SO real and intense.
There is no reason to doubt the mother's assertion that she sent the cbihl back through the intervention of the police, for this
wa> clearly her best policy, more especially because .she and her
1 i 1
2 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
advisers found in the incident a wished-for occasion to renew her petition to have her son admitted into the R. I. Convict. It was this petition, enforced by Hotschevar's long paper and its accompanying documents, which had led to the question of Beet- hoven's right to have his case tried by the tribunal of the nobility, and the negative decision which transferred the whole matter to the City Magistracy. At this point a few official data are wanting, and the suspension of Beethoven from the guardianship of his nephew can only be stated as having been determined by the magistrates immediately after the beginning of the new year, and that, in consequence of this, the boy was for a few weeks with his mother. On January 10, Fanny Giannatasio writes in her diary: "What Miiller tells me about Beethoven pains me deeply. The wicked woman has finally succeeded in triumphing over him. He has been removed from the guardianship1 and the wicked son returns to the source of his wickedness. I can imagine Beethoven's grief. It is said that since yesterday he has been entirely alone and eats apart from the others. He ought to know that Karl is glad to be with his mother; it would ease the pain of the separation." On January 7 the magistrates summoned Beethoven (who still lived in the Gartnergasse), the boy, the mother, Hotschevar and the curator, Dr. Schonauer, to appear before them on January 11. Of what action was taken that day there is no record, but Hotschevar's attack brought out a vigorous defense in the shape of a letter sent by Beethoven to the Magistracy,2 in which he main- tained the superiority of the educational plan which he was pur- suing over that which had been proposed by the mother, proclaimed the magnanimity and virtuousness of all his acts and discharged a broadside of accusation and insinuation against Madame van Beet- hoven and the priest who had come to her help. We can make room for only a few passages:
His exceptional capacity, and partly also his peculiarities, call for exceptional measures; and I never did a more beneficial or magnanimous act than when I took my nephew to myself and personally assumed charge of his education. Seeing that (according to Plutarch) a Philip did not think it beneath his dignity to direct the education of his son Alexander and give him the great Aristotle for a teacher because he did not consider the ordinary teachers suitable, and a Laudon looked after the education of his son himself, why should not such beautiful and
'He had not been removed, but only temporarily suspended; he retained the super- vision of the boy's education and at a later period voluntarily resigned the guardianship for a time.
■See Kalisoher-Shedlork. Vol. II. p. 124 et seq. The letter was dated erroneously February 1, 1818, instead of 1819.
Beethoven's Appeal to the Magistracy 3
.sublime examples be followed by others? Already during hi> lifetime
Ins father entrusted my nephew to me and 1 confesa that I feel myself better fitted than anybody else to incite my nephew to virtue and in- dustry by my men example.
Had the mother been able to subdue her wicked disposition and
permitted my plans to take their quiet development a very favorable result would have followed; but when a mother of this sort seeks to involve her child in tin- secrets of her own vulgar and evil surroundings, and in his tender years a plague for children! ! '.) leads aim astray to deception,
to bribery of my servants, to untruthfulness, by laughing at him when he tell-, t lie t rut h, yes, even giving him money to awaken in him lu^t -^ and desires which are harmful, tells him that things are trifles which in me ami others would lie accounted grave faults, the already difficult task becomes more difficult and dangerous.
Gifts of fortune may be acquired; morality must be implanted early, particularly when a child has had the misfortune to suck in such mother's mill:, was in her care for several years, was put to thoroughly bad um -s, even had to help deceive his father. Furthermore he will inherit from >ue and even now I could leave him enough to keep him from leant while continuing his studies until lie should receive an appoint- ment. We need only quiet and no more interference from the mother, and the beautiful goal which 1 have set will be attained.
Ought I now to reply to the intrigues of a Mr. Courtscrivener Hotschowa [Hotschevar] against me, or to the priest of Mddling, who is despised by his congregation, who is suspected of being guilty of illicit intercourse, who lays his pupils military fashion on a form to be thrashed and could not forgive me because I kept watch on him and would not permit my uephew to be caned like a brute — ought I? Xo; the association of these men with Madame van Beethoven bears wit- ness againsl them both, and only such could make common cause with
Madame van Beethoven against me.
Beethoven accompanied this address with a private letter presumably to Dr. Tschiska (or Tschischka), an official of the Magistracy, in which he said:
I am not a guardian from self-interest, but I want to rear a new monument to myself in my nephew. I do not need my nephew, but he
needs me. Gossip, calumny, are beneath the dignity of a man who is raising himself up! What is to be done when they even touch the laundry!?!? I mighl be very sensitive, but the just man must be able to endure injustice without departing an iota from the right. In this
Bense I shall endure every trial, nothing shall shake my resolution.
A great responsibility would be incurred were my nephew to be wholly
withdrawn from me; moral and even political consequences would follow- to him. 1 commend him to you ami appeal to your heart for his welfare. My actions must commend me for his sake, not mine.
We do not know the particulars, but for the present Beethoven
retained the right to look after the further education of the boy; the right , at least, was not judicially taken away from him or given
4 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
to another. He did not send him again to a public school, but engaged a private tutor under whose care he continued his studies in an institute conducted by Joseph Kudlich, of whom he spoke in great praise. Besides the ordinary subjects, he received in- struction in French, drawing and music; his religious training was entrusted to a priest. This state of affairs lasted till the end of March, when he announced a desire to resign the guardianship — persuaded to take this step, it is fair to presume, by the magistrates who, in the end, would have been obliged to remove him. Karl was living with his mother at the time. According to the court records, Beethoven left the matter of education "entirely to Kud- lich," with whom (if a passage in one of the Conversation Books is read correctly) he seems also to have lived temporarily, and it was given to him to propose the name of a guardian, either in place of himself or as an associate. He consulted earnestly with his friends as to what was to be done with the boy and who should be his guardian, and those friends were sorely tried by his constitu- tional indecision. In these consultations, the project of sending the boy away from Vienna, and the name of Sailer, were mooted.1 "What must be done," Bernard says, "is to select as guardian a man who has your entire confidence both as respects morality and pedagogical skill, and with whom you may always remain on friendly terms concerning the affair. Since Kudlich has more influence on Karl than Giannatasio, it is my opinion that you seek no further for someone who would meet every requirement. — It would merely be very troublesome for you." Beethoven seems to be in doubt; he had a preference for his friend the magis- terial Councillor Tuscher, and the project of sending him to Sailer in Landshut appealed to him. Bernard says again: "If you want peace of mind I think it wise that you name a guardian as you were willing to do yesterday. But if it is possible to send the boy to Sailer at Landshut,2 it would, of course, be better still, since then you could feel assured that he was in the best of hands. Even if you have Tuscher as co-guardian, your case will not be bettered, inasmuch as all cares will still rest on you. Perhaps Tuscher and Kudlich might jointly assume the guardianship — this might be very advantageous. All the same, everything will remain as heretofore, even if you send him away he will remain with Kudlich until a change has been made. So long as you are guardian and Karl remains here, you will not only have all the cares as heretofore, but also be compelled to fight
'These citations are from the Conversation Books. 2Landshut University. It was afterward removed to Munich.
A New Guardian for Karl Appointed 5
the mother and all her intrigues. Have Karl sent for the present again to Kudlich, meanwhile the matter may be straightened
out."1
Beethoven seems to have expressed a doubt as to Tuscher's willingness to serve as guardian. Bernard continues: "Perhaps he might be more easily persuaded it' a co-guardian like Kudlich were appointed. — It is not necessary to settle everything by to- morrow. If we go to Omeyer to-morrow morning, then to Tuscher and Kudlich, we can come to an understanding as to what will be the best thing to do." Tuscher, if we are correct in recognizing his handwriting, permitted himself to be persuaded, though a bit under protest; he foresaw difficulties. The Magistracy at the suggestion of Beethoven thereupon appointed the Magisterial Councillor Matthias von Tuscher guardian of the boy on March 26. He was commanded to place his ward, then "living with his mother, Johanna van Beethoven," in another place for bringing up and education under proper care, and submit his opinion touching the proposition of the mother and Hotschevar that he be entered in a public institute of learning before the expiration of the second school semester, that Beethoven contribute to the cost and that the share of the mother's pension and the interest on the money deposited for the boy be applied to this end. Tuscher was decidedly of the opinion that the boy must be sent away for a time and was agreed with the plan of placing him with Prof. Sailer in Landshut after it had been broached to him. For this the consent of the Magistracy and the police authorities and a passport were necessary. In the opinion of one of Beethoven's advisers (Bach) Tuscher was to be informed of the plan only after the passport had been obtained, but before the mother, who had already found "a channel," could take steps to communicate with Tuscher. Beethoven applied to the city authorities for a pass- port for two years for his ward. On April 28, the authorities asked of the Magistracy if there were any objections to the pro- posed step. The Magistracy objected to the boy's being sent into a foreign country, but asked Tuscher if he were not willing to withdraw his application and name an institute in Austria. Tuscher declined and set forth the great hopes which he placed in the training to be had of a man like Sailer, who, "because of his reverence tor the talents of the composer, Beethoven, was es- pecially bound to him," and hence would bestow upon his charge
'As a matter <>f fad the l>'»y waa with Kudlich after tlii* ami remained then- until Beethoven wenl t<> Mtfdling. At tin- time of this consultation he waa with his mother. Kudlich was instructed Dot to permit any communication between him ami his mother.
6 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
the strictest oversight and care, which was of great importance in the case of a boy who was "extremely cunning and an adept in every sort of craftiness." In replying to the municipal authorities the Magistracy (on May 7) conceded the necessity of withdrawing the boy from his mother's influence, but thought it unnecessary to send him out of the country on this account, against which the mother had protested and the curator of the ward, Dr. Schonauer, had declared himself . The passport was therefore refused. Beet- hoven had taken a step which seems to have been made to prevent the widow from securing help for her plans from a source higher than any that had yet been invoked and to enlist that higher power in his own behalf. He appealed to Archduke Rudolph to use his influence with Archduke Ludwig, the youngest brother of Emperor Franz I, to aid him in his project of sending his nephew far away from the mother's influence. In the letter written to the Arch- duke1 he states that it had been his intention to petition Archduke Ludwig in the premises, but there had thitherto appeared to be no occasion for so doing for the reason that all the authorities who had jurisdiction in the matter were convinced of the advisability of the step, viz.: the Police, the Supervisory Guardianship Court and the guardian. He had heard, however, that the mother in- tended to seek an audience of Archduke Ludwig to prevent the execution of his plan. Convinced that she would stop at nothing in the way of calumination, he expressed the hope that his reputation for morality would suffice as a refutation of her slanders, and that Archduke Rudolph would bear testimony in his behalf.
The plan to send the nephew out of the country had been frustrated and had to be abandoned. His mind being filled with artistic projects of the greatest magnitude, Beethoven was desirous to pass the summer months again in Modling, and after the experi- ences of the preceding year nothing could be hoped for his nephew in that quarter. He came to a realization of the advantages which Giannatasio's institute had offered and in a letter to Gian- natasio asked him again to take the lad till other arrangements had been made. The Giannatasio family were fearful lest such a proceeding might work harm to their institution, and on June 17 visited Beethoven at Modling to tell him that his wishes could not be complied with. "Grievously as it pained us," Fanny writes in her diary, "to refuse Beethoven anything, I am yet so convinced of the necessity of the step and that it could do
'It is undated, but to judge by its contents and the sequence of events was written in May. See Kalischer-Shedlock, Vol. II, p. 134.
Tuscher Relieved of the Guardianship 7
us no good, but on the contrary harm, that I prefer to have it so." Thereupon the lad was sent to the institute of Joseph Blochlinger. Claudius Artaria, who was one of the teachers there (1821—1824), recalled in later years that Karl was one of the older scholars, "naturally talented, but somewhat conceited because he was the nephew of Beethoven." He also saw the mother there a few times, but remembered nothing in particular in connection with her visits. The lad appears to have prospered during the early part of his stay at this school. In December, 1811), an unknown hand writes in a Conversation Book:
A great deal has been gained in that the boy has again become orderly in his public studies. Plochlinger [sic] moreover, though not exactly brilliant, seems to be good — the public school system acts as a restraint on him. — Your nephew looks well; handsome eyes — charm, a speaking physiognomy, and excellent bearing. I would continue his education for only two years more. — He is always present, and thus she can do him no harm. But he is agreed that she spoils the boy. — When you have accpiired the sole guardianship, then do you decide and he will obey. — Your views are admirable but not always reconcilable witli this wretched world. — Would that everybody might understand and appreciate your love for your nephew.
Tuscher, a member of the Magistracy, was compelled to recognize that his colleagues were wholly under the influence of Madame van Beethoven and Hotschevar, and that he could do no service to his friend or his friend's ward; on July 5, he applied to be relieved of the guardianship which, he said, had become "in every respect burdensome and vexatious," on the ground that "the multiplicity of official duties as well as various other consi- derations would not permit him longer to administer the othce." Beethoven took this action in very bad part, and Tuscher shared the fate of many others of being for a space an object of the com- poser's critical ill will. Beethoven now served notice on the Magis- tracy that he would resume the guardianship under the testa- mentary appointment and that he had placed his ward in Bloeh- linger's institution. On July 15 he writes to Archduke Rudolph, lamenting that confusion still reigns in his domestic affairs, no hope or comfort is in sight, all his structures are blown away, as if by the wind. "The present proprietor of the institute in which I have placed my nephew, a pupil of Pestalozzi, IS of the opinion that it will be difficult to achieve a desirable outcome in the boy's training— and also that there could be nothing more profitable to my nephew than absence from the country." In a letter of Sep- tember 14 to BlSchlinger he writes: "Only the following individual*
8 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
have free access to my nephew, Mr. v. Bernard, Mr. v. Oliva, Mr. v. Piuk, Recording Secretary. . . . My nephew is not to go out of the house without my written permission— from which it is plain what course is to be followed toward the mother — I insist that in this respect strict obedience be given to what the authorities and I have ordained."
It is not known whether the Magistracy was immediately informed of the new steps which Beethoven had taken, or whether Madame van Beethoven made a presentment of some sort on the subject. Be that as it may, as chief guardian it determined if possible to put an end to the continual friction and undertook an investigation of all the educational experiments which had been made, arriving at the conclusion that the boy had been "subject to the whims of Beethoven and had been tossed back and forth like a ball from one educational institution to another." For this reason it decreed, on September 17, that Tuscher's request be granted, but that the guardianship should not again be en- trusted to Beethoven but to the mother, the natural guardian under the law, with a capable and honest man as co-guardian. To this office Leopold Nussbock, municipal Sequestrator, was appointed. Beethoven protested against the action in a letter which the Magistracy received on October 31. 1 Having been absent from the city at the time, "on a matter of business," he had made no objection to the appointment of Herr Nussbock as guardian of his nephew, but returning with the intention of re- maining in Vienna he wished to resume the guardianship, as this was essential to the welfare of the boy, the mother having neither the will nor the strength to look after his training. He was the more insistent on a resumption of this duty since he had learned that owing to lack of money the boy was to be removed from the institution which he had selected for him, and he charged that the mother wished to take her son to her home so that she might be able to expend his income, including the half of her pension which she was obliged to devote to his education, upon herself. He asked that the intermediary guardianship be taken from Nuss- bock and be restored to him without delay. About the same time (October 23) he wrote at great length to Dr. Bach, who had now become his lawyer.2 From this it appears that Madame van Beethoven had addressed another communication to the Magis- trates' Court, in which she apparently said or intimated that Beethoven would, in consequence of the elevation of the Archduke
•Kalischer-Shedlock. Vol. II. p. 149. *Kalischer-Shedlock, Vol. II, p. 145.
Beethovex Insists on Sole Guardianship 9
to the Archbishopric, be obliged to spend the greater part of his time in Olmiitz, and had renewed her attacks upon his moral character. "His Imperial Highness, Eminence and Cardinal"
would unhesitatingly bear witness to his morality, and, as to the twaddle about Olmiitz, the Archduke would probably spend not more than six weeks of the year there.
The chief points are that I he recognized at once as sole guardian, I will accept no co-guardian, that the mother he excluded from inter- course with her son in the Institute because in view of her immorality there cannot be enough watchmen there and she confuses the teacher by her false statements and lies. She also has led her son to tell shameful lies and make charges against me, and accuses me herself of having given him too much or too little; but that the claims of humanity may not be overlooked, she may see her son occasionally at my home in the pre- sence of his teachers and other excellent men It is my opinion
that you should insist stoutly and irrevocably that I be sole guardian ami that this unnatural mother shall see her son only at my house; my well known humanity and culture are a guarantee that my treatment of her will be no less generous than that given to her son. Moreover, I think that all this should be done quickly and that if possible we ought to get the Appellate Court to assume the superior guardianship, as I want my nephew to be placed in a higher category; neither he nor 1 belong to the Magistracy under whose guardianship are only innkeepers, shoemakers and tailors. As regards his present maintenance, it shall be cared for as long as I live. For the future he has 7,000 florins W.W. of which his mother has the usufruct during life; also S.OOO fl. (or a little more since I have reinvested it), the interest on which belongs to him, and 4,000 florins in silver of mine are lying in the bank; as he is to inherit all my property this belongs to his capital. You will observe that while because of his great talent (to which the Honorable Magistracy is in- different) he will not be able at once to support himself, there is already a superfluity in case of my death.
In a postscript he accuses the mother of wishing to gain pos- session of her son in order to enjoy all of her pension. In view of this he had taken counsel as to whether or not he should let her keep the money and make it good from his own pocket. He bad been advised not to do so, however, because she would make bad use of the money. "I have decided, therefore, to set aside the sum in time. You see again how foolishly the Magistracy is acting in trying to tear my son wholly from me, since when she dies the boy will lose this share of the pension and would get along very poorly without my aid." A few days later Beethoven wrote to Dr. Bach again, this time to suggest that legal steps be taken to attach the widow's pension, he having a suspicion thai she was trying to evade payment of her son's share because she had permitted
10 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
nine months to pass without drawing the pension from the ex- chequer.
The Magistracy disposed of Beethoven's protest and appli- cation on November 4, by curtly referring him to the disposition made of his petition of September 17. Beethoven asked for a reconsideration of the matter, but without avail, and the only recourse remaining to him was the appeal to the higher court which had already been suggested to Dr. Bach. The story of that appeal belongs to the year 1820. Meanwhile the association of Councillor Peters with him in the guardianship had been broached and was the subject of discussion with his friends. In December Bernard writes in a Conversation Book:
The Magistracy has till now only made a minute of the proceedings and will now hold a session to arrive at a decision. It is already decided that you shall have the chief guardianship, but a 2d is to be associated with you. As no objection can be made to Peters, there will be no difficulty. The matter will be ordered according to your wishes and I will take care of Mr. Blochlinger. The mother will not be admitted to the institute unless you are present, 4 times a year is enough — nor the guardian either? — The Magistracy has compromised itself nicely.
Bach seems to have advised that the mother be accepted as co-guardian. He writes: "As co-guardian she will have no au- thority, only the honor of being associated in the guardianship. She will be a mere figurehead." Whether the conversations noted at the time referred to the case on appeal or to the application still pending before the Magistracy, or some to the one, some to the other, it is impossible to determine. The record of the refusal of the Magistracy has not been procured, but the decree of the Appellate Court gives December 20 as its date.
Frequent citations from the so-called "Conversation Books" made in the course of the narrative touching the later phases of the controversy over the guardianship call for some remarks upon this new source of information opened in this year. In the "Nieder- rheinische Musikzeitung," No. 28 of 1854, Schindler wrote:
Beethoven's hearing had already become too weak for oral con- versation, even with the help of an ear-trumpet, in 1818, and recourse had now to be had to writing. Only in the case of intercourse with Archduke Rudolph, and here because of his gentle voice, the smallest of the ear-trumpets remained of service for several years more.
That he was able, partly by the ear and partly by the eye, to judge of the correctness of the performance of his music, Schindler states in the same article — a fact also known from manv other sources; this was the case even to his last year. When, after the
Schindleb am) mi. Conversation Books 11
death of Beethoven, such of bis manuscripts and papers as were thought to be salable were set apart, there remained in the hands of von Breuning a lot of letters, documents and Conversation
Books. Tlif estimated value in the inventory of the manuscripts and the price obtained for them at the auction sale, indicate how
utterly worthless from a pecuniary point of view that other col- lection was thought to be; as, however, they might be of use to some future biographer, it was well to have them preserved, and doubt- less a small gratification to Schindler for his great sacrifices and very valuable services to Beethoven in these la>t months, the only one which be as guardian to the absent nephew could make; so Breu- ning gave them to him. The Conversation Books, counting in as BUCh those which were really nothing but a sheet or two of paper loosely folded, were only about 400 in number, or less than fifty per annum for the last eight and a half years of Beethoven's life — that being the period which they cover. Schindler, who spoke on this as on so many other topics frankly and without reserve, said that he long preserved the books and papers intact, but not finding any person but himself who placed any value upon them, their weight and bulk had led him in the course of his long unsettled life by degrees to destroy those which he deemed to be of little or no importance. The remainder were, in 1845, transferred to the Royal Library in Berlin, and, in 1855, when they were examined for this work, numbered 138. It was but natural that those pre- served are such as place Schindler's relation to the master in the strongest light and those deemed by him essential to the full under- standing of the more important events of Beethoven's last years. Most of them bear evidence of the deep interest with which Schind- ler, while they remained in his possession, lived over the past in them. In many cases he appended the names of the principal writers; so that one soon learns to distinguish their hands with- out difficulty; ami occasionally he enriched them with valuable annotations.1 The larger of them — ordinary blank note-books — are only of a size and thickness fitted to be carried in the coat- pocket. It is obvious, therefore, on a moment's reflection, that at a single sitting with a few friends in an inn or coffee-house, the pages musl have filled rapidly as the book passed from hand to hand and one or another wrote question or reply, remark or .state- ment , a bit of news or a piece of advice. A few such conversations, one sees, would fill a book, all the sooner as there is no thought of
'That In- vu n<>t always scrupulous in preserving their integrity when they offered evidence in contradiction of hia printed statements is the conviction of this editor for
reasons which will appear later.
12 The Life of Ludavig van Beethoven
economizing space and each new sentence is usually also a new paragraph. It strikes one, therefore, that the whole 400 could have contained but a small portion of the conversations of the period they covered. This was so. At home a slate or any loose scraps of paper were commonly used, thus saving a heavy item of expense; moreover, many who conversed with Beethoven would only write upon the slate in order to obliterate it immediately, that nothing should remain exposed to the eyes of others. The books, there- fore, were for the most part for use when the composer was away from home, although there were occasions when, it being desirable to preserve what was written, they were also used there. Hence, the collection in Berlin can be viewed as little more than scattered specimens of the conversations of the master's friends and com- panions, most unequally distributed as to time. For months to- gether there is nothing or hardly anything; and then again a few days will fill many scores of leaves. In a few instances Beethoven has himself written — that is, when in some public place he did not trust his voice; and memoranda of divers kinds, even of musical ideas from his pen, are not infrequent. One is surprised to find so few distinguished names in literature, science and art — Grill- parzer's forms an exception and he appears only in the later years; as for the rest, they are for the most part of local Vienna celebrities.
There is no source of information for the biography of Beet- hoven which at first sight appears so rich and productive and yet, to the conscientious writer, proves so provokingly defective and requires such extreme caution in its use as these Conversation Books. The oldest of them belongs to the time before us (1819) and was evidently preserved by Schindler on account of the pro- tracted conversations on the topic of the nephew. We have al- ready made several citations from it and shall have frequent occasion to have recourse to it in the progress of this narrative. The period in which it was used is approximately fixed by a re- ference to a concert given by the violinist Franz Clement, at which he played an introduction and variations on a theme by Beethoven. This concert took place on April 4, 1819. x The last conversations
Apparently in reply to a question put by Beethoven an unidentified hand writes: "Poor stuff, — empty — totally ineffective — your theme was in bad hands; with much monotony he made 15 or 20 variations and put a cadenza (Jermate) in every one, you may imagine what we had to endure — he has fallen off greatly and looks too old to entertain with his acrobatics on the violin."
Thayer's industry in the gathering and ordering of material for this biography, let it be remarked here in grateful tribute, is illustrated in the fact that he made practi- cally a complete transcript of the Conversation Hooks, laboriously deciphering the frequently hieroglyphic scrawls, and compiled a mass of supplementary material for the
Mi s» al Surprise at a Wedding 13
in the hook took place aboul the time of Beethoven's removal to Modling — shortly before and after.
This explanatory digression may serve as a modulation to more cheerful themes than thai which has occupied us of late.
Though Karl was no longer a member of the Giannatasio household or pupil of the institute, and though there were, in con- sequence, fewer meetings between Beethoven and his self-sacri- ficing friends, their relations remained pleasant, and early in 1819 Beethoven found occasion to supplement his verbal protestations of gratitude with a deed. Xanni, the younger daughter of Gian- natasio, was married on February 6, 1819, to Leopold Schmerling. When the young couple returned to the house after the ceremony they were greeted by a wedding hymn for tenor solo, men's voices and pianoforte accompaniment. The performers were hidden in a corner of the room. When they had finished they stepped forth from their place of concealment. Beethoven was among them and he handed the manuscript of the music which he had written to words of Prof. Stein, who occupied a chair of philosophy at the Uni- versity and was also tutor in the imperial household,1 to the bride.
purpose of fixing the chronological order of the conversations. The dates of all concerts and other public events alluded to were established by the examination of newspapers and other contemporaneous records and the utility of the biographical material greatly enhanced.
'Madame Pessiak-Schmerling. a daughter of Xanni, recounted this incident twice in the letters to Thayer. Madame Pessiak possessed a copy of the song. Her mother had jealously preserved the original, but, together with Beethoven's letters to Giannatasio, it was stolen. In 1861 Thayer found song and letters among the auto- graphs owned by William Witt of the firm of Ewer and Co. in London, and obtained copies of them, but Thayer's copy of the song was not found by this Editor among the posthumous papers of the author when he examined them in order to set aside the need- ful material for the completion of this biography. The music of Miss Nanni's hymeneal ode was forty yean later put to a right royal use. Transposed from (' to A major it was published for the first time by Ewer and ( d. as a setting to Knglish words on the occasion of the marriage of Victoria, eldest daughter of Queen Victoria, to Frederick William of Prussia (afterwards Emperor Frederick III) on January i5, 1858. The title of this publication, which IS now out of print, was "The Wedding Song, written and by gracious permission dedicated to Her Royal Highness Victoria. Princess Royal, on her Wedding Day, by John Oxenford. The music composed by L. van Beethoven. Posthumous Work." The inscription on the original manuscript, according to Thayer, was "Am 14ten Jennet 1819 — filr F. v. Giannatasio de Rio von L. v. Beethoven."
At the Editor's request Mr. J. S. Shedlock, in 1912, kindly made an investigation and reported that so far as could be learned from the public records the song had no place in the wedding ceremonies in ls.">s. Messrs. Novcllo and Co. most courteously brought forth the old plates from their vaults and had a "pull" of them made for this Editor's use. The music can not be said to have any other than a curious interest. A .single stanza will suffice to disclose t he quality of Mr. Oxenford's hymeneal ode:
"Hail, Royal Fair, by love unite, 1;
With ev'ry earthly blessing crown'd;
A people lifts its voice delighted,
And distant nations hear the sound. All hearts are now with gladness swelling, All tongues are now of rapture telliug,
A day of heartfelt joy is found!'-
14 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
Beethoven made a single appearance as conductor in this year. It was on January 17 at a concert given for the benefit of the Widows and Orphans of the Juridical Faculty of the Univer- sity. The orchestra was largely composed of amateurs and the programme began with the overture to "Prometheus" and ended with the Seventh Symphony. Among the listeners was P. D. A. Atterbom, the Swedish poet, who wrote a sympathetic account of it.
In the midst of the worries occasioned by the guardianship, Beethoven was elected Honorary Member of the Philharmonic Society of Laibach, an institution which had been founded in 1702 and revived, after repeated interruptions, in 1816. The project of giving him the distinction had been broached in the councils of the society in 1808, but Anton Schmith, a physician in Vienna, whose opinion had been asked, had advised against it, saying: "Beethoven is as freakish as he is unserviceable." Eleven years later the men of Laibach had more knowledge or better counsel, and they sent him a diploma on March 15 through von Tuscher. Acknowledging the honor on May 4, Beethoven stated that as a mark of apprecia- tion he was sending, also through the magistrate, an "unpublished" composition and would hold himself in readiness to serve the society should it ever need him. There is no direct evidence as to what composition he had in mind; but in the archives of the Laibach so- ciety there is a manuscript copy of the Sixth Symphony. It is not an autograph except as to its title, Beethoven having written "Sinfonia pastorale" on the cover in red crayon, and corrections in lead pencil in the music.1
The time for Beethoven's annual summer flitting had come. Modling was chosen again for the country sojourn and Beethoven arrived there on May 12, taking lodgings as before in the Hafner house in the Hauptstrasse. He had, evidently, brought a house- keeper with him and now engaged a housemaid. The former endured two months.2 Karl was placed under the tuition of Blochlinger on June 22. Beethoven, as letters to the Archduke
'Dr. F. Keesbacher, who published a history of the Laibach Philharmonic Society in 1862, thought that this was the composition sent by Beethoven; but the "Pastoral" Symphony had been published nearly ten years before — by Breitkopf and Hartel in May, 1809.
2On the blank leaves of an Almanac for 1819, such as used to be bound in those useful household publications for the reception of memoranda, Beethoven notes: "Came to Modling, May 12. ! ! ! Miser sum pauper. . . ." "On May 14 the housemaid in Mr. came, to receive 6 florins a month. . . . On 29th May Dr. Hasenohrl made his 3rd visit to K. Tuesday on the 22nd of June my nephew entered the institute of Mr. Blochlinger at monthly payments in advance of 7.5 florins TV. W. Began to take the baths here regularly (?) on 28th Monday, for the first (?) time daily." Schindler adds: "On July 20 gave notice to the housekeeper."
In a Frenzy of Composition 15
dated July \") and August 31 J show, W&S not in the best of lira 1 th, hut was hard at work on the mass, with an excursion now and then into the symphony (Ninth). Schindler presents us with a pathe- tic impressive, almost terrifying picture of the .state to which his labors lifted him (Ed. of I860, I, 270):
Towards the end of August, accompanied by the musician Johann Horsalka still living in Vienna, I arrived at the master's borne in Modling.
It was 4 o'clock in the afternoon. As soon as wc entered we learned that in the morning both servants had gone away, and that there had been ;i quarrel after midnight which had disturbed all the neighbors, because as a consequence of a long vigil both had gone to sleep and the food which had been prepared had become unpalatable. In the living-room, behind a locked door, we heard the master singing parts of the fugue in the Credo singing, howling, stamping. After we had been listening a long time to this almosl awful scene, and were about to go away, the door opened and Beethoven stood before us with distorted features, calculated to excite fear. He looked as if he had been in mortal com- bat with the whole host of contrapuntists, his everlasting enemies. His first utterances were confused, as if he had been disagreeably sur- prised at our having overheard him. Then he reached the day's happen- ings and with obvious restraint he remarked: "Pretty doings, these! (Saubere Wirthschaft.) Everybody has run away and I haven't had anything to eat since yesternoon!" I tried to calm him and helped him to make his toilet. My companion hurried on in advance to the restaurant of the bathing establishment to have something made ready for the famished master. Then he complained about the wretched state of his domestic affairs, but here, for reasons already stated, there was nothing to be done. Never, it may be said, did so great an artwork as is the Missa SolemnU see its creation under more adverse circumstances.2
The fact that Beethoven received an advance payment on a commission for an oratorio which he undertook to write for the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde has been mentioned. The sum was 400 florins. It was on August IS. Four days later there was a meeting of the society at which Landgrave von Fiirstenberg re- ported3 that on the written application of Prince von Odescalchi, representing the President, Beethoven had replied that he had long been desirous to compose a work which would reflect honor on the society and that he would do his best to expedite it. That seems to have been the end of the matter for the time being.
'Kalischer-Shedlock, Vol. II. pp. 188 and 189.
Mm his draft f<>r this chapter Thayer wrote: '"In tin- hope of obtaining further par- ticulars Horsalka's attention was directed to this passage in the copy now before the' writer. The result is written on the margin in llerr Luib'a hand: 'Horsalka knows nothing of this'. This incident is doubtless true, but thai Horsalka should not have remembered it if lie was present, is incredible. Schindler'a queer memory has again proved treacherous in regard to his companion."
3So Pohl, who wrote ;i history of the •'( resellschaft." informed Thayer in a note.
16 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
There was also during the Modling sojourn a continuation of the negotiations with Thomson. A Mr. Smith visited Beethoven bearing a letter from the Scotch publisher which called out a playful rejoinder in which Beethoven sought to turn an easy play upon German words into French. Thomson suggested that the introductions and accompaniments to the Scotch songs be made easier ("lighter," in the German idiom); they would be so, Beet- hoven replied, if the compensation were made more difficult ("heavier" would have been his word had he been permitted to use the German equivalent). As it is, Beethoven's humor becomes rather ponderous, as see the letter which was written in French by Beethoven apparently without assistance:
Vienne le 25me Maj, 1819. Mon cher Ami!
Vous ecrives toujours facile tres — je m'accomode tout mon possible, mais — mais — mais — Vhonorare pourroit pourtant etre plus difficile, ou plus-tot pesantel ! ! ! ! Votre ami Mosieur Smith m'a fait grand plaisir a cause de sa visite chez moi — en Hate, je vous assure, que je serais tou- jours avec plaisir a votres services — comme j'ai a present votre Addresse par Mr. Smith, je serai bientot en Etat de vous ecrire plus ample — Vhonorare pour un Theme avec variations j'ai fixe, dans ma derniere letter a vous par Messieurs le Friess, a moien dix ducats en or, C'est, je vous jure malgre cela settlement par complaisance pour vous, puisque je nais pas besoin, de me meter avec de telles petites choses, mais il faut toujours pourtant perdre du temps avec de telles bagatelles, et Vhonneur ne permit pas, de dire a quelqu'un, ce quon en gagne, — je vous souhaite toujours le bon gout pour la vrai Musique et si vous cries facile — je crier ai difficile pour facile ! ! I !
Thomson indorsed on this letter: "25 May, 1819. Beethoven. Some pleasantry on my repeated requests to make his Symphs and accompgnts. to our National Airs Easy, sent by Mr. John Smith of Glasg." Another British commission was offered him about the same time. There are two entries in a Conversation Book, apparently in the handwriting of Schindler:
The Englishman brought me your letter yesterday and evening before last I received another one for you through Fries. Another commission was brought by the other Englishman, the friend of Smith. A Mr. Donaldson in Edinburgh wants to know if you will not write a Trio for 3 pianofortes and in the style of your Quintet in E-flat. He wants to announce it as his property — The remuneration which you demand is to be paid to you in any way you may select — All the parts of the Trio must be obbligato. If you do not, write to Donaldson in Edin- burgh direct. These Englishmen speak of nothing else than their wish to have you come to England — they give assurance that if you come for a single winter to England, Scotland and Ireland, you will earn so much that you can live the rest of your life on the interest.
Meeting between Beethoven and Zelter 17
And again:
The gentleman is going to write to Donaldson — Edinburgh — to-day — the answer can be here in 4 weeks and the gentleman can be here that long. Tell him how much you want, when it might be finished and how you want the payment made. He is very desirous to have a composition from you and there is no possibility of its being left on your hands — Moreover it is a great work. If you get 40 ducats for the Sonata he can doubtless pay 10U. By that time the answer may be here from Edin- burgh.
Great Britain's monetary reward, had Beethoven accepted all its invitations, would no doubt have been all that the friend of "Mr. Donaldson of Edinburgh" stated and in proportion would have been the appreciation which Beethoven would have fouud at the hands of the English professional musicians, amateurs and musical laity.
Pathetic and diverting are the incidents which Karl Friedrich Zelter relates in letters to Goethe of his attempts to form a closer acquaintance with Beethoven. Zelter came to Vienna in July. He says that he wanted to call upon Beethoven, but he was in the country — nobody knew7 where. This in his first letter which mentions the subject. On August 16 he writes:
It is said that he is intolerably maussade. Some say that he is a lunatic. It is easy to talk. God forgive us all our sins! The poor man is reported as being totally deaf. Now I know what it means to see all this digital manipulation around me while my fingers are becoming use- less one after the other. Lately Beethoven went into an eating-house; he sat himself down to a table and lost himself in thought. After an hour he calls the waiter. "What do I owe?" "The gentleman has not eaten anything yet ' "What shall I bring?" "Bring anything you please, but let me alone!"
Zelter stays in Vienna from July to September, but sees noth- ing of Beethoven. Then, on September 12, he sets out with Steiner to visit the master at Modling. On the road they meet Beethoven, who is on his way to the city. Leaving their carriages they embrace each other, but conversation with a deaf man not being practicable on the highway they separate after agreeing to meet at Steiner's at 4 o'clock in the afternoon. Zelter was moved almost to tears. After a hurried meal he and Steiner hastened back to Vienna. Let him relate the rest:
After eating we drove back to Vienna at once. Full as a badger
and tired as a dog I lie down and sleep away the time, sleep BO soundly thai not a thing enters my mind. Then I go to the theatre and when I see Beethoven there I feel as if I had been struck by lightning. The
same thing happens to him at sight of me, and this is not the place for
18 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
explanations with a deaf man. Now comes the point: In spite of the things of which Beethoven is accused justly or unjustly, he enjoys a popular respect such as is bestowed only upon the most excellent. Steiner had given it out that Beethoven would appear in his little office, which will hold only six or eight persons, for the first time in person at 4 o'clock, and invited guests so generously that in a room crowded to the street, half a hundred brilliant people waited in vain. I did not get an explanation till next day, when I received a letter from Beethoven in which he begged my pardon, for he. like me, had passed the time set for the meeting in blissful sleep.
Zelter's letter calls for a slight rectification. It was not the next day but four days later that Beethoven wrote him the letter of explanation, and Zelter's statement that Beethoven had over- slept himself as he had done was pure assumption — unless he learned it from another source. Beethoven wrote:
Highly respected Sir:
It is my fault that you were lately besmeared {angeschmiert, that is, deceived, cheated) as we say here, by me. Unforeseen circumstances robbed me of the pleasure of passing a few lovely and enjoyable hours, which would have been profitable to art, with you. I hear that you are already leaving Vienna day after to-morrow. My country life, to which I am forced by my poor health, is, however, not as beneficial as usual to me this year. It may be that I shall come in again day after to-morrow and if you are not already gone in the afternoon I hope to tell you by word of mouth with true cordiality how much I esteem you and desire your friendship (to be near to you).
The autograph of this letter contains what appears to be either a transcript or a draft of a letter which Zelter either sent or planned to send to Beethoven. In view of the fact that it shows a different feeling towards the great composer than that formerly enter- tained by the teacher of Mendelssohn, it is given here:
To see once more, face to face, in this life the man who brings joy and edification to so many good people, among whom I of course am glad to count myself — this was the purpose, worthy friend, for which I wished to visit you at Modlingen. You met me, and my aim was at least not wholly frustrated, for I saw your face. I know of the infirmity which burdens you and you have my sympathy, for I am similarly afflicted. On the day after to-morrow I go from here to resume my labors, but I shall never cease to hold you in high respect and to love you.
Friedrich Schneider, of Dessau, visited Vienna in the fall of the year and caused a sensation by his organ-playing. He re- ported that Beethoven had received him graciously and that he, in turn, had heard the master play the pianoforte, his improvisa- tion being the most marvellous thing he had ever listened to.
A Composition by Archduke Utdolph 19
In August, Johann van Beethoven bought an estate near Gneixen- dorf. This brought the brothers together in Vienna during the winter. Johann was the "landowner" ol a familiar story, and Beethoven, the "brain owner," seemed at this time disposed to emulate him. At least he read advertisements of houses for sale in Modling before the day set for the sale and advised him in the premises. In the same letter1 he advises Steiner to publish a set of variat ions composed by the Archduke. "I have mentioned your name in the matter, inasmuch as I do not believe that you will lose anything by the transaction, and it is always honorable to print something by such a Principe Prqfessore." The variations were on a theme composed by Beethoven and given to his imperial pupil as a lesson, and had called out the obsequious remarks which may be read in the New Year's letter to the Archduke. His remark to Steiner is explained by the fact that on August 31 he had written to the Archduke as follows:
As regards the masterly variations of Y. I. H. I think they might be published under the following title, namely:
Theme, or Task set by L. v. Beeth.
forty times varied and dedicated to his teacher by the Most Serene Author.
There are so many requests for them, and eventually this honorable work will reach the public in garbled copies. Y. I. II. will yourself not be able to avoid presenting copies here and there: therefore, in the name of God, among the many consecrations which Y. I. II. is receiving and of which the world is being informed, let the consecration of Apollo (or the Christian C&cilia) also be made known. True, Y. I. II. may accuse me of vanity; but I can assure you that although this dedication is precious to me and I am really proud of it, this is not at all my aim. 8 publishers have appealed for it, Artaria, Steiner and a third whose name does not occur to in.-. To which of the first two shall the Variations be given?
()M this point I await the commands of Y. I. II. Both of them have
offered to print the variations at their owl cost. The question now is whether Y. 1. II. is satisfied with the title? To the question whether or not the variations ought to be published, Y. I. II. ought to close your eyes; if it is done, Y. I. II. may call it a misfortune; but the world trill think the contrary.
Steiner printed the archducal work in the seventh number of his "Musical Museum" under a slightly changed title, viz. : "Theme (Aufgabe) composed by Ludwig van Beethoven, varied forty times and dedicated to the author by his pupil R[udolph], A[rch-]
'Kaliacher-Shedlock, II. p. 144.
20 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
Dfuke].1 Other evidences of Beethoven's interest in Archduke Rudolph's studies in composition are to be noted about this time. On July 29 he wrote to his pupil from Modling, sending him three poems and asking him to select one for composition, en- couraging him in these words: "The Austrians now know already that the spirit of Apollo has newly awakened in the Imperial family. From all quarters I receive requests for something. The proprietor of the Modezeitung will appeal to Y. I. H. in writing. I hope I shall not be accused of bribery — at Court and not a courtier, what possibilities? ? ! ! !" In this letter, however, there are words of vaster import, as showing Beethoven's attitude towards musical evolution. We quote:
. . . but freedom, progress, is the aim in the world of art as in the whole great universe, and even if we moderns are not so far advanced in sound technique (Festigkeit) as our forefathers, refinement in manners has opened many things to us. My exalted pupil in music, already a fellow-contestant for the laurel of fame, must not subject himself to the accusation of onesidedness, — et iterum venturus judicare vivos et mortuos.2
^he theme was the melody written for a song beginning "O Hoffnung, du stahlst die Herzen, vertreibst die Schmerzen," from Tiedge's "Urania." Nohl, without giving an authority, quotes an inscription on the autograph as follows: "Composed in the spring of 1818 by L. v. Beethoven in doloribus for H. Imp. Highness the Archduke Rudolph." Thayer knows nothing about such an inscription, but it does not look like an invention. In one of the Conversation Books somebody (Dr. Deiters opines it was Peters) writes: "Fraulein Spitzenberger played the 40 variations by the Archduke for me yesterday. I know nothing about it, but it seems to me that they were pretty extensively corrected by you. The critics insist on the same thing." We do not know what reply Beethoven made and it is a matter of small moment. The same comment has been called out by many a royal composition since; it was Brahms who said: "Never criticize the compo- sition of a Royal Highness; — you do not know who may have written it!" In justice to Archduke Rudolph, however, it deserves to be mentioned that a set of variations on a melody from Rossini's "Zelmira" composed by him shows pencil corrections in the hand of Beethoven and they are few and trifling.
2There is a vagueness in this passage, and especially in the words which precede it, which has exercised the minds of Kochel, Nohl and Deiters; but it is the opinion of the English Editor that the meaning has been reproduced in the above translation. As the reader may, however, wish to form his own opinion in the matter, which is certainly most interesting, the context is given in the original and what might be described as an expository rendering into English: Ich war in Wicn, vm aus der Bibliothek I. K. II. das mir Tauglichste auszusuchcn. Die Hauptabsicht ist das geschicinde Treffcn vnd mit der bessern Kunst-Vereinigung, wobei aber practische Absiehten Ausnahmen machen, wofiir die Alten zwar doppelt dienen, indem moistens recller Kunstwerih (Genie hat doch nur der deutsche Handel und Seb. Bach gehabt) allein Freiheit, etc., that is: "I was in Vienna to seek out some things best suited to my purpose. What is chiefly needed is a quick recognition of the essential coupled with a better union of the arts [i. e., poetry and music] in respect of which practical considerations sometimes compel an exception, as we may learn in a twofold way from the old composers, where we find chiefly stress laid upon the aristically valuable (among them only the German Handel and Seb. Bach had genius) but freedom, etc." Beethoven, presumably, was following the in- junction noted in the Tagcbuch and, for the purposes of the work which then engrossed him, was consulting authorities on ecclesiastical music. That his mind was full of his Mass is indicated by the somewhat irrelevant quotation from the text of the Credo. Was he not essaying a union between the technical perfection of the old masters and a more truthful, or literal, illustration of the missal text, wherefor freedom was necessary?
A Painter's Presence Forgotten 21
A number of incidents in Beethoven's life may now he passed in hurried chronological review: On Oetober 1, he was made an honorary member of the Mercantile Association (Kaufmannischer Verein) in Vienna. In the fall Ferdinand Sehimon (1?!»? ls.>2 . who was musician and opera-singer as well as painter, painted the portrait which afterward came into the possession of Schindler, and was engraved by Eduard Eichers for Schindler's biography.1 Sehimon had obtained permission through Schindler to set up his easel in the chamber adjoining Beethoven's workroom, the com- poser having resolutely refused a sitting because he was busy on the Credo of the mass. From this point of vantage he made his studies and had finished them all but the eyes — the most striking feature in the portrait. Out of this dilemma Beethoven un- consciously helped him. He had evidently been impressed with the discretion, or independence, of the young artist who came with- out a "good morning" and went without a "good evening," and invited him to coffee. Thus Sehimon had ample opportunity to supply the one deficiency in his sketches.
At the end of October, Beethoven returned to Vienna from Modling, taking lodging this time at No. 16 Josephstadter Glacis, opposite the Auersberg Palace and near the Blochlinger Institute where Karl was studying. The guardianship matter soon oc- cupied his attention; spells of indisposition tormented him; and financial distress so threatened him that he attempted to nego- tiate a loan from the banker Hennickstein, and borrowed 750 florins from Steiner.2 Countess Erdody was in Vienna at the end of the year and he sent her a note on December 11), promising to visit her soon and scratching down a musical phrase which he afterwards erased to make of it the New Year canon: "Gliick, Gltlck zum neuen Jahr.*'
It i> remarkable that Beethoven, under the circumstances which have been set forth in this chapter, could continue his labors on the Mass which were his principal occupation during the year; it was but another proof of the absorbing possession which the composition of a great work took of him when once fairly begun. So diligently did he apply himself that he had hopes not only of finishing it in time for the installation of the Archduke as Areh- bishop of Olmiitz, but wrote to Hies on November 1" that he had already nearly completed it and would like to know what could be
. * I
done with it in London. To Schindler. however, in expressing a
'Tin- picture u bow preserved among the rest ol the relics which Schindler de- pusitnl in Berlin.
ECalischer-Shedlock, II, p. LSI.
22 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
doubt that he would have it done in time for the ceremonial, he said that every movement had taken on larger dimensions than had originally been contemplated. Schindler says also that when the day came, not one of the movements was finished in the eyes of the composer; yet he alleges that Beethoven brought the completed Credo with him when he came back to Vienna from Modling. There is this to be added to these statements: A pocket sketch- book used in 1820 (it is now in the Beethoven House at Bonn) shows some sketches for the Credo; and there are memoranda for the same movement in a Conversation Book used near the close of the year. That the Gloria had received its final shape is a fair de- duction from a Conversation Book of the same period. Bernard (presumably) writes:
It was decided yesterday that you give a concert either on Christ- mas or some other day. Count Stadion will give the use of the room, and Schick, Czerny and Janitschek will care for the rest. The programme is to include a symphony, the Gloria from your mass, the new Sonata played by you and a grand final chorus. All your works. 4,000 florins are guaranteed. Only one movement of the mass is to be performed.
The project is mentioned again by another friend, and Beet- hoven remarks: "It is too late for Christmas, but it might be possible in Lent." That he worked occasionally on the Ninth Symphony, especially in the early part of the year, has already been said. Thomson's commissions occupied some of his time, as well as a project to extend his labors on folksongs into a wider field. The second set of Variations on folksong themes which was pub- lished as Op. 107 in 1820, must be assigned, at least in part, to this year. He also, as Schindler tells us, composed a set of waltzes for a band of seven men who played at an inn in the valley of the Brtihl near Modling, and wrote out the parts for the different in- struments. These waltzes have disappeared; Schindler tried in vain to find them a few years later. The canon "Gliick zum neuen Jahr" was composed for Countess Erdody on the last day of December, if A. Fuchs, who says that he copied it from the ori- ginal manuscript, is correct. He also wrote a canon for Steiner in the summer, as appears from a conversation recorded in a book of March 20, 1820. An unidentified hand writes:
Last summer you sent a canon infinitus a due to Steiner from Modling
*e>
Nobody has solved it, but I have solved it. The second voice enters on the second:
Publications of the Year isid
2:3
4
Violin
it Bass
>.
t=3
^
«;
5T
V
^
it is infinite. Go to the devil1 God protect you
was the text.
On September 21 he wrote a canon to the words "Glaube und hoffe" for the younger Schlesinger, afterwards publisher in Paris, who was a visitor in Vienna from Berlin at the time, as Beet- hoven's inscription on the autograph shows. -
The publications of the year 1819 were (1) Two Sonatas for Pianoforte and Violoncello, Op. 102, dedicated to Countess Er- dody, by Artaria in Vienna (they had already been published by Simrock); (2) The Quintet in C minor, Op. 104, arranged from the Trio, Op. 1, No. 3; (8) Themes and Variations on Motives from Folksongs, for Pianoforte and Flute or Violin, Op. 105, by Arta- ria; Pianoforte Sonata in B-flat, Op. 106, dedicated to Archduke Rudolph, by Artaria.
'"Hoi Euch der Teufel! B'htit Euch Gott!"
•Marx published it f<>r the firsl time mfaesimUe in the appendix of Vol. II of his
biography of Beethoven. In the Collected Works it appears on page ilo, Series i.5.
Chapter II
The Years 1820 and 1821 — End of the Guardianship Litiga- tion— A Costly Victory — E. T. A. Hoffmann — Financial Troubles — Adagios and English Hymn-tunes — Arrested as a Vagrant — Negotiations for the Mass in D — The Last Pianoforte Sonatas.
ALMOST involuntarily, in passing in review the incidents of the year whose story has just been told and projecting a glance into the near future, the question arises: Where, in these moments of doubt, ill-health, trial, vexation of spirit and torment of body were the old friends of Beethoven who in the earlier years had stood by him faithfully and lovingly? Where was Stephan von Breuning? Alas! he seems to have been an early sacrifice to Beethoven's obstinate course in respect of his nephew. Schindler says that he had advised against the adoption of the boy and thus wounded Beethoven in his most sensitive part. The temporary estrangement began in 1817. Some others of the old friends may have been rebuffed in like manner; some, like the faithful seneschal, Zmeskall, were ill; some were absent from Vienna — Count Brunswick, Schuppanzigh; some were dead; in some the flames of friendship may have died down because there was so little in Beethoven's public life to challenge their sympathy and support. Count Lichnowsky has dropped out of the narra- tive and does not appear for some years. What had happened to the ardent friend of the youthful days, Count Waldstein? There is no answer. Once a Conversation Book awakens curiosity and a hope. Somebody warns Beethoven in a public place not to speak so loud, as everybody is listening. "Count Waldstein is sitting near; where does he live?" Beethoven's answer is unre- corded and thus passes the only opportunity which the known material offers from which might have been learned what caused the death of that beautiful friendship. Bernard, Schindler, Oliva, Peters and Bach were near to him, and the last was of incalculable
[24]
Departure of Old Friends 25
value to him in his great trial. But could they replace those who w ere gone?
Beethoven was become a lonely man — -an enforced seeker of solitude. No doubt many who would have been glad to give him their friendship were deterred by the wide-spread reports of his suspicious, unapproachable, almost repellant nature. But a miracle happens. Driven in upon himself by the forces which seem to have been arrayed against him, introspection opens wider and wider to him the doors of that imagination which in its crea- tive function, as Ruskin tells us, is "an eminent beholder of things when and where they are not; a seer that is, in the prophetic sense, calling the things that are not as though they were; and forever delighting to dwell on that which is not tangibly present." Now he proclaims a new evangel, illustrates a higher union of beauty and truthfulness of expression, exalts art till it enters the realm of religion.
In the Tagebuch there stands a bold inscription written in February of the year 1820: "The moral law in us, and the starry sky above us — Kant."1 This and two other citations, the first of which Beethoven surely culled from some book, also deserve to be set down here as mottoes applicable to the creative work which occupied his mind during the year and thereafter:
'Tis said that art is long and life is fleeting: — Nay; life is long and brief the span of art!
If e'er her breath vouchsafes with gods a meeting, A moment's favor 'tis of which we've had a part.
The world is a king and desires flattery in return for favor; but true art is perverse and will not submit to the mould of flattery. Famous artists always labor under an embarrassment; — therefore, first works are the best, though they may have sprung from dark ground.
We can only record the fact that Beethoven began the year 1820, as he had begun its immediate predecessor, by sending a New Year's greeting to the august pupil who was now almost continu- ally in his mind— Archduke Rudolph, soon to be Archbishop and Cardinal2 — before taking up the story of the incubus which oppressed the composer's mind, the clog which impelled his creative activities during much of the year — the legal proceedings
'"Two things fill tlit" soul with ever new anil increasing wonder and reverence theoftener tin- mind dwells upon them — the starry sky above me and the moral law
within me." — Kant's "Criticism of Practical Reason.''
The greeting was in the form of a four-part canon beginning with a short homo- phonic chorus, the words: "Seiner Kaiserlichen Efoheit! Dem Ershenog Rudolph! Dem geistlichen Ftlrsten! Alles Gute, alles Schttne!" The autograph is preserved by the Gesellschaft <ler Musikfreunde in Vienna. B. and EL Ges. Aus. Series XXIII, page 187.
26 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
concerning the guardianship of nephew Karl. Fortunately for the tinge of these pages the end is not distant.
Two applications made by Beethoven to the Court of Magis- trates had been denied and he now asked for a review of these de- cisions by the Court of Appeals. The action of the Magistracy had grievously pained him, so he informed the superior tribunal, and not only had his rights been set aside, but no regard had been shown for the welfare of his nephew. Against this he now sought relief, and he set forth his grievances: (1) He was testamentary appointee and the Landrecht had confirmed him and excluded the mother; circumstances compelling his absence from Vienna, he had arranged that Herr Nussbock should be appointed guardian ad interim; back permanently in the city, his nephew's welfare re- quired that he resume the guardianship; (2) The higher education which his nephew's talents demanded neither the mother nor Nussbock could direct — the former because she was a woman and had conducted herself in a manner which had led the Landrecht to exclude her, Nussbock because he was too much occupied with his duties as Municipal Sequestrator and, having been no more than a paper-maker, he did not possess the insight and judgment essential to the scientific education of the ward. (3) Having no child of his own, his hopes were set on the boy, who was unusually talented, yet he had been told that he had been held back a year in his studies and that owing to a lack of funds he was to be taken from the institution in which he had been placed and given in the care of his mother; by her mismanagement the boy would be sacri- ficed, it being the aim of the mother to expend his share of the pension money on herself. He had declared to the Magistracy his willingness to defray the costs at the institute and also to engage other masters for the boy. Being "somewhat hard of hearing" communication with him was difficult and therefore he had asked that a co-guardian be appointed in the person of Herr Peters, Prince Lobkowitzsian Councillor, whose knowledge and moral character would assure such a training and education as were justified by the boy's capacity. "I know of no more sacred duty than the care and education of a child," he observes. He would offer no objection to the mother's having a "sort of joint-guardianship," but its duties and privileges should be limited to her visiting him and learning what plans were making for his education; to permit more would be to compass the ruin of the boy.1
•The reader who desires to read the documents in full is referred to the German edition of this biography for the decrees and minutes of the courts and to the Kalischer- Shedlock collection of letters for Beethoven's pleadings.
An Appeal to a Higher Court 27
This petition was filed Oil January 7. 1820; three days later the Appellate Court commanded the Magistracy to file a report of the proceedings had before it, together with all minutes and documents. The Magistracy complied on February 5, citing its decision of September 17, 181!), and defending its action on the grounds thai (a) Beethoven, owing to his deafness and his hat red of the mother of the ward, was incapable of acting as guardian; (b) the guar- dianship belonged to the mother by right of law; (c) the com- mission of an aet of infidelity against her husband in IS 11, for which she had suffered punishment, was no longer a bar; id) none of the alleged "injurious disturbances and interferences" had been definitely set forth or proven:
If under injurious disturbances we are to understand that the mother is desirous to see her child once every 14 days or 4 weeks, or to convince herself about the wear and cleanliness of his clothing, or to learn of his conduct toward his teachers, these can appear injurious only in the eyes of the appellant; the rest of the world, however, would find it amiss in a mother if she made inquiry concerning her child only once a fortnight or month.
Answering the second charge, the magistrates urged that the appellant seemed to ask of the mother and other guardian that they themselves educate the boy in the sciences. For this not even the appellant was fitted, at least he had not demonstrated such a fitness; he had left the preparation for the higher studies to others and this the mother and guardian could also do, having, indeed, a better plan, which was to send the boy to the R. I. Con- vict, where he would surely make better progress at smaller expense. Ad tertium, the failure of the boy to advance in his classes could not be laid to the mother or guardian, but must be charged against the appellant, who had taken the boy away from his studies for the university after two months, kept him at home three months, and sent him to another institution of learning at the end of June; naturally enough he lost a school year.
The Court of Appeals demanded a more explicit report, which the Magistracy tiled on February 28, taking advantage of the opportunity to review the proceedings had before the Land- recht from tin- beginning, and to make severe strictures on the conduct of Beethoven in tiling an exhibit (F) with his petition in support of which no evidence was offered, though because of it the Landrechi was asked to exclude the mother from the guardian- ship which belonged to her under the law. Again we quote:
This exclusion can have nothing for its foundation except the misdemeanor of which the mother was guilty in 1811, for all the rest
tA
28 The Life of Ludyvig van Beethoven
contained in appellant's exhibit F is unproven chatter to which the Land- recht could give no consideration, but which gives speaking proof of how i passionately and inimically the appellant has always acted, and still acts, towards the mother, how little he recks of tearing open wounds that were healed, since after having endured punishment she stood re- habilitated; and yet he reproaches her with a transgression for which she had atoned years before, which had been pardoned by the injured hus- band himself who petitioned for leniency in her sentence and who had declared her capable and fit for the guardianship of his son in his last will and testament, directing that the son be not taken away from his mother. Regardless of this the appellant last year, certainly not in the interest of the boy's welfare, inasmuch as we have excellent educational institutions here, but only to pain the mother, to tear the heart out of her bosom, attempted to send him out of the country to Landshut. Fortunately the government authorities, acting on information de- rived from this court, frustrated the plan by refusing a passport.
Let us try now to take a dispassionate view of the case as thus far presented in the pleadings and documents. Not only the law of nature but the lawrs of the land justified the mother in asserting her right to look after the physical wrell-being of her child and seeking to enforce it. Dr. Bach seems to have impressed that fact upon Beethoven, wherefore he declares his willingness in the bill of appeal to associate her with himself in the guardianship to that extent. That the Magistrates displayed unusual, not to say unjudicial zeal in her behalf while defending their own course is indubitable; but we are in no position to judge of the propriety of their course, wrhich seems to have been in harmony with the ju- dicial procedure of the place and period, least of all to condemn them, so long as it was permitted them so to do, for having made a stout resistance when their acts were impugned in the appeal to the higher court. The "Exhibit F," filed in the proceedings before the Landrecht, has not been found and its contents can only be guessed at from the allusions to it in the documents. Obviously it contained aspersions on the moral character of Madame van Beethoven, and it may have been, nay, probably was, true that they were unsupported by evidence and therefore undeserving of consideration in a court either of law or equity. Perhaps they were not susceptible of legal proof. It has been thought that Beethoven felt some hesitancy in flaunting evidence of his sister- in-law's infamy in the face of the world, l but he certainly showed no disposition to spare her in his letters, nor did he hesitate to accuse
JDr. Deiters remarks on this point: "No doubt Beethoven had hoped to attain his ends by general statements and thus spare himself the shame and humiliation which would have followed had he presented the truth, even in disguise, touching the lewdness and shameless life of his own sister-in-law; and her legal advisers and the members of the Magisterial Court knew how to turn this fact to their own advantage."
Depravity of Karl's Motheb 29
her of unmentionable things by innuendo. In a Conversation Book of this year ( 1S-20) he writes of her that she was "horn for intrigue, accomplished in deceit, mistress of all the arts of dissi- mulation." On the other hand, it is singular thai the Magistrates in their final efifort to justify their course have nothing to say ahout the present moral standing of the woman whose legal and natural rights they claimed to be upholding. Were they in ignorance of what we now know, namely, that her conduct had not only been reprehensible in 1811 (though condoned hy her husband) but- continued SO after her husband's death? Schindler says that she gave birth to a child while the case was pending, and that is con- firmed hv a statement of Nephew Karl's widow,1 that in her old age Madame van Beethoven lived in Baden with this illegitimate daughter, who was also a dissolute woman.
But there are many anomalous things to the studious mind in the proceedings which we are reporting, which differ greatly from anything which could happen in a court of chancery or probate in Great Britain or America to-day. It is certainly repugnant to our present legal ethics that having filed a petition to reverse the action of one court Beethoven should not only have written private letters to a judge of the court of review, pleading his case on per- sonal grounds, but that his counsel should have advised him to visit members of the higher court to present arguments in his behalf. But, no doubt, this was consistent with the customs of Austria a century ago; and it is what happened. Beethoven writes to Karl Winter, an Appellationsrat, and his lawyer tells him to engage him and one of his colleagues, Schmerling, in conver- sation on the subject. Perhaps Winter himself questioned the propriety of the proceeding, for in a Conversation Book somebody, who had evidently acted as messenger in the delivery of the letter, writes: "I gave it to Ilerr v. Winter; he kept me waiting and then said that he could give no answer, nor involve himself in a cor- respondence." The letter in question was written on March (>. In it Beethoven says that he had prepared a memorial which he would place in his hands in a few days. From the outline given it is plain that the memorial contained a review of the case since the deal h of Beet hoven's brother. It had been prepared, said Beet- hoven, "believing that I owed it to myself to expose the falsity of the many slanders which have been uttered against me and to lay hare t lie intrigues of Madame van Beethoven against me to the injury of her own child, as also to place in it s proper light the eon- duct of t he Magisl rates' Court ." He charges t hat. t he Magist rates
'Made to Thayer.
30 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
had summoned the widow and her son to a hearing without his knowledge and, as his nephew had told him, he had been urged and led on by his mother to make false accusations against him. He had also forwarded a document which proved the wavering and partisan conduct of the Magistrates. He repeats the charge about his nephew's failure to advance in his studies and adds that the boy had had a hemorrhage which, had he not been on hand, might almost have cost him his life. These things were not attributable to Herr Tuscher for the reason that the Magistrates had given him too little support and he could not proceed with sufficient energy — this the writer could do in his capacity of uncle, guardian and de- frayer of expenses. He asks that if it becomes necessary he and his nephew be examined, cites his expenditures to keep the boy two years in an educational institution, saying that he had received nothing from the widow in nearly fourteen months but would con- tinue to pay the cost unselfishly in the future, and had set apart 4,000 florins which was on deposit in bank and was to go to his nephew on his death. Moreover, he had expectations from his relations with the Archbishop of Olmiitz, etc.
The case was prepared shrewdly, carefully and most discreetly by Dr. Bach, who seems to have exerted an admirable influence on Beethoven at this crisis. The nature of his advice may be learned from the communication of Bernard in one of the recorded con- versations. Bernard is writing, and evidently giving the result of a consultation with Dr. Bach. The Court of Appeals would ask another report from the Magistrates and on its receipt would ad- judge the case. Nussbock, who Dr. Bach said was willing, should voluntarily retire from the guardianship. Beethoven was asked as to the appointment of Tuscher; had he resigned permanently or only temporarily in favor of Tuscher, the better to accomplish the nephew's removal from his mother? In what manner had Tuscher abdicated, and had the Magistracy informed Beethoven of the fact? It was necessary, said the adviser, to proceed with moderation in all things so as to avoid the appearance of malice, and the mother should not be assailed if it was at all avoidable, stress being laid only on the fact that as a woman she ought not to have the direc- tion of the education of a boy of Karl's age, not having the requisite fitness. It would also be necessary for him, in case he were asked, to state his readiness to defrav the cost of the bov's education in the future and this, if the worst came to the worst, might be fol- lowed by a threat to withdraw wholly from his care. Reproaches might be made against him concerning the period when he had the boy with him, the priests having taken to meddling in the matter,
Appointment of a Joint Guardianship 31
and it would be well in the future not to take the boy to public eating-houses where he would be observed and scandal fomented.
Bach seems to have advised Beethoven to visit two of the judges, Winter and Schmerling, and himself had an interview with the hoy, who told his uncle what the advocate had questioned him about. For the nonce Karl was on his good behavior. Bloch- lingei reported favorably on his studies to Bernard, and in a Con- versation Book the hoy apologized to his uncle for some statements derogatory to him which he had made to the Magistrates. "She promised me so many things," he said, "that I could not resist her; I am sorry that I was so weak at the time and beg your forgiveness; I will not again permit myself to be led astray. I did not know what results might follow when I told the Magistrates what I did; but if there is another examination I will retract all the falsehoods I uttered." The magisterial commission which followed on March 29, had plainly been held at the instance of the Appellate Court. Beethoven was solemnly admonished, and in answer to questions declared: (1) that he still demanded the guardianship of his nephew under the will and would not relinquish his claim; (2) that he requested the appointment of Councillor Peters as associate guardian; (3) that he demanded that Madame van Beethoven be excluded from the guardianship as she had been by the Landrecht, and (4) he reiterated his readiness to provide financially for the care of his ward; he would accept an associate guardian, but not a sole guardian, as he was convinced that no guardian would care for his nephew as well as he. In insisting on a renewed declaration on these points it is likely that the Court of Appeals had some hope that Beethoven might voluntarily renounce or modify his claims or the Magistrates recede from their attitude. Neither contingency occurred, however, and on April 8 the reviewing court issued its decree in Beethoven's favor, he and Peters being appointed joint guardians (gemein.schaftliche J'ormiinde), the mother and Xuss- bock being deposed. The widow now played her last card: — she appealed to the Emperor, who upheld the Court of Appeals. There was nothing for the Magistracy to do except to notify the result of the appeals to Beethoven, Madame van Beethoven, Peters and Nussbock. This was done on July "-24.
Beethoven had won at last. But at what a cost to himself, his art, the world! What time, what labor, what energy had he not taken away from his artistic creations! What had he not expended in the way of peace of mind, of friendship, of physical comfort, of wear of brain and nerve-force, for the privilege of keep- ing the boy to himself, of watching unmolested over his physical
32 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
welfare and directing his intellectual and moral training un- hindered! Surely such sacrifices, inspired, as we know they were, by a transcendent sense of duty and profoundest love, merited the rich reward of which he had dreamed — the devotion of one who ought to have been all that a son could be, the happiness of seeing the object of his love grow into a brilliant man and a useful citizen. Was it vouchsafed him? Let us not in the midst of his present happiness look too far into the future. Now his joy is unbounded. He breaks into a jubilation when, in conveying the news to Pinte- rics — that Pinterics who had sung the bass in "Ta, ta, ta," in honor of Malzel: "Dr. Bach was my representative in this affair and this Brook (Bach) was joined by the sea, lightning, thunder, a tem- pest, and the magisterial brigantine suffered complete shipwreck!" Schindler says that "his happiness over the triumph which he had won over wickedness and trickery, but also because of the sup- posed salvation from physical danger of his talented nephew, was so great that he worked but little or not at all all summer — though this was perhaps more apparent than real, the sketchbooks dis- closing from now on only empty pages." A wise qualification, for though the sketchbooks may have been empty, there is evidence enough elsewhere of hard work. Yet the Mass was not finished, and for this unfortunate circumstance the guardianship trial was no doubt largely to blame. To this subject we shall return presently.
Of Peters, who was appointed joint guardian with Beethoven of the nephew, little is known beyond what we learn from Beet- hoven and Peters's contributions to the Conversation Books. He was a tutor in the house of Prince Lobkowitz and had been on terms of friendship with Beethoven since 1816; his appointment by the court is a confirmation of Beethoven's tribute to him as a man of intellectual parts and of good moral character. His wife had a good voice and was a great admirer of Beethoven, who pre- sented her with a copy of the song cycle "An die feme Geliebte." A letter, once in the possession of John Ella in London, which may be of earlier date than 1821, to which year it is, however, most naturally assigned in view of the allusion to the "state burden" (the nephew), runs as follows:
How are you? Are you well or ill? How is your wife? Permit me to sing something for you:
Canon (Lively)
tr r r r -H- » rn
Saint Pe - ter was a rock! St.
Bad Conduct of Nephew Karl 33
Canon (Drawn out and drapsecT)
rthV" hT i' if r I " IP^fl
Her - nar - dus was a Sainl? I • r-
How are vour young princes? Will you be at home this afternoon at 5 o'eloek? Perhaps I'll visit you together with my jr/afr' harden.
Nephew Karl remained at Blflchlinger's institute and con- tinued to cause worry and anxiety to his uncle. Reports concern- ing his conduct and studies were variable from different persons and at different times. Blochlinger complained that lie needed constant supervision: "Had we not always been strict with him, he would not be where he is now." A cleric declares that he was at heart not a bad child but had been harmed by bad examples. "Karl has little feeling and in spite of the knowledge for which he is praised he has no reasoning powers," writes an unidentified per- son in the Conversation Book, surely not to the satisfaction of the uncle who was always setting forth his nephew's exceptional talent. In June somebody else (this time it may have been Oliva) feels constrained to write: "The boy lies every time he opens his mouth." The "terrible occurrence" which had almost crushed Beethoven in December, 1818, repeats itself, fortunately without such dire results to the too sympathetic uncle: In June, instead of coming to an oral examination, Karl ran away to his mother. Madame Blochlinger had to take a coach and servant and bring him back to the school; and to get him away from Madame van Beethoven, who was disposed to keep him in concealment, had to promise to see to it that he should not be punished for his naughtiness. Now Blochlinger, who says that the presence of Madame van Beethoven "poisons the air," wants the woman excluded from his house and asks for a power of attorney to call in the help of the police every time that Karl shall go to his mother, whom he calls a "notorious -trumpet," of whose presence in his house he must needs be ashamed. All this was told to Beethoven by Bernard, who had learned it from Bhichlinger. Beethoven went for advice to Bach, who told his client that it was impracticable to get a judicial writ againsl the mother enjoining her from meeting her son, and impossible to prevent secret meetings and secret correspondence. The practical solution of the problem was to have Blochlinger refuse to admit the woman to his institute and compel her to see Karl at his uncle's home. This would serve the purpose to some extent, as the mother did not like to meet her brother-in-law.
The enthronization of Beethoven's imperial pupil as Arch- bishop of Olmutz took place on March 20*. The Mass which was
34 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
to have been the composer's tribute was still unfinished. The reader knows why, or at least has been provided with an oppor- tunity to form an opinion as to the reason. It may have been for the purpose of offering an explanation to the new dignitary of the church, that Beethoven sought an audience as he states in a letter of April 3. The Archducal Archbishop had gone to Olmiitz and Beethoven wants to know his plans for the immediate future. He had heard that H. I. H. was to return to Vienna in May, but also that he intended to be absent for a year and a half. If so, Beethoven deplores that he has made plans for himself which are unwise. He begs H. I. H. not to give credence to the false re- ports concerning himself (Beethoven) which might reach his ears: "If Y. I. H. calls me one of your most treasured objects, I can honestly say that Y. I. H. is to me one of the most treasured ob- jects in the universe. Although I am no courtier, I believe that Y. I. H. has learned to know me well enough to know that no cold interest, but a sincere affection, has always attached me to your- self and inspired me; and I might well say that Blondel was found long ago, and if no Richard is to be found in the world for me, God will be my Richard." He has evidently concerned himself about the music at the court in Olmiitz: "It appears to me that my idea to maintain a quartet will certainly be the best thing to do. If there are already productions on a large scale in Olmiitz, something admirable might arise in Moravia through a quartet/' He advises his pupil, in case it is his purpose to return in May, to keep his compositions till then so as to play them first to him; but if his stay is to be longer, he will receive the compositions with the great- est pleasure and seek to guide H. I. H. "to the highest peaks of Parnassus."
A reference to himself as one who was at court yet not a courtier had been made by Beethoven in an earlier letter. This play on words seems to have been much in his head about this time and it is small wonder that when an opportunity offered for the employment of the pun in a canon it should have been em- braced; in fact, it looks as if possibly he had strained for the oc- casion, unless it should appear from evidence yet to be found that "One who was named Hoffmann," in Beethoven's words, was, as was long believed, the redoubtable E. T. A. Hoffmann, who had surely deserved the tribute contained in a canon which Beethoven wrote at this time. In the Conversation Book used in March, 1820, a strange hand writes: "In the Phantasic-Stiicke by Hoffmann, you are often spoken of. Hoffmann was musical director in Bamberg; he is now Government Councillor. Operas of his composition are
A Punning Canon ox Hofmann 35
performed in Berlin." Beethoven remarks, in writing: "Hofmann du bist kein Ilofmann." Later in a conversation held at table, these words occur twice: "Hofmann -r sei ja kein Hofmann — nein -f- -f- -r ich heisse Hofmann und bin kein Hofmann." These words are preceded by a measure of music, the beginning of the canon in question. Did Beethoven thus honor the fantastic poet, musician, novelist, essayist, singer, scene-painter and thea- trical manager who had shown such keen critical appreciation of his symphonies? It was long a pleasure to believe so and natural, too, until Nottebohm came with his iconoclastic evidence to the contrary. On March 23 Beethoven had written a letter to Hoff- mann, expressing his gratification at having won the good opinion of a man gifted with such excellent attributes as Hoffmann pos- sessed. Had he written the canon at this time he would surelv
■
have enclosed it in this letter and then, since it was preserved among Hoffmann's papers, it would have been found and given to the world with the letter. But Beethoven kept the canon in his mind or had a copy of it, and printed it in 18w25, when B. Schott's Sons in Mavence asked him for a contribution to their musical journal "Caeilia," which had been founded a year before. Now comes Xottebohm with his evidence in the case. A man named Gross was once the owner of the autograph and his son told Xotte- bohm that it had been written in the Matschaker Hof. a tavern at which Beethoven was dining at the time, and referred to a church musician named Vincenz Hoffmann, as the informant remembered the name. Xottebohm looked through the official lists of mu- sicians in Vienna in the first decades of the century; he did not find a Vincenz, but did find a Joachim Hoffmann who might have been an acquaintance of Beethoven s; and so he set him down as the recipient of the composer's tribute.1
In the summer of ISSO, Beethoven went to Modling again, but he did not take the lodgings in the Harfner house for the very sufficient reason that the proprietor had served notice on him in 1S1!>, that he could not have it longer on account of the noisy disturbances which had taken place there. He took a house in- stead in the Babenbergerstrasse and paid twelve florins extra for the use of a balcony which commanded a view which was es- sential to his happiness. He takes the baths and receives a
'Hero, as in several other cases, in which opinions only and not definitely ascer- tained (acta are concerned, the present Editor la inclined to attach aa much importance to Thayer's judgment aa to that of his critics and revisers. Thayer's working copy of his "Chronologischea Verseichnias," which containa annotationa of a much later date than Nottebohm a publication in the "Thematischea Vera iss" which he edited for
Breitkopf and Bartel, pays no attention to Nottebohm"* conclusion.
36 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
visit from his nephew, who probably stays with him during his school vacation; at any rate, the boy does not return to Vienna until October 5, on which day the Giannatasios, making an ex- cursion to Modling, meet him with Karl driving to town. There is at this time considerable talk in the Conversation Book of pub- lishing a complete edition of Beethoven's works. Bernard, pro- bably, tells him that Steiner is already counting on it and Schindler, who is enthusiastic over the project, gives it as his opinion that arrangements must be made with a Vienna publisher so as to avoid voluminous correspondence. Somebody remarks: "Eck- stein will so arrange it that you will always get all the profits and will also publish your future works as your property. He thinks that every fourth or fifth piece should be a new one." The plan appealed strongly to Beethoven, but nothing came of it at the time, though we shall hear of it later. It was the discussion of it, prob- ably, by his friends which brought out a letter from Beethoven to Haslinger, "best of Adjutants," asking him to decide a bet. Beethoven had wagered 10 florins that it was not true that the Steiners had been obliged to pay Artaria 2000 florins damages for having published Mozart's works, which were reprinted univer- sally.
Towards the end of October, Beethoven returned to Vienna and took lodgings at No. 244 Hauptstrasse in the Landstrasse, "the large house of the Augustinians" beside the church. There he was visited by Dr. W. Chr. Miiller of Bremen, a philologist and musical amateur who had long admired Beethoven and, with the help of his "Family Concerts," established in 1782, had created such a cult for Beethoven's music as existed in no city in Germany in the second decade of the nineteenth century — according to Schindler. Miiller 's daughter Elise played the sonatas exception- ally well and was largely instrumental with her father in creating this cult. Miiller was making an Italian tour, visited Vienna in October and November and published an account of his meetings with Beethoven in the "Allg. Musik. Zeit." in 1827. In this he tells of Beethoven's freedom of speech at public eating-houses, where he would criticize the Austrian government, the morals of the aristocracy, the police, etc., without stint. The police paid no attention to his utterances, either because they looked upon him as a harmless fantastic or had an overwhelming respect for his artistic genius. "Hence," says Dr. Miiller, "his opinion that nowhere was speech freer than in Vienna; but his ideal of a polit- ical constitution was the English one." It was through Dr. Miiller that we know somewhat of Beethoven's views on the
"Programme" fob the Seventh Symphoni 37
Biibjecl of analytical programmes. Among the zealous promoters of the Beethoven cult in Bremen, was a young port Darned Dr. Karl Iken, editor of the "Bremer Zeitung," who, inspired by the Familien-Concerte, conceived the Idea of helping the public to an understanding of Beethoven's music by writing programmatic expositions of the symphonies for perusal before the concerts. Some of his lucubrations were smt to Beethoven by Dr. Mttller, and aroused the composer's ire. Schindler found four of these "programmes" among Beethoven's papers, and he gave the world a specimen. In the Seventh Symphony, Dr. Iken professed to Bee a political revolution.
The sign of revolt is given; there is a rushing and running ahout of the multitude; an innocent man, or party, is surrounded, overpowered after a struggle and haled before a legal tribunal. Innoeency weep-,; t be judge pronounces a harsh sentence; sympathetic voices mingle in la- ments and denunciations — they are those of widows and orphans; in the second part of the first movement the parties have become equal in numbers and the magistrates are now scarcely able to quiet the wild tumult. The uprising is suppressed, but the people are not quieted; hope smiles cheeringly and suddenly the voice of the people pronounces the decision in harmonious agreement. . . . But now, in the last move- ment, the classes and the masses mix in a variegated picture of unre- strained revelry. The quality still speak aloofly in the wind-instruments, — strange bacchantic madness in related chords — pauses, now here, now there — now on a sunny hill, anon on flowery meadow where in merry May all the jubilating children of nature vie with each other with joyful voices — float past the fancy.
It is scarcely to be wondered at that such balderdash dis- gusted and even enraged Beethoven. In the fall of 1819, he dic- tated a letter to Mttller — it lias, unfortunately been lost — in which he protested energetically against such interpretations of his music. He pointed out, says Schindler, who wrote the letter for him, the errors to which such writings would inevitably give rise. If expositions were necessary, they should be confined to charac- terization of the composition in general terms, which could easily and correctly be done bv anv educated musician.
Beethoven's complaints concerning his financial condition were chronic and did not cease even in periods where extra- ordinary receipts make them difficult to understand. That the lamentations in his letters during the two years which we have in review were well-founded, however, i> no doubt true. With so engrossing a work as the "Missa Solemnis"on hand t here could not have been much time for such potboilers as he mentions and the other sources of revenue were not many. From the records which are at hand, we know something about a few of his monetary
38 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
transactions. On October 26, 1820, he collected 300 florins on account, apparently, from Artaria and Co., through his old friend Oliva. Shortly after his return to Vienna from the country, he asks the same firm, from which he had borrowed 750 florins,1 for a further loan of 150 to save himself the necessity of selling one of his bank shares. These shares, it will be remembered in partial extenuation or at least explanation of some of his actions which are scarcely compatible with his protestations of his unswerving honesty in business transactions, had been set apart by him as his nephew's legacy and he clung to them as to a sacred pledge. He promises to repay Artaria in three months and meanwhile to send him a composition in one, two or more movements, with- out honorarium. An incident which shows him in an unamiable light is connected with his financial relations with the publisher Steiner. On December 29, 1820, Steiner wrote him a letter which did not see the public eye until published in the "Neue Freie Presse" newspaper of Vienna on August 17, 1900. Steiner had sent Beethoven a dun, or at least a statement of account, and Beethoven had, evidently, been both rude and unreasonable in his reply. We quote from Steiner:
I cannot rest content with your remarks concerning the account sent you; for the cash money loaned you I have charged you only 6% interest, while for the money which you deposited with me I paid you 8% promptly in advance and also repaid the capital promptly. What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander (Was also dem Einen recht ist, muss dem Andern billig sein). I am not in a position to lend money without interest. As a friend I came to your help in need, I trusted your word of honor and believe that I have not been importunate, nor have I plagued you in any way; wherefore I must solemnly protest against your upbraidings. If you recall that my loan to you was made in part 5 years ago, you will yourself confess that I am not an urgent creditor. I would spare you even now and wait patiently if I were not on my honor in need of cash for my business. If I were less convinced that you are really in a position to give me relief and able to keep your word of honor I would, difficult as it would be for me, right gladly remain patient a while longer; but when I remember that I myself returned to you 4,000 florins, conventional coin, or 10,000 florins, Vienna Standard, as capital 17 months ago and at your request did not deduct the amount due me, it is doubly painful to me now to be embarrassed because of my good will and my trust in your word of honor. Every man knows best where the shoe pinches and I am in this case; wherefore I conjure you again not to leave me in the lurch and to find means to liquidate my account as soon as possible.
As for the rest I beg you to accept from me the compliments of the season together with the request that you continue to give me your
"See the letter in the Kalischer-Shedlock Coll. II, 178.
Indebtedness to Steineb 39
favor and friendship. It will rejoice me if you keep your word and honor me Boon with a visit; it rejoices me more thai you have happily wit h- stood your illness and arc again restored to health. God preserve you long in health, contentmenl and enjoyment, this is the wish of your wholly devoted
S. A. Steiner.
The letter contains pencil memoranda by Beethoven. He has evidently added together the various sums which he owes Steiner and they amount to 2420 florins \Y. W. He remarks that 1300 florins was received "probably" in 1816 or 1817; 750 florins "perhaps" in 1819; 300 florins '"are debts which I assumed for Madame van Beethoven and can he chargeable for only a few year-; the ?<) florins may have been for myself in 1S19. Payment may be made of 1200 florins a year in semi-annual payments." A further memorandum on the cover notes Steiner's willingness to accept payments on April 15 and October 15, 1821. The settle- ments seem to have been made. On April 1, 1821, Beethoven collected 600 florins from the estate of Kinsky, being one-half of the annuity for the year September ISOO to September 1821. He also persuaded his friend Franz Brentano to advance him money on the amount for which he sold the "Missa Solemnis" to Simrock in Bonn, though he did not give him the Mass for publi- cation in the end. But this is a matter which can be better dis- cussed in connection with the incidents in the history of the com- positions which fall within the present period.
The beginning of the year 1821 found him still at his home in the suburb Landst rasse, and, it would seem, working as hard as his health permitted. When he went to the country for the summer he went to Unterdobling and thence, after September, to Baden to take a cure prescribed by his physician, Dr. Stauden- heimer. In Baden he lived in the Rathshausgasse. He had suffered from rheumatism during the preceding winter and now becalm- a victim of jaundice, for which, no doubt, he was sen! to Baden, though he had gotten rid of the disease to some extent at least by the end of August. The cure prescribed by Stauden- heinier was more severe than he could endure and. as he writes to Franz Brentano on November 10, 182 1 . he had to "flee to Vienna," where he was more comfortable. The attack of jaundice may have been an (irnnf-fonricr of the disease of the liver which broughl him to the grave six years later. He expresses B bar in a letter to the Archduke (July IS, 1821) that it might prevent him for a lontf time from waiting upon his pupil. There is the usual mone- tary complain! in the letter, which concludes with: "God who
40 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
knows my heart and how sacredly I fulfill all the duties com- manded by humanity, God and nature will some day free me from this affliction."
In 1820 the voice of an old English admirer reaches him with a request which must have seemed strange to him. William Gardiner, as has been told in the chapter in the first volume of this work devoted to the compositions of the Bonn period, was one of the first proclaimers of Beethoven's evangel in England. He had now compiled and composed a sort of pasticcio, an oratorio en- titled "Judah," piecing the work out with original compositions where he had failed to find music written by others which he could use. In his book "Music and Friends" (III, 377) he relates that he had hoped to get an original composition for "Judah" in the shape of an appropriate overture, and to this end had written a letter to Beethoven and forwarded it to Vienna through Baron Neumann of the Austrian Embassy, who, on receiving it, had re- marked that it was doubtful if an answer would be received, as Beethoven held no communication with the world. Gardiner's letter was as follows:
To Louis van Beethoven. Dear Sir:
At the house of Lady Bowater in Leicestershire in 1796, I met with your Trio in E-flat (for Violin, Viola and Bass). Its originality and beauty gave me inexpressible delight; indeed it was a new sense to me. Ever since I have anxiously endeavoured to procure your composi- tions as much so as the war could permit. Allow me to present to you the first volume of my "Sacred Melodies" which contain your divine Adagios appropriated to the British church. I am now engaged upon a work entitled "The Oratorio of Judah" giving a history of that pecu- liar people from the Jewish scriptures. The object of this letter is to express a hope that I may induce you to compose an Overture for this work upon which you can bring all the force of your sublime imagination (if it please you) in the key of D minor. For this service my friend Mr. Clementi will accept your draft upon him for one hundred guineas.
I have the honour to be, dear Sir,
Your faithful servant
William Gardiner.
There is no date, but as "Judah" was criticized in "The Musical Review" in 1821, it is presumable that the letter was written in 1820. Gardiner deplores the fact that he received no reply from Beethoven, although the Empress had thanked him for a copy of the "Sacred Melodies" which he had sent to her. Evidently he did not realize that Beethoven was not the man to feel complimented by having his "divine Adagios" turned into hymn-tunes. An occurrence which may have cost Beethoven a
A Portrait Painted by Stieleb 41
pantf was t be loss of his fail hful helper ( )li\ a, uim took hi^ passport in December, 1820, and went to St. Petersburg, where be settled as a teacher of languages.
Another of the portraits of Beethoven which have been made familiar by reproductions was painted in 1820, though begun in 1819. Joseph Stieler, who enjoyed wide reputation as a portrait painter, bad come to Vienna from Munich to paint the portrait of Emperor Franz in the latter year. He remained till some time in 1820 and made the aequaintanee of Beethoven through a letter of introduction probably given to him by Brentano. Beethoven took a liking to him and gave him some sittings— -three, according to the testimony of the painter himself, thus disproving Schindler's statement that "sitting after sitting was granted and never a complaint uttered." On the contrary, the Conversation Book presents the artist as pleading for a little more time; ami because Beethoven refused to sit longer, Stieler had to exercise his imagina- tion or memory in painting the hands. In fact, the painting never received the finishing touches hut remained, as those who have seen it testify, "sketchy." In March Stieler writes in the Conversation Book: "Have you written to Frankfort that I have begun your portrait? — You must determine the destination of the picture. I say that I am painting it for myself." In April Stieler asks the question: "In what key is your mass? I want to write on the sheet: (Mass in — )" Beethoven writes the answer: "MisSQ solemnis in /)," and Stieler: "After it has been exhibited I shall send it to Brentano — I thank you thousands and thousands of times for so much patience." Beethoven's friends refer fre- quently to the picture in their written conversations with Beetho- ven. One says: "That you have been painted en face is the result of more extended study of your physiognomy. This view shows your spirit much better than a profile." Schindler writes that he prefers the portrait by Schimon: "There is more character in it — all agree on that — You were very well two years ago; now you are always ailing." J. Czerny writes: "We were just talking about your portrait. Oliva thinks you are well hit off." The artist visits Beethoven again at M&dling in July and writes: "Before the exhibition I shall paint your portrait again, hut full life-size.
Your head makes an excellent effed full face, and it was so ap- propriate because Haydn was on one side and Mo/art on the ot her." Stieler dated the canvass "1819," bul this can only refer
to the time when it was begun. It remained for a while in the
possession of the family of the painter, then passed through several hands by purchase until it reached those of Countess Sauerma
42 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
in Berlin, in whose possession it was when Frimmel and Kalischer inspected it for purposes of description. Schindler says it re- produces Beethoven's characteristic expression faithfully and that it met with approval, though fault was found with the pose. Beethoven's contemporaries were not used to see him with his head bowed down as Stieler represents him; on the contrary, he carried his head high even when suffering physical pain. A lithographic reproduction of the portrait was made by Fr. Diirck and published by Artaria in 1826.
In April, 1860, the author1 had a conversation with Horzalka in which the latter spoke very highly of Schindler and his dis- interested fidelity to Beethoven. Horzalka also said that in 1820 or 1821, as near as he could recollect, the wife of a Major Baum- garten took boy boarders in a house then standing where the Musikverein's hall now stands in Vienna. Her sister, Baroness Born, lived with her. Frau Baumgarten had a son who studied at Blochlinger's Institute, and Beethoven's nephew was amongst her boarders. One evening Horzalka called there and found only the Baroness Born at home. Soon another caller came and stayed to tea. It was Beethoven. Among other topics, Mozart came on the tapis and the Baroness asked Beethoven, in writing of course, which of Mozart's operas he thought most of. "Die Zauberflote," said Beethoven and, suddenly clasping his hands and throwing up his eyes exclaimed, "Oh, Mozart!" As Horzalka had, as was the custom, always considered "Don Giovanni" the the greatest of Mozart's operas, this opinion by Beethoven made a very deep impression upon him. Beethoven invited the Baroness to come to his lodgings and have a look at his Broadwood piano- forte.
In 1820 Professor Hofel, who lived at Salzburg in the last years of his life and who engraved the Latronne portrait of Beet- hoven for Artaria, was appointed to a professorship of drawing in Wiener Neustadt. A year or two afterward, as he said,2 he was one evening with Eisner and other colleagues in the garden of the tavern "Zum Schleifen," a little way out of town. The Commis- sioner of Police was a member of the party. It was autumn and already dark when a constable came and said to the Commis- sioner: "Mr. Commissioner, we have arrested somebody who will give us no peace. He keeps on yelling that he is Beethoven; but he's a ragamuffin, has no hat, an old coat, etc. — nothing by which
•Thayer.
2This anecdote is recorded in Thayer's note-book as a memorandum of a conver- sation had with HOfel on June 23, 1800.
Abbes i ed \a a Vagh \ \r 43
he can be identified." Herr Commissar, wir kaben Jemand arretirt, welcher uns kein* Huh gibt. Er schreit immer doss er Beethoven set. Er isi aber ein Lump, hat kein* /////, alter Rock, etc., kein Aufweis wer er isi, etc.) The Commissioner ordered thai the man be kept under arrest until morning, "(lien we will examine him ami learn who he is." Next morning the company was very anxious to know how the affair turned out, ami tin- Commissioner >aid that aboul 1 I o'clock at eight he was waked by a policeman with the information that the prisoner would give them no peace and had demanded that Herzog, Musical Director in Wiener Neustadt, lie called to identify him. So the ( lommissioner got up, dressed, went out and waked up Herzog, and in the middle of the night went with him to the watchhouse. Herzog, as soon as he cast eyes on the man exclaimed, "That is Beethoven:-' lie took him home with him, gave him his best room, etc. Next day came the burgomaster, making all manner of apologies. As it proved, Beethoven had got up early in the morning, and, slipping on a miserable old coat and, without a hat, had fjone out to walk a lit tie. lie got upon the towpath of t he canal and kept on and on; seems to have lost his direction, for, with nothing to eat, lie had continued on until he brought up at the canal-basin at the Dn- gerthor. Here, not knowing where lie was, he was seen looking in at the windows of the houses, and as he looked so like a beggar the people had called a constable who arrested him. Upon his arrest the composer said, "I am Beethoven/' "Of course, why not?" (Warum nicht gar?) said the policeman; "You're a tramp: Beethoven doesn't look so." (Ein Lump sind sir: so sirhf der Beet- hoven nicht (ins.) Herzog gave him some decent clothes and the burgomaster sent him hack to Baden, where he was then living, in the magisterial state-coach. This simple story is the foundation for the tine narrative related as a fact in Vienna that Beethoven had got into this scrape following troops from Vienna who had a sham battle near Wiener Neustadt, and taking notes inv his "Wellington's Victory"- which whole story thus goes to the
wall.
A letter written from Baden on September 1". 1821, to Tobias Haslinger accompanying a canon' on the words *'( ) Tobias domir nus Haslinger, 0, 0!" deserves t<> he given here to show that Beethoven's high spirits could at times dominate him in spite of
his general misery.
'For the music tin- reader ia referred t.> Series XXIII of the Complete Edition of Beethoven's works published by Breitkopf and Hartel.
44 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
Very best fellow!
Yesterday, in the carriage on the way to Vienna, I was overcome by sleep, naturally enough, since (because of my early rising here) I had never slept well. While thus slumbering I dreamed that I had made a long journey — to no less distant a country than Syria, no less than India, back again, no less than Arabia, finally I reached Jerusalem; the Holy City aroused in me thoughts of Holy Writ and small wonder that the man Tobias now occurred to me, and how natural that our little Tobias should enter my mind and the pertobiasser, and now during my dream journey the following canon came to me: "O Tobias dominus Haslinger, O, O!" But scarcely awakened, away went the canon and nothing of it would come back to my memory. But when, next day, I was on my way hither in the same conveyance (that of a poor Austrian musician) and continued the dream journey of the day before, now awake, behold, according to the laws of association of ideas, the same canon occurred to me again; now fully awake I held it fast, as erst Menelaus held Proteus, only allowing it to change itself into 3 voices.
Farewell. Presently I shall send you something on Steiner to show you that he has no stony (steinernes) heart. Farewell, very best of fellows, we ever wish that you will always belie your name of publisher (Verleger) and never become embarrassed (verlegen) but remain a publisher (Verleger) never at a loss (verlegen) either in receiving or paying — Sing the epistles of St. Paul every day, go to pater Werner,1 who will show you the little book by which you may go to heaven in a jiffy. You see my anxiety for your soul's salvation; and I remain with the greatest pleasure from everlasting to everlasting,
Your most faithful debtor
Beethoven.
And now as to the creative work of the two years. Para- mount attention must be given to the Mass in D, which, though long in hand and destined for a function in which Beethoven and his Imperial Arch episcopal pupil were profoundly concerned, was yet incomplete when the time for that function arrived. Arch- duke Rudolph was installed as Archbishop of Olmiitz on March 20, 1820. Exactly what condition the Mass was in at that time we have no means of knowing; it was, however, in a sufficient state of forwardness to enable Beethoven to begin negotiations for its publication. On March 18 he wrote to Simrock:
As regards the mass, I have pondered the matter carefully and might give it to you for the honorarium of 100 Louis d'ors which you offered me, provided you agree to a few conditions which I shall propose and which I think, will not be found burdensome by you. We have gone through the plan for publication here and believe that with a few modifi- cations it can be put into effect very soon, which is very necessary; where- fore I shall make haste to inform you of the necessary changes soon.
'The dramatic poet Zacharias Werner, who had become a convert to Roman Catholicism and. now an ordained pr'n-st. was preaching to great crowds of Viennese. The puns on the German word I'erlrgrr and verlegen an- untranslatable.
Negotiations fob fhe Mass i\ D 45
This would seem t<> indicate that the work had been practi- cally completed, and that this view obtained amongst Beethoven's friends we know from the evidence <>t' the Conversation Books, [n the summer at Mttdling he was frequently asked if it was finished and when it would be performed. Some hurried sketches be- longing to the Credo are found amongst the remarks of his friends, and also sketches for the Agnus Dei. Schindler asks him in August: "Is the Benedictus written out in score? Arc those .sketches for the Agnus?" Rudolph had communicated to aim bis intention to spend a part of the summer in Modling. Beetho- ven writes to him on August •'> and September 2, making apologies for apparent aeglect in not waiting upon him (he had do carriage the first time, was in ill-health the second), l>ut says Dot a word aboul the mass. Some of the remarks in the Conversation Book are vague as to the composition referred to, but many are plain enough to show that Beethoven had informed his friends and ad- visers of the negotiations with Simrock. Surprise is expressed at Simrock's delay. Beethoven is advised to write to him and also to Brentano in Frankfort, who had been authorized to collect the honorarium. In April somebody writes: "Have you written to Simrock that he must not publish the mass at once, as you want first to send it or hand it to the Archduke?" Again: "If you send the Recepisse of the stage-coach he will certainly .send you the money at once" And later: "It would be quicker to give the music to the stage-coach and send Brentano the receipt at the same time informing Simrock that Brentano had been assured of its despatch; then Brentano can send you the money at once without waiting to receive the music." In April again : "But he has not yet replied to your last offer of the mass? I mean Simrock — 200 ducats could help you out greatly Because of your circumstances. You must not delay writing to Simrock or Brentano. Brentano can send you the monev <tl once or at least very soon." "I am surprised that Simrock has not answered yet." Meanwhile Simrock answers. "Leave Simrock's letter with me." says the mentor, "I'll answer it and give you the letter this afternoon if you are Satisfied with it you will sign it and I will po>t it to-morrow. There
must be no delay." "He says the mass can be used only by Catho- lics, which is not true." "lie is paying too little rather than too much wit h "200 duca I S."
It is obvious that some difficulty had arisen between Beet- hoven ami Simrock. What that difficulty was is explained in a letter from Simrock to Brentano dated November 12, 1820. It was ;i misunderstanding concerning the price of the "new grand
46 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
musical mass" which the composer wished to sell for 100 Louis d'ors. The publisher had agreed to the price, understanding Louis d'ors to mean what the term meant in Bonn, Leipsic and throughout Germany, namely, the equivalent of Friedrichs d'ors, pistoles. In order to avoid unpleasantness after the reception of the mass he had explained this clearly to Beethoven and in a letter, dated September 23, had repeated that by Louis d'ors he meant Friedrichs d'ors; he was not in a position to give more. He would hold the sum in readiness against the receipt of the mass, which Beethoven had promised to provide with German as well as Latin words. He was also under the impression that he had asked a speedy decision, as he did not want to keep his money tied up in Frankfort. Hearing nothing for four weeks he had quit counting on the mass and made other use of his money. Learning, however, from Brentano's letter of November 8th that Beethoven had agreed to let him have the mass, he now finds himself in the embarrassment of not having the gold Louis d'ors on hand, but as Brentano had said nothing on the subject he would in the meantime try to secure the coin, unless Brentano were willing to take the equivalent in florins at the rate of 9.36. He asked to be informed of the ar- rival of the music so that he might instruct Heinrich Verhuven to receive it on paying the sum mentioned.
Simrock waited four weeks before abandoning hope that Beet- hoven would send the mass; it was ten weeks and more before Beethoven answered Simrock's letter. Then he sent his reply to Brentano enclosed in a letter dated November 28. The letter has not been found, or at least not made public; but the letter to Brentano1 makes it plain that Beethoven had acceded to Sim- rock's offer and agreed to take pistoles for Louis d'ors. He says:
Your kiudness permits me to hope that you will not refuse to have the enclosure sent to Simrock, inasmuch as in it my views are set forth concerning the whole matter. Nothing remains now except to take what he offers, namely the 100 pistoles and as much more as you, an expert in the business, can get for me by the rate of exchange. I am convinced of your kind disposition in this regard. I am very hard-pressed just now, but such things are to be told last of all to a publisher; it is, thank God, not my fault, but my sacrifices for others, chiefly, too, for the weak Cardinal who led me into this morass and does not know how to help himself. As soon as the translation is finished I shall trouble you again by sending you the mass, and I pray you give a little attention then to secur- ing what you can for me from the Jewish2 publisher.
'The letter is preserved in the Beethoven House at Bonn. It was first published in the "Vossische Zeitung" by Dr. Kalischer on July 26, 1903. See Kalischer-Shedlock, II, 177.
!Dr. Kalischer refers the remark about the "Jewish publisher" to Schlesinger in Berlin; but this may be a mistake. In a later correspondence with Peters, who suggests
Loan Ad yam ed on the Mass 47
Thus matters stand with the Mass al the end of 1S-20, and thus they seem to have remained throughout the next year. Simrock always was to be but never was blesl with the score. On July 18, 1821, Beethoveu promises to put the work into the Archduke's hands "while here" — i. e., at Unterd5bling; he leaves the reasons for the delay to the imagination of his patron: "the details might prove anything l>ut pleasanl to V. I. II." In November he thinks again of Simrock and on the 12th writes to Brentano:
The mass might have heen sent hefore this, but had to he carefully looked through, for the publishers in other countries do not get along well with my manuscript, as I know from experience, and a copy for the en- graver must be examined note by note. Moreover, I could not come because of illness, the more since despite everything I have been compelled to make a considerable number of potboilers (as unfortunately I must call them i. I think I am justified in making an attempt to get Simrock to reckon the Louis d'ors at a higher rate, inasmuch as several applica- tions have been made from other quarters, concerning which I shall write you soon. As for the rest, do not question my honesty; frequently I think of nothing except that your kind advance may soon be repaid.
It seems a fair inference from the concluding remark, to- gether with the advice of his friend or friends in the Conversation Book of the previous summer concerning a collection through Brentano as soon as the mass had been handed over to the stage- coach, that Beethoven had got an advance from Brentano on the money which was awaiting the arrival of the work in Frankfort. The following letter to Brentano strengthens the inference:
Vienna, December -20, 1821. Noble man!
I am awaiting another letter respecting the mass, which I shall send you to give you an insight into the whole affair. In any event the en- tire honorarium will be paid to you whereupon you will please deduct the amount of my indebtedness to vou, mv gratitude to von will always be unbounded. I was so presumptuous as without asking to dedicate a
composition of mine to your daughter Maxe, please accepl the dcn\ as a mark of my continual devotion to you and your entire family— do not misinterpret the dedication as prompted by interest or as a recompense — this would pain me greatly. There are nobler motives to which such things may be ascribed if reasons must be found. The new year is about to enter, may it fulfil all your wishes and daily increase your happiness as the father of a family in your children. I embrace you cordially and
the term, Schlesinger ia thus referred n>; but there is nothing t-> indicate thai when correspondence between Schlesinger and Beethoven had icarcely begun, Brentano wbb
railed mi to come to the rescue. Beethoven may mean ■ flintf nt Simroek for his action in the matter of the Louis <l*cirs.
48 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
beg you to present my compliments to your excellent, only and glorious Tonj.
Yours, etc.
I have received from here and elsewhere offers of 200 ducats in gold for the mass. I think I can get 100 florins W. W. more. On this point I am waiting for a letter which I will send you at once, the matter might then be presented to Simrock, who will certainly not expect me to lose so much. Till then please be patient and do not think that you have acted magnanimously towards an unworthy man.
Brentano informed Simrock of the situation; but the subject is now carried over into the next year and must be left for the nonce, while we take up the history of some other compositions. The last three pianoforte sonatas, Op. 109, 110 and 111, belong to this period. Also the Bagatelles Op. 119, Nos. 7 to 11 inclusive. Their story is known. Friedrich Starcke, Chapelmaster of an Austrian regiment of infantry, had undertaken the publication of a pianoforte method which he called the "Wiener Pianoforteschule." Part III of the work, which appeared early in 1821, contained these five Bagatelles under the title "Trifles" (Kleinigkeiten). Above them Starcke printed: "A contribution from the great composer to the publisher." They must have been asked for in 1820. Somewhere about February of that year an unidentified hand writes in the Conversation Book: "Starcke wants a little music- piece by you for the second part of his Klavierschirfe, for which he has contributions from the leading composers besides short notices. . . . We must give him something. Notwithstanding his great deserts in music and literature he is extremely modest, industrious and humble. . . . He understands the art of compiling well. There are now weaklings everywhere even among the strong." To this appeal Beethoven yielded. He wrote the five Bagatelles, sketches for which are found amongst some for the Sonata in E major (Op. 109) and the Benedictus of the mass. No. 6 is also sketched among studies for the Credo. No doubt these little pieces were some of the "potboilers" (Brodarbeit) referred to in the letter to Brentano; also some folksong arrangements; and it may even be, that Beethoven included also the three great sonatas. Schindler relates that when Beethoven heard that it was bruited about that he had written himself out, his invention was exhausted, and that he had taken up Scottish melodies like Haydn in his old age, he seemed amused and said: "Wait a while, you'll soon learn differently." Schindler then adds: "Late in the Fall (1820), returned from his summer sojourn in Modling, where like a bee he had been engaged busily in gathering ideas, he sat himself down
Three Sonatas at a Breath 49
to his table and wrote out the three sonatas Op. 109, 110, ill 'in a single breath,' as he expressed it In a letter t<> Count Brunswick: in order to quiel the apprehension of his friends touching his men- tal condition." Schindler w ;is dubious about the "single breath" and, indeed, there was a considerable lapse of time between the Writing of the firsi of the three sonatas and the last two. The Sonata in K belongs unquestionably to the year 1820. The first theme is found in the Conversation Book of April, ami tin- work w as sketched before lie began t he Benedictus of t he ma>s ami while In- was at work on this movement, the (redo, the Agnus Di i and the Bagatelles for Starcke. Before the end of the year Archduke Rudolph received the manuscript for his collection. It was de- dicated to Maximiliane Brentano,1 and published in November, 1821, by Schlesinger in Berlin.
Beethoven has himself left data concerning the other two sonatas. On the autograph of that in A-flat major, Op. 110, he wrote the date "December 25, 1821." Sketches for it follow sketches for the Agnus Deioi the mass, which were begun in IK-JO. J It was published by Schlesinger in Berlin and Paris in 1822. There is evidence in a memorandum to Schindler found among the hitter's papers, and also in a letter to Schlesinger of 1823, that Beethoven intended to dedicate both of the last two sonatas to Madame Brentano. "Hies- -nichts" ("nothing to Ries"), says the memorandum, significantly. Ideas utilized in the C minor Sonata, Op. Ill, are found amongst those for Op. 110 and part ic- ularly among some for the Agnus Dei. The autograph bears the date January IS, 1822,1 and it is plain that most of the work was done in 1821. It was published by Schlesinger in April, 1823, after Beethoven had offered it to Peters of Leipsic. Corrections for these three sonatas occupied a great deal of time; the engraving of the French edition of the C minor was so faulty that Beethoven
demanded proof copies three times; twice his call was granted, the third time it was refused.1 This Sonata, Op. Ill, was dedicated
lSee the letter to Prani Brentano ol December 20, 1S£1, and the note to his daugh- ter date- 1 December 6, L821. (Kalischer-Shedlock, II. 180.)
•See Nottebohm, "Zweit Beeth.," pp. 166 and 471.
'Beethoven wrote, as if abaenl mindedly, "Ludwig Ludwig am ISten Jenner is^f."
*It is noteworthy, :i< shown by Nottebohm t "Zweil . Beeth. ".pp. 467, 168) thai the 1 1 r - 1 theme ol the firsl movemenl . • f the C minor Sonata was originally intended for a third movement in ■ "second Bonata" whicb (Op. 100 being finished] can only have been the one in C minor. It would Beem as if the use o! the theme in the first movemenl did not occur n> the composer until after be bad conceived the theme of the variations. Hut the theme had figured twenty years before in a sketchbook used when the Sonata in \ major, Op. 80, was in baud. Its k<-v t h.-n was P-sharp minor, and it may have been intended for <>[,. 80.
50 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
to Archduke Rudolph. Beethoven had left the matter to Schle- singer, but he afterward made a suggestion as to his wishes, for in a letter to the Archduke on June 1, 1823, he writes: "Y. I. H. seemed to find pleasure m the Sonata in C minor, and therefore I feel that it would not be presumptuous if I were to surprise you with its dedication."
There are few other compositions of these two years to ask attention, the Canons and five Bagatelles having been mentioned. There is a song, "Abendlied unter dem gestirnten Himmel,', words by Heinrich Gobel, the original manuscript of which bears date March 4, 1820, and which was published as a supplement to the "Modenzeitung" on March 28, 1820, with a dedication to Dr. Braunhofer.1 The twenty -five Scotch Songs, Op. 108, were pub- lished in 1821 by Schlesinger. The performances of Beethoven's works in Vienna in 1820 and 1821 are quickly summed up. The Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde performed the "Eroica" on February 20, the C minor on April 9 and the F major on November 19. The Overture in C, Op. 115, was played at a concert for the benefit of Widows and Orphans on April 16, 1820. In the Concerts spirituels, conducted by F. X. Gebauer in the season 1820-21, the Symphonies in C minor, A major, and F major, and the Oratorio "Christus am Olberg," were performed. Leopol- dine Blahetka, a young woman of 18 who was creating something of a furore by her pianoforte playing at the time, played the Con- certo in B-flat on April 3, having studied it with J. Czerny.
Published .also, together with three other songs — "Geheimniss," "Resignation" and "So oder so" — by Sauer and Leidesdorf as Op. 113 in 1821 or 1822. Beethoven presented a copy of it to Fanny Giannatasio on April 19, 1820.
Chapter III
The Year ls-2-2 — The Missa Solrmnis — Beethoven and IIi> Publishers Brother Johann — Meetings wit li Rochlitzand Rossini — Overture: "The Consecration of the House" A Revival of "Fidelio" Madame Schroeder-Devrient The "Bagatelles" — A Commission from America.
IT is now desirable to disregard the strict chronological sequence of incident and dispose, so far as is possible, of the history of the great Mass in 1) prior to the adoption of a new plan by which Beethoven hoped to make it a source of extraordinary revenue. So far as it affects Beethoven's character as a man not always scrupulous in his observance of business obligations, the story does not need to extend bevond the rear 1822. Careful readers of
» «
this biography can easily recall a number of lapses from high ideals of candor and justice in his treat merit of his friends and of a nice sense of honor and honesty in his dealings with his publishers; but at no time have these blemishes been so numerous or so patent as they are in his negotiai ions for the publication of the Missa Solem- rew — a circumstance which is thrown into a particularly strong Light by the frequency and vehemence of his protestations of moral rectitude in the letters which have risen like ghosts to accuse him, and by the strange paradox that the period is one in which his artistic thoughts and imagination dwelt in the highest regions to which they ever soared. He was never louder in his protestations of business morality than when he was promising the mass to four or more publishers practically at the same time, and giving it to none of them; never more apparently frank than when lie was making ignoble use of a gentleman, whom he himself described a-*
one of the best friends on earth, as an intermediary between him- self and another friend to whom he was bound by business ties and
childhood associations which challenged confidence; never more obsequious (for even this word musl now be used in describing his attitude towards Franz Brentano) than after he had secured a loan
from that friend in the nature of an advance on a contract which
[ 51 I
52 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
he never carried out ; never more apparently sincere than when he told one publisher (after he had promised the mass to another) that he should be particularly sorry if he were unable to give the mass into his hands; never more forcefully and indignantly honest in appearance than when he informed still another publisher that the second had importuned him for the mass ("bombarded" was the word), but that he had never even deigned to answer his letters. But even this is far from compassing the indictment; the counts are not even complete when it is added that in a letter he states that the publisher whom he had told it would have been a source of sorrow not to favor had never even been con- templated amongst those who might receive the mass; that he permitted the friend to whom he first promised the score to tie up some of his capital for a year and more so that "good Beethoven" should not have to wait a day for his money ; that after promising the mass to the third publisher he sought to create the impression that it was not the Missa Solemnis that had been bargained for, but one of two masses which he had in hand.
It is not only proper, but a duty, to give all possible weight to the circumstances which can be, ought to be, must indeed be pleaded in extenuation of his conduct; but the facts can not be obscured or ignored without distorting the picture of the man Beethoven as this biography has consistently striven from the beginning to present it. For English and American readers, more- over, the shock of surprise will be lessened by a recollection of Beethoven's first transactions in London, which more than five years before had called out the advice of the English publishers to Neate for God's sake not to buy anything of Beethoven! As for the rest it is right to remember that at this time many of the sources of Beethoven's income had dried up. He was no longer able to offer his publishers symphonies in pairs, or sonatas and chamber compositions in groups. He produced laboriously and, in the case of compositions which were dear to his heart, with infinite and untiring care and insatiable desire for perfection. Engrossed in such works, he gave no thought to pecuniary reward; but, rudely disturbed by material demands, he sought the first means at hand to supply the need. Hence his resurrection of works composed and laid aside years before; his acceptance of commissions which he was never able to perform; his promise of speedy delivery of works scarcely begun; his acceptance of ad- vances on contracts which he could not fulfil; his strange con- fidence (this we feel we are justified in assuming) in his ability to bring forth works of magnitude in time to keep his obligations
Reprehensible Conduct towards Simbock '.;
even when the works which he bad in mind had already been there for years; hi> ill-health which brought with it loss of creative vitality, of fecundity in ideas and facility in execution in inverse ratio to the growth of his artistic ideals; the obsession of his whole being by bis idolatrous love for bis nephew and the mental dis- tress and monetary sacrifice which his self-assumed obligation entailed and which compelled him to become the debtor of bis publishers lesl he encroach upon the emoluments of the Vienna Congress which he had solemnly consecrated t»» bis foster-son. Let all these tilings be remembered when the story of his short- comings is told.1
And now let the story of the Mass be resumed from the point where it was dropped in the preceding chapter; with it will be found statements bearing on a few other more or less inconse- quential compositions.
On May 13, 1822, Simrock reminds Beethoven that a year has passed since he promised to deliver the score into his hands by the end of April. Since October ^o, 1820, he (Simrock) had kept 100 Louis d'ors on deposit in Frankfort so that there would be no delay in the payment of the remuneration. On March 11), Beet- hoven had written that he had been sick abed for six weeks and was not yet entirely well. He bad told the publisher to rest easy in his mind, that being the sole purpose of the letter. The pub- lisher had gone to the autumn fair of 1821 and to the Easter fair of 1822 and asked Brentano for the mass; but been told that it had not been received. He begs for a few worths on the subject. It would seem as if Simrock had preserved his temper very well. The letter brings another evidence of his unchanged good will, lie had resolved at an earlier period to publish the six symphonies which were in his catalogue in a new edition, but had not done so because it would not pay. Now, he said, he wanted to rear a monument to his worthy old friend and had brought out the scores in a style which he hoped the composer would deem worthy.
'For this arraignment anil defence (if defence it !>'■> <>f Beethoven the pr.>.nt Editor wishes t" assume rutin- responsibility. Thayer's Botes fail him here, but the indict mint . In- i-, convinced, is nut only demanded by historical truth hut also wholly within tin- spirit of Thayer as manifested in the «-arl i<r volumes <>( this «urk. l>r. Dei ten makes do effort to conceal tin- facts, though In- does nut marshal them so as to present the mural delinquency in tin- -arum,' li<_'ht in which it appears when Beethoven's words ami deeds are brought sharplj into juxtaposition; nevertheless, after presenting a plea in extenuation fully ami fairly. In- says: "We pay tin- tribute "f our profoundest sympathy fur Beethoven under these circumstances; we know sufficiently well tin- noble impulses of his soul in all other fields; we an- aware of tin- reasons which compelled him tut ry everything which promised to better his condition; but tin- conscientious reporter cannot ignore facts which lie notoriously before bim, ami. bard as it maj I"-. can not acquit Beethoven of the reproach that his conduct was not in harmony with the principles of strict justice and uprightness."
54 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
What Beethoven said in reply to this letter is not known, his answer not having been given to the world; it can be surmised, however, from the recital given to Brentano in a letter from Beethoven dated May 19. He had been troubled by "gout in the chest" for four months, he says, and able to do but little work; nevertheless the Mass would be in Frankfort by the end of the next month, that is, by the end of June, 1822. There was another reason for the delay. Cardinal Rudolph, strongly disposed in favor of his music at all times, did not want the Mass published so early and had returned to the composer the score and parts only three days before. Here we have a very significant statement. What may be called the official copy of the Mass in D was formally presented to Archduke Rudolph on March 19, 1823; here, ten months earlier, he speaks of a score and parts which the Archduke had returned to him three days before. The Mass, therefore, must have had what, for the time being (Beethoven never considered it finished so long as it was in his hands), was looked upon as a definitive shape at the time when Beethoven promised to send it to Brentano for Simrock. The Archduke returned it, as Beethoven says, so that the publication might not be hindered. How long it had been in the hands of the Archduke no one can tell. Now, said Beethoven to Brentano, the score will be copied again, carefully examined, which would take some time owing to his ill health, but it would be in Frankfort at the end of June "at the latest," by which time Simrock must be ready to make payment. He had received better offers from Vienna and elsewhere, but had rejected all of them because he had given his word to Simrock and would abide by the agreement even if he lost money, trusting to make his losses good by other sales to Simrock who, moreover, might be disposed to make a contract for the Complete Edition. Brentano communicated with Simrock at once and received a letter from the publisher on May 29 expressing regret that sickness had been partly responsible for the delay. He had been expecting the Mass every day for more than a year, during which time the money had lain with Heinrich Verhuven because he did not want Beethoven to wait a single day for it.
Thus on May 19, Beethoven tells Brentano that he will keep the faith with Simrock even at a sacrifice. On March 1, however, he had written to Schlesinger in Berlin :
In regard to my health, things are better. As to the Mass I beg of you to get everything, everything (Alles, alles, in Jahn's transcript) in readiness as other publishers have asked for it and many approaehes have been made to me, especially from here, but I resolved long ago that
Tin-; Mass Sold to S« ii i.k-i \< ,i:k 55
it should imt be published here, as the matter is a very important one for me. For the present 1 ask <>t* you only that you Bignify to me whether you accept my last offer of the Mass together with the two songs; as regards the payment of the honorarium, it may wait for more than four weeks. I must \n>\>\ upon an early answer, chiefly because two other publishers who want to have it in their catalogues have been waiting for a definite answer from me for a considerable time. Farewell, and write to me at once; it would grieve me very much if / could not give you just this particular work.
Schlesinger, as we learn from a letter dated July i2, 1822, had received letters from Beethoven under date of April !». May 29 and June he mistakenly says May 1). He answers the three at once, excusing his delay on the ground that he had attended the fair in Leipsic, where he fell ill, and had remained under the weather for several weeks after his return to Berlin. Meanwhile business had accumulated. He accepts Beethoven's terms for the mass and the two songs:
Everything is in order about the Mass; pray send it and the two songs as soon as possible and draw on me at fourteen days' sight for 650 R. T. I will honor the draft at once and pay it. I have no opportunity to make payment to you through Vienna. Although several music dealers there ;ire extensively in my debt I cannot count on prompt pay- ment from any of them. These gentlemen have two very ugly traits: 1), they do not respect property rights and 2), it is with difficulty that they are brought to pay their accounts. The book dealers are much sounder.
By a coincidence Schlesinger's son, who had established him- self in business in Paris, wrote to Beethoven on the same day and asked him if a third movement of the Pianoforte Sonata in ( ' minor i Op. 1 1 1 \ which he was publishing, had not been forgotten at the Copyists. He. like his father a little later, evidently suspected that they had not received as much music, measured in detached
movements, as they had paid for; they missed a rondo finale!
The incident may have amused, or (which is more likely) even angered Beethoven; but it can scarcely account for the fact that Beethoven rooked about this time to have nothing more to do with Schlesinger p&re. On July 26 he writes to Peters of Leipsic,
with whom he has now entered into negotiations ami to whom he has offered the Mass, "In no event will Schlesinger ever get any- thing more from me; he has played me a Jewish trick, but aside from that he is not among those who might have received the
Mass." When Beethoven was conducting the negotiations with
Schott and Soii^ in Mayenee which resulted in the firm's getting the work, he recurred to the Schlesingers in a letter of January 22, 1824, and said: "Neither is Schlesinger to be trusted, for he
56 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
takes where he can. Both pere et fils bombarded me for the mass, but I did not deign to answer either of them, since after thinking them over I had cast them out long before." Beet- hoven's threats were frequently mere brutum fulmen; the Schle- singers, pere et fils, remained his friends to the end and got two of the last Quartets.
Both Simrock and Schlesinger are now waiting for Beethoven to send them the Mass and the fee is waiting for the composer at Frankfort. Meanwhile negotiations have been taken up with a newcomer in the field, who, however, is but trying to renew an association which had begun more than 29 years earlier. Before entering upon this phase of the history of the Mass it seems well to dispose finally of the Simrock incident.1 On August 22, 1822, Simrock wrote to Beethoven again. Beethoven's answer followed on September 13 and, as it contains more than a mere implication why he refused to abide by his contract (a point that has been a matter more or less of speculation from the time when the negotia- tions ceased till now), it is given in full here:
Baden, September 13, 1822. My dear and valued Simrock:
You will receive this letter from Baden, where I am taking the baths, as my illness which has lasted a year and a half is not yet ended. Much as I should like to write to you about many things I must yet be brief and only reply to your last of August 22nd. As regards the Mass you know that at an earlier date I wrote you that a larger honorarium had been offered me. I would not be so sordid as to haggle with you for a hundred or few more florins; but my poor health and many other un- pleasant circumstances compel me to insist upon it. The minimum that at least four publishers have offered me for the mass is 1000 florins Convention Coin at the rate of twenty, or counting the florin at 3 Austrian florins C. C. Much as I shall regret if we must part just because of this work, I know that your generosity (Biederherzigkeit) will not allow me to lose money on this work, which is perhaps the greatest that I have com- posed. You know that I am not boastful and that I do not like to show the letters of others or even quote from them; if it were not so I might submit proofs from far and near. But I very much wish to have the matter about the Mass settled as soon as possible, for I have had to en- dure plots of all sorts on account of it. It would be agreeable if you would let me know as soon as possible if you will pay me this honorarium. If you will, you need only deposit the difference with Brentano, where- upon I will at once send you a well corrected score of the Mass which will
'This has been made possible for the editor by the courtesy of the present representa- tives of the venerable house in Bonn, viz.: N. Simrock G. in. b. H. in Berlin, who in 1909 issu«-il a handsome book containing all the letters which passed between N. Simrock and Beethoven in a period beginning in 1 7!> !• and ending in 1843. Nieolaus Simrock, the reader may be reminded, was a friend of Beethoven in his childhood and a colleague in the orchestra at Bonn.
An Appeal to Simbo k's Generosity 57
Buffioe you for the engraving. I hope my dear Simrock, whom I consider the richest of all these publishers, w ill n< >t permit his old friend to go else- where f«>r the sake of a lew hundred florins. Concerning all other mat tors
I will write ymi soon; I shall remain here till the beginning of October. I >hall receive all letters which you may write, safely as 1 did your last, only I beg you to write soon. Farewell, greet the family cordially for me; as soon as I can 1 will write to them myself.
Cordially your old friend,
Beethoven.
This letter can scarcely be called ingenuous by the most zealous of Beethoven's defenders. Aside from the fad that lie hail closed the contract, had received an advance on the sum deposited and told Brentano that he would keep his promise even at a sacrifice to himself, the 1000 florins which he now asks Simrock to pay was not the minimum sum which other publishers had offered but the maximum sum which he had asked and all of them had agreed to pay — which, indeed, B. Schott and Sons did pay a year and a half later. Under the circumstances it is scarcely to be wondered at if the appeal to Simrock's generosity fell on stony soil; but we do not know that it did. The letter was evidently answered by Simrock, who, despairing of ever getting the Mass, may have suggested that he would accept other works in lieu of it, for on March 10, 1823, Beethoven writes again saying (as he had said to Peters in November, 1822) that he should surely receive a mass, for he had written two and was only undecided which one to vend. lb- asked Simrock to be patient till Easter, when he would >end one of them to Brentano. lie intended also to write a mass for the Emperor. As to other works, he offered the over- ture to "The ( onseeration of the House," the music to "The Ruins of Athens," the overture to "King Stephen," some songs and " Klein igkeit en" for the pianoforte. Only for the new overture did he fix a price 1 50 ducats), but he added: "You will surely receive one of these two grand masses which are already composed; only 1m- patient till after Easter, by which time I shall have decided which to send." This is the last letter between Beethoven and Simrock which has been found. It leaves the composer promising a mass instead of delivering the Mass, and that promise unful- filled; of a necessity, for the work, though described as "already composed," was never written.
In IS 11 ('. F. Peters had purchased the Bureau (\v Musiquc
founded in 1798 by Hoffmeister and Kilhnel, publishers of a num- ber of Beethoven's compositions, including the First Symphony, between 1800 and 1805. On May is, 1822, Peters addressed a letter to Beethoven in which he said that he had long wished to
58 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
publish some of his compositions but had refrained from applying to him because he did not wish to offend the Viennese publishers; seeing now, however, that he was going outside with his compo- sitions and giving them "even to the Jew Schlesinger," he would no longer give heed to such considerations. He had spoken to Steiner on the subject at the last fair, who had offered no objections, had, indeed, said that he would be glad if he (Peters) got the works instead of Schlesinger, and had offered his services as mediary between him and Beethoven, and asked for a list of compositions which he wanted. Thereupon he had given Steiner such a list: symphonies, pianoforte quartets and trios, pianoforte solos "among which there might be small pieces," songs, etc. — anything, in short, which Beethoven should send him would be welcome, for he wanted honor, not profit, from the association. Beethoven replied on June 5:
Although I met Steiner several days ago and asked him jocularly what he had brought for me from Leipsic, he did not mention your com- mission, even in a syllable, nor you, but earnestly pleaded with me to assure him that / would give him and him alone all my present and future ivorks and this contract-wise; I declined. This trait suffices to show you why I often prefer foreign publishers to local; I love straightforwardness and uprightness and am of the opinion that the artist ought not to be belittled, for alas ! glittering as is the external aspect of fame, he is not permitted to be Jupiter's guest on Olympus every day; too often and too repulsively the vulgar many drag him down from the pure ethereal heights.
He now opened his budget of wares: the largest work was a Mass — many had striven for it, "100 weighty Louis d'ors" had been offered for it, but he had demanded at least 1,000 florins Convention Coin, for which sum he would also prepare the piano- forte score; variations on a waltz ("there are many") for piano- forte— 30 ducats in gold; a comic air wTith orchestra on Goethe's "Mit Madeln sich vertragen," and another air of the same genre, 16 ducats each;1 several rather extended songs with pianoforte accompaniment, among them a little Italian cantata with recita- tive,2 12 ducats each; there were also recitatives to some of the German songs; 8 ducats each for songs; an elegy for four voices and string quartet accompaniment,3 24 ducats; a chorus of Dervishes with full orchestra, 20 ducats; a march for orchestra wrritten for the tragedy "Tarpeia," with arrangement for pianoforte, 12
Mouthful works.
2Probably "Primo amore," though it has orchestral accompaniment.
'Composed in 1814 in memory of Baroness Pasqualati.
The Mass Sold to Peters 59
ducats; Romance for violin solo and orchestra,1 15 ducats; Grand Trio for 2 oboi and 1 English horn,-' which mighl be transcribed for other instruments, SO ducats; four military marches with
percussion ("Turkish music") prices on application; bagatelles, or trifles for pianoforte, prices on application.
The copy of the letter as printed contains the words here: "All these works are ready," but they are wanting in the original draft. Beethoven now goes on with a list of compositions which Peters "might have soon"; a sonata for pianoforte solo,3 40 ducats; a string quartet, 50 ducats. More than anything else, however, he was desirous to have a complete edition of his works, as he wished to look after the publication in his lifetime. He had received a number of applications, but could not, or would not, meet all the conditions. With some necessary help he thought such an edition of his works might be brought out in two years, possibly in one- and-a-half ; a new work was to be added to each class, "to the Varia- tions a new set of variations, to the Sonatas a new sonata," etc., "and for all these together I ask 10,000 florins Convention Coin." He deplores the fact that he is no business man; he wishes that matters were different than they are, but he is forced to act as he does by competition, and begs that secrecy be observed touching the negotiations, to guard against trouble with other publishers.
He was not kept waiting for an answer; — Peters' reply is dated June 15. He regrets to hear of Steiner's duplicity, but his conduct may have been harmless in intention and caused by his weakness. The works which he wanted and of which he had given a list to Steiner were a quartet for strings, a trio of the same kind, a concert overture for full orchestra, songs and some small solos for pianoforte "such as capriccios, divertissements," etc. Then he takes up Beethoven's detailed offer of compositions:
The most admirable amongst them is your Grand Mass, which you offer me together with the pianoforte score for one thousand florins C. C.
and to the acceptance of which at the price I confess my readiness
Between honest men (offencn Miinncrn) like us there is no need of a con- tract; but if you want one send it to me and I will return it signed. If not, please state to me in writing that I am to receive the Mass in question
■The Romances for Violin Op. 40 and 50 having been published long before, Beethoven musl have had another one in mind.
-Tin- Trio for wind-inst rument 8, Op. ST, already ID print . Beethoven bad com- posed variations on "La <i darem" from "Don Giovanni" for tin- same instruments and the composition was called a Terzetto when performed in 1797. This was probably in his mind.
The last three sonatas as we know them being out <>f the question, Beethoven
must have thought himself in readiness to write another if it was desired; there was no lack of material in his sketchbooks.
60 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
together with the pianoforte score for 1000 florins in 20-florin pieces, and indicate when I am to receive it and that it is to be my sole property for ever. I want the first so that I may look upon this transaction as concluded, and the time I want to know so that I can arrange about the publication. If I were a rich man I would pay you very differently for this Mass, for I opine that it is something right excellent, expecially be- cause it was composed for an occasion; but for me 1000 florins for a Mass is a large expenditure and the entire transaction, on my word, is under- taken only in order to show myself to you and the world as a publisher who does something for art. I must ask another consideration, namely, that nobody learn how much I have paid for the Mass — at least not for some time; I am not a man of large means, but must worry and drudge; nevertheless I pay artists as well as I can and in general better than other publishers.
For the present, Peters adds, he does not want to publish larger vocal works by Beethoven nor the Mass singly but along with other works, to show the Viennese publishers that there is a contract between him and Beethoven which obliges the latter to send him compositions. To that end he asks for some songs, a few bagatelles for pianoforte solo, the four military marches; he would be glad to take also the new string quartet, but 50 ducats is be- yond his means. Beethoven is at liberty to tell Steiner that he had applied to Beethoven with his knowledge and consent. Beethoven's answer (incorrectly dated July instead of June 26) says:
I write you now only that I give you the Mass together with the pianoforte score for the sum of 1000 florins, C. C. in 20-florin pieces. You will in all likelihood receive the score in copy by the end of July — perhaps a few days earlier or later. As I am always busy and have been ailing for five months and works must be carefully examined, if they go to a distance this always is a slower matter with me. In no event will Schlesinger ever get anything more from me; he has played me a Jewish trick, but aside from that he is not among those who might have received the Mass. The competition for my works is very strong at present for which I thank the Almighty, for I have also already lost much. Moreover, I am the foster-father of the child of my brother, who died destitute. As this boy at the age of 15 years shows so much apti- tude for the sciences, his studies and support cost much money now and he must be provided for in the future, we being neither Indians nor Iroquois who, as is notorious, leave everything in the hands of God, and a pauper's is a wretched lot. I keep silence concerning everything between us by preference and beg you to be silent about the present connection with me. I will let you know when it is time to speak, which is not at all necessary now ... I assure you on my honor, which I hold highest after God, that I never asked Steiner to receive orders for me. It has always been my chief principle never to appeal to a pub- lisher, not out of pride but because I have wanted to see how extended is the province which my fame has reached. ... As for the songs, I have
Sale of the Mass to Peters Confirmed Gl
already spoken. I think that an honorarium of 40 ducats is not too much for t lie 3 songs and 1 marches. You can write to me on the sub- ject. As soon as the Mass is ready I will let you know and ask you to remit the honorarium to a house here and I will deliver the work as soon as I have received it. 1 will take care to lie present at the delivery to the post and that the freight charge shall not he too great. 1 should like soon to he made acquainted with your plan concerning the complete edition which is so close to my heart.
Peters answers this letter on July 3. He is willing to pay 40
ducats for the songs and marches and to remit part of the hono- rarium in advance. Beethoven's complaint about his financial affairs distresses him and he would like to help him. "It is wrong that a man like you is obliged to think about money matters. The great ones of the earth should long ago have placed you in a position free from care, so that you would no longer have to live on art but only for art." Before this letter was received Beethoven had written a second and supplementary reply to the letter of June 1.3; it is dated July 6. He had reread his letter and dis- covered that Peters wanted some of the bagatelles and a quartet for strings. For the former, "among which are some of con s ider- able length — they might be published separately under the title 'Kleinigkeiten' (Trifles) No. 1, 2, etc." — he asked 8 ducats each. The quartet was not fully completed, work on it having been in- terrupted. Here it was difficult to lower the prices, as such works were the most highly paid for — he might almost say, to the shame of the general taste, which in art frequently falls below that of pri- vate taste. "I have written you everything concerning the Mass, and that is settled." On July 12, Peters writes that he does not know how long the bagatelles are and so can not tell whether they are to be printed separately or together; but he asks that a number be sent to him together with word as to how many of such small pieces Beethoven has on hand, as he might take them all. As for songs he would prefer to have some in the style of "Adelaide" or "Schloss Markenstein." The honorarium for the compositions which were to be sent now would amount to SOO or 300 florins in pieces of 20, but as he could not determine the exact amount he asked Beethoven to collect the amount from Meiss (Meisl) Bro- thers, bankers, on exhibition of receipt and bill of shipment. It was all the same to him whether he collected (he money now or later; it was waiting and at Beethoven's disposal. In this manner, so convenient for Beethoven, he would make all his payments for manuscripts purchased. On August 3 Beethoven writes:
I have not made up my mind as to the selectiou of SOngS and
Kleinigkeiten, bu\ everything will he delivered by August 15. 1 await
62 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
your advices in the matter and will make no use of your bill of exchange. As soon as I know that the honorarium for the Mass and the other works is here all these things can be delivered by the 15th.
Peters was prompt in his remittance of the money which was to be subject to Beethoven's order; Beethoven, though less prompt in getting it, was yet ahead of his delivery of the manuscripts for which the money was to pay. Singularly enough, the incident which provides for us knowledge of the time when the money was received by Peters's agent served as evidence in Beethoven's excuse for drawing the money without keeping his part of the agreement. On July 25, about a fortnight after the date of Peters's letter of advice, Piringer, associate conductor of the Concerts spirituels, who was on terms of intimacy with Beethoven, wrote him as follows :
Domine Generalissimo!
Victoria in Dobling — fresh troops are advancing! The whole- salers, Meisl Bros, here in the Rauhensteingasse, their own house, 2nd storey, have received advices from Hrn. Peters in Leipsic to pay several hundred florins to Herrn Ludwig van Beethoven. I hasten on Degen's pinions1 to convey this report to Illustrissimo at once. To-day is the first sad day in the Viennese calendar, because yesterday was the last day of the Italian opera.
This letter Beethoven sent to Peters from Baden on September 13 in evidence of his presumption that Piringer, who was a daily caller at the Steiner establishment, had gossipped about the re- lations between him and Peters. He was sorry that Peters had sent the money so early, but fearing talk he had collected the money. He would send all the little things soon. He had been pressed by the Cardinal, who had come to Baden on the 15th and on whom he had to attend several times a week; and work had been forced upon him by the opening of the Josephstadt Theatre; also he wanted to write new trios to some of the marches and revise other works, but illness and too much other employment had prevented. 'You see from this at least that I am not an author for the sake of money. . . You will recall that I begged you to keep everything away from Steiner. Why? That I will reveal to you in time. I hope that God will protect me against the wiles of this wicked man Steiner." On November 22, Beethoven writes again: he had been expecting reproaches for his negligence but though he had delivered nothing he had received the hono- rarium. It looked wrong ("offensive" is his word), but he was sure that all would be set right could they but be together a few minutes.
•Degen was a popular aeronaut who had long before excited the interest of Beethoven.
"A Mass" not "the Mass" for Peters G3
All the music intended for Peters had been laid aside except the songs, the selection of which had not yet been made; as a reward for waiting, Peters should receive one more than the stipulated number. He could deliver more than the four bagatelles agreed on, as he had nine or ten extra ones on hand.
Now there enters a new element into the story of the Mass; let Beethoven introduce it in his own words: "This is the state of affairs with regard to the Mass: I completed one long ago, but another is not yet finished. There will always be gossip about me, and you must have been misled about it. I do not know which of the two you will receive." The gossip against which Beethoven warned Peters, it is safe to assume, related to the compositions which the latter had purchased but not received; in great likeli- hood rumors about the Mass had reached Leipsic. Peters was in communication with Steiner and others; and that he knew that the mass had been planned for the installation of Archduke Rudolph as Archbishop of Olmiitz he had indicated when he expressed the belief that it was something "right excellent" because it had been composed for an occasion. The mass which Beethoven had agreed to deliver by the end of July could therefore have been none other than the Mass in D. It is deserving of mention, however, that there is evidence that Beethoven was thinking of more than one mass at the time — in fact, that he had thoughts of three. In a sketchbook of the period is found a memorandum: "The Kyric in the second mass with wind-instruments and organ only";1 and in another place there are six measures of a theme for a Dona nobis with the superscription "Mass in C-sharp minor." To this Dona there is still another reference or two of a later date; but that is all. It is likely that the second mass was intended for the Emperor, as we shall see later; Beethoven himself says that he had thoughts of a third.
Peters is getting importunate, and on December 20 Beethoven writes to him that nothing intended for him is entirely ready; there had been delays in copying and sending, but he had no time to explain. The songs and marches would be sent "next week" and there would be six bagatelles instead of four, and he asks that payment be made for the extra two on receipt. He had SO many applications for his works that he could not attend to them all: "Were it not that my income brings in nothing- I should compose
'Evidences of tin- second mass may be found in \.>tttl>olim's "Zweit. Beeth.," pages L52 and 541-543.
^Beethoven indulges in bis propensity f"r puns: "Ware mein Gehall oicht ganx
ohne (it-halt ."
64 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
only grand symphonies, church music or at the outside quartets in addition." Of smaller works Peters might have variations for two oboes and English horn on a theme from "Don Giovanni" - — Da ci la mano wrote Beethoven, meaning La ci darem la mano — and a Gratulatory Minuet;1 he would like Peters' opinion about the complete edition. In a letter with the double date February 15 and 18, 1823, Peters is informed that three songs,2 six bagatelles, one march and a tattoo had been sent on the preceding Saturday — the tattoo in place of one of the promised marches:
You will pardon the delay I believe, if you could see into my heart you would not accuse me of intentional wrongdoing. To-day I give the lacking two tattoos and the fourth grand march to the post. I thought it best to send three tattoos and a march instead of four marches, although the former can be used as marches. Regimental chapelmasters can best judge how to use such things and moreover pianoforte arrangements of them might be made. My conduct as an artist you may judge from the songs; one has an accompaniment for two clarinets, one horn, violas and violoncellos and can be sung to these instruments alone or with the piano- forte without them. The second song is with accompaniment for two clarinets, two horns and two bassoons, and can also be sung to them alone or with pianoforte accompaniment alone. Both songs have choruses and the third is a quite extended arietta with pianoforte alone. I hope you are now reassured. I should be sorry if these delays were attributed to my fault or desire. I shall soon write to you about the Mass, as the decision which you are to have will presently be made.
"Some time" before March 10, 1823, Beethoven repaid the loan of 300 florins to Brentano, sending the money through Geimiiller. In his letter of thanks on that date he encloses a letter to Simrock, unsealed evidently, and says to his friend, "You see from it the state of things concerning the Mass." What that state was as it presented itself to the mind of Beethoven we have as yet no means of knowing; but we know that Peters was still kept in a state of expectation, for on March 20, 1823, Beethoven writes:
As regards the Mass I will also send you a document which I beg you to sign, for in any event the time is approaching when you will re- ceive one or the other. Besides yourself there are two other men who also desire each a mass. I am resolved to write at least three — the first is entirely finished, the second not yet, the third not even begun; but in view of them I must have an understanding so that I may be secured in any case. You may have the Mass whenever you pay 1000 C. C.
'A composition written for a serenade given to Hensler, Director of the Joseph- stadter Theatre, as will appear later.
2Nottebohm says that the three songs were "Opferlied," "Bundeslied" and "Der Kuss." Peters published none of them. The first appeared as Op. 121, the second as Op. 122, the third as Op. 128, published by Schott and Sons in 1825. This was the firm which eventually got the Mass in D.
Three Purchasers Fail to Get the Mass 65
So far as Peters is concerned the matter must be dropped for a space; he published none of the works sent to him, did not re- ceive the Mass, and, refusing to take a quartet in return for the 360 florins which Beethoven collected in advance, placing the blame on him, got the money back from Beethoven some time after Novem- ber, 1S-25. Peters did not gel the Mass; nor did Simrock; nor did Schlesinger; nor did Probst, another Leipsic publisher with whom Beethoven carried on negotiations for it and the Ninth Symphony, as will appear later; nor did Artaria, Beethoven's old publisher who, in all likelihood, was one of the "two other men" of whom Beethoven wrote in the letter last quoted. On August "2.'}, 1822, Artaria received a letter which, as it seems to stand alone so far as the Mass is concerned, may well be printed in full:
Being just now overwhelmed with work, I can only say briefly that I have always returned your favors whenever possible. As regards the Mass I have been offered 1000 florins, C. C. for it. The state of my affairs do not permit me to take a smaller honorarium from you. All that I can do is to give you the preference. Rest assured that I do not take a heller more from you than has been offered me by others. I could prove this to you in writing. You may think this over but I beg of you to send me an answer by to-morrow noon as to-morrow is postday and my decision is expected in other places.
I will make a proposition to you concerning the 1.50 florins C. C. which 1 owe you, but the sum must not be deducted now, as I am in urgent need of the 1000 florins. In addition I beg of you to keep every- thing secret about the Mass.
It must long ago have been observed by the studious reader of these pages that a great deal of illuminative material in the life- story of Beethoven is found in the correspondence between the composer and his publishers; but these letters in the later years of his life, and especially in the period with which we are now con- cerned, were but sorry guides to the state of forwardness in which compositions found themselves at any stated time. Frequently they offer for publication works which, so far as they had been fixed on paper at all, existed only in the form of detached sketches; also some which, so far as we know, existed only in the plans or pur- poses of the composer of which the letters themselves are the only surviving records. It seems also to be a fair deduction from them that Beethoven's attitude towards his publishers with reference to them depended to a considerable extent on his temporary financial condition, and sometimes they are an index of that const era I ion to high artistic ideals of which he remains an unapproaehed exemplar. The Mass in I) i^ almosl always ready for delivery when he IS in financial extremities; but when he has helped himself with loans
66 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
or the collection of advances, or the sale of old manuscripts or potboilers, his insatiable desire to revise, amend and improve his great work takes possession of him, and the vast amount of re- writing and recopying thus entailed pushes its ultimate comple- tion into the future and precipitates another period of distress. He borrowed money from Brentano on the strength of the deposit which Simrock had made in Frankfort; collected the honorarium which Peters had advanced on the purchase of long undelivered songs, bagatelles and marches; postponed the evil day of liquida- tion with Steiner; finally borrowed money from his brother Johann, and to secure the debt practically hypothecated to him all the manuscripts which lay finished and unfinished in his desk by placing their sale in his hands, subject to his instructions and ad- vice. This circumstance brings Johann van Beethoven back significantly into this history and invites an inquiry into his charac- ter and his conduct with reference to his famous brother. That, contemptible as his character may have been, he has yet been maligned and his conduct towards Beethoven falsified by Schind- ler and the romance writers who have accepted Schindler's mis- representations and embellished them with the products of their own unscrupulous imaginations, is scarcely open to doubt.
Something of the earlier history of Johann van Beethoven has been told in the chapters of this biography which deal with the incidents of the vears 1808 and 1812. The brother, whose associa- tion with a woman obnoxious to him because of her frivolousness and moral laxity Beethoven sought to prevent by police methods and thereby only precipitated a marriage, had grown rich enough in the interim to buy some farm property near Gneixendorf and to make his winter residence in Vienna. There we find him in the spring of 1822 living in the house of his brother-in-law, a baker named Obermayer, at the intersection of Koth- and Pfarrgassen. Thenceforward for a number of years, because of his relationship to his famous brother, his idiosyncrasies, habits and public behavior (and to a smaller number, the conduct of his wife), he became a conspicuous and rather comical figure in Vienna. Gerhard von Breuning described him thus:1
His hair was blackish-brown; hat well brushed; clothing clean but suggesting that of a man who wishes to be elegantly clad on Sundays; somewhat old-fashioned and uncouth, an effect which was caused by his bone-structure, which was angular and unlovely. His waist was rather small; no sign of embonpoint; shoulders broad; if my memory serves me rightly, his shoulders were a trifle uneven, or it may have been his
'Ina note to Thayer.
Character of Johann van Beethoven 07
angular figure which made him look unsymmetrical; his clothing gener- ally consisted of a blue frockcoat with brass buttons, white uecktie, light trousers (1 think corn color), loose linen-thread gloves, the fingers
too long so that they folded at the ends or Stuck OUt loosely. His hands were broad and bony. He was not exactly tall of stature, hut much taller than Ludwig. His nose was large and rather long, the position of his eyes, crooked, the effect being as if he squinted a little with one eye. The mouth was crooked, one corner drawn upwards giving him the ex- pression of a mocking smile. In his garb he affected to be a well-to-do elegant, but the role did not suit his angular, bony figure. He did not in the least resemble his brother Ludwig.
Breuning also says in his book "Aus dem Schwarzspanier- hause," that he was sometimes seen driving in the Prater with two or four horses in an old-fashioned phaeton, either handling the reins himself or lolling carelessly in the seat with two gallooned servants on the box. Beethoven's friends used to ridicule his brother to his face. In a Conversation Book of 1822-23 Count Moritz Lichnowsky writes: "Everybody thinks him a fool; we call him only the Chevalier — all the world says of him that his only merit is that he bears your name." No doubt there was something, even a good deal, of the parvenu in Johann's character. He had neither the intellectual nor moral poise to fit him for the place which he thought he was entitled to fill by virtue of his wealth and his relationship to one of the most famous men of his age. Nor could he command respect from a social point of view. How far from above reproach his wife was, Beethoven showed by his un- justifiable conduct when he sought to have her ejected from Lin/, in order to separate her from his brother. That conduct Lud- wig's letters, soon to be quoted, show had been condoned by him, but a memorandum found among Schindler's papers discloses that her conduct in Vienna was such that Beethoven again thought of invoking the police.1
'1'hat Johann van Beethoven was fond of monev is indicated in his remarks in the Conversation Books, when his advice to his
'\'>. 34 in Portfolio I of the Schindler papers in Berlin is a note as follows: "Mr. v. Schindler of course must not be mentioned in the presence (or by) the two persons, tuit I, certainly." To this Schindler attached the following explanation: "The above lines were addressed to Police Commissioner (Jngermann as an appendix to a detailed report t<> him. The commissioner was requested by official <>r other means to help bim induce liis brother to watcb over the mural coin I net of bis \\ ife, or to li a\ <• it overseen l>y others, since ber excesses bad reached a pass w bicb already subjected berand 1 1 « ■ r busband to public censure. But the efforts <>f Beethoven and the public official were fruitless because his brother could not be persuaded to take energetic action. The excesses of the [icentious woman grew greater f rum year to year until they 1 id; in 1823, to open scandal in the barracks where Madame van Beethoven had visited her lovers (officers), with whom she was seen <>n the public promenades. Then our Beethoven took energetic steps with tiis brother, trying to persuade him to divorce his vicious wife, 1 >u t made shipwreck on the indolent f 1 1 1 1 - man, w ho was himself morally depraved."
68 The Life of Ltjdwig van Beethoven
brother is always dictated by financial considerations and, no doubt, by the thoughts of profits in which he hoped to share. But what would you? For what other purposes had Beethoven asked him in to his councils? Surely not to get his views on the artistic value of his work. He defers in his letters to his brother's superior business sagacity — that is all. It does not anywhere appear that Johann ever attempted to overreach him or lead him to financial injury. No doubt Beethoven in his fits of anger said many things about him which put him in a bad light before his friends; but did he not do the same thing in their own cases? Did Schindler escape calumny? The better evidence is that offered by the letters which show that Beethoven had confidence in his brother's honesty and judgment, invited his help, and was solicitous lest he suffer loss from his efforts. If Johann lacked appreciation of his brother's real significance in art, he was proud of the world's appreciation of him, and if he could not have high regard for that high moral attitude in the matter which had brought condemnation on his sister-in-law and wife, he at least showed magnanimity in not trying to do his brother injury and being always ready to help him when he could. It is very likely that he was not at all musical and that his affectation of appreciation of his brother's works made him a fair subject for ridicule. But surely there was little moral obliquity in that. In a conversation in 1824 the nephew relates that his uncle had been present at a chamber concert. Beethoven wants to know what he was doing there, and the nephew replies: "He wants to acquire taste; he is continually crying bravo." So also Holz relates, in 1826, that Johann had cer- tainly heard the Quartet in E-flat major ten times, yet when it was played in that year he said he was hearing it for the first time.1
Beethoven needed Johann 's help; he had a good opinion of his business ability, and it is possible that he had learned something of tolerance from the trials and tribulations which his quarrels with his other sister-in-law had brought him. It is certain that after a separation of nine years from his brother he was not merely desirous but eager for a perfect reconciliation and a closer union. Johann offers his help, but it is Beethoven who expresses the wish that the two may live together, it is Beethoven who asks his brother to come to him and help him negotiate the sale of
'Here, as in a former case, the editor of this English edition is seeking to reproduce the spirit of Thayer, who was so eager to undo some of the injustice which had been visited upon Beethoven's brothers Karl and Johann that he undertook their defense in a brochure entitled "Ein kritischcr Brit rag zur Beethovenliteratur," published in Berlin in 1877. He also spoke with emphasis on the subject in a review of Nohl's biography of Beethoven which he contributed to the "New York Tribune" in the spring of 1881.
A Defense of the Older Brother 69
his compositions. Johann no doubt conducted some negotia- tions without his brother's knowledge, hut not without authority; and so far as the Mass is concerned it is put into the brother's hands only after Johann has lent Beethoven 200 florins and the Mass lias been promised not only to Peters but to Simrock before him. No doubt Johann exceeded his authority; at least, something had come to the ears of Count Moritz Lichnowsky, probably from Beethoven himself, which made him say in the con- versation already cited, "You ought to forbid him doing business or carrying on correspondence without your signature. Perhaps he has already closed a contract in your name"; but would it not have been better for Beethoven's present reputation for business honesty — if we must distinguish between the ethics of the counting-house and those of the rest of the world — if he had closed and kept the contracts which he had made when he called his brother to help him with his correspondence? Schindler accuses Johann of having persuaded Beethoven to take unfit lodgings; but Beethoven expressly exonerates him from blame. He re- proaches Johann for not having provided his brother with money to pay his debts or offering his security for them; but Johann lent him 200 florins before he went to Baden and probably did not see why he should burden his own business enterprises in order to enable Beethoven to keep the bank shares intact for the nephew. He was willing to be helpful, however, and repeatedly offered his brother a house on his estate, and in 1824 tried to persuade him to take one rent free; but Beethoven's antipathy to his sister-in-law would not let him accept.
Exactly when Beethoven went to Oberdobling in the summer of 1822 is not known, but he was there in July, ami an endorsement on the Simrock letter of May 13 would seem to indicate that he was there in that month. His lodgings were in No. 135 Alleegasse. In the spring or early summer he writes to Johann begging him, instead of driving in the Prater, to come to him with his wife and step-daughter. His whole desire is for the good which would in- evitably follow a union. He had made inquiries about lodgings and found that it would not be necessary to pay much more than
« I *
at Oberdobling, and that, without sacrifice of any pleasure, much money might be saved for both. He says:
I have nothing against your wife; I only wish that she might realize how much you might benefit from being with me and that all the miser- able trifles of this life ought to cause no disturbances.
Peace, peace be with us. God grant that the most natural tie between brothers be not unnaturally broken. At the best my life may
70 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
not be of long duration. I say again that I have nothing against your wife, although her behavior towards me has struck me as strange several times of late; besides, I have been ailing for three and a half months and extremely sensitive and irritable. But away with everything which does not promote the object, which is, that I and my good Karl lead a regular life which is so necessary to me.
Here there is no mention of business matters and hence it may be assumed that the letter dates from an early period in the reunion of the brothers. But business considerations prompt a letter of July 26 in which he tells Johann that his physician had ordered him to go to Baden to take thirty baths and that he would make the journey on August 6 or 7. Meanwhile he would like to have his brother come to him and give him his help and then accompany him to Baden and remain there a week. He was engaged, he said, upon corrections of the Mass for which Peters was to give him 1000 florins. Peters had also agreed to take some smaller works and had sent 300 florins, but he had not yet accepted the money. Breitkopf and Hartel had also sent the Saxon Charge oV 'Affaires to him to talk about new works and inquiries had come from Paris and Diabelli in Vienna. Publishers were now struggling for his works: "What an unfortunate fortunate am I! ! ! — this Berliner has also turned up — if my health would re- turn I might yet feather my nest (auf einen griinen Zweig kom- men)."
The Archduke-Cardinal is here. I go to him twice a week. Though there is nothing to be expected from him in the way of magnanimity or money, I am on such a good and confidential footing with him that it would be extremely painful not to show him some agreeable attention; moreover, I do not think that his apparent niggardliness is his fault.
In the same letter he says he might have had the 1000 florins from Peters in advance but did not want to take them. He did not want to "expose" himself, and he therefore asked his brother for a loan, so that his trip to Baden might not be delayed. There was no risk involved, as he would return the 200 florins in Septem- ber wTith thanks. "As a merchant you are a good counsellor," are some of his words. The Steiners are also crowding him into a corner and trying to force him into a wrritten agreement to let them have all his compositions; but he had declared that he wTould not enter into such an arrangement until his account had been settled, and to that end he had proposed to them that they take two pieces which he had written for Hungary1 and which might be
'"King Stephen" and "The Ruins of Athens."
Beethoven Asks Johann's Help 71
looked upon as two little operas. They had before then taken four of the numbers. The debt to the Steiners amounted to 8000 florins, but they had in the "most abominable manner" charged interest, to which he would not consenl . Part of t he debt had been Karl's mot her's ' \\ hich he had assumed because he \\ anted to show himself as kindly disposed as possible, SO thai Karl's interests would not be endangered. Again he urges him to come to Baden and to put pantry and cellar in the best of condition againsl September, for presumably he and his little son would set up headquarters with him and had formed the noble resolve to eat him out of house and home.
In this letter was enclosed a memorandum of the deposit of 800 florins (from Peters) to his credit at Maisl's; and another of no date, hut evidently written at about the same time, stated that the money was at Maisl's but in case of need he would rather make a loan than draw it, "for the Mass will be ready on the 15th of next month." He went to Baden on September 1, but before then wrote again to Johann expressing a wish to see him so that the affair with Steiner might be settled, it being necessary to have the music to "The Ruins of Athens"- in print by the end of October, when the theatre for which it had been prepared would be opened. A week after his arrival in Baden, on September 8, he writes that he had been disturbed at the delay, partly because of his brother's ill health, partly because he had had no report on the commission undertaken with Steiner. Simrock had written again about the Mass, but had mentioned the old price; if he were written to, however, he thought he would increase it. Two singers had called on him that day and asked to kiss his hands, "but as they were very pretty I suggested that they kiss my lips." Another letter obviously written about the same time but a little later tells of his temporary apprehension lest his brother had fallen out with Steiner. He also suspected that his brother might be angered at his not having mentioned the loan. In this dilemma. Fearful for the -Ma--, he had written to Simrock that he would let him have it lor 1000 florin-. "But as you write that you want the Mass 1 am agreed, but I do not want you to lose anything by it." Matters are not yet straightened out at Steiner's, as appears from a letter which he enclose-. Meanwhile the Josephstadt Theatre has given him work to do which will be quite burdensome, in view of his cure, Staudenheimer having advised him to take baths of one and a half hour's duration. However, he already had written a chorus
'300 florin-.
•Which li<- bad adapted to "Die Weihe del Qausee."
72 The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
with dances and solo songs;1 if his health allows, he will also write a new overture. On October 6, he addresses his brother in a jocular mood: "Best of little Brothers! Owner of all the lands in the Danube near Krems! Director of the entire Austrian Phar- macy !" The letter contains a proposition for Steiner concerning the Josephstadt Theatre music. Steiner has two numbers already and has advertised one of them; there are eight numbers left, in- cluding an overture. These Steiner can have at the following rates: the overture 30 (perhaps he could get 40 ducats) ; four songs with instrumental accompaniment, 20 ducats each; two wholly instrumental numbers, 10 ducats each: — total, 140 ducats. If "King Stephen" is wanted there are twelve numbers of which four are to be reckoned at 20 ducats each, the others at 10 ducats and one at 5 ducats — summa summarum 155 ducats. "Concern- ing the new overture, you may say to them that the old one could not remain, because in Hungary the piece was given as a postlude, while here the theatre was opened with it. . . . Ponder the matter of the Mass well, because I must answer Simrock; unless you lose nothing, I beg of you not to undertake it."
The story of the music composed and adapted for the Joseph- stadt Theatre will be told in the chronological narrative of incidents belonging to the year; as for the Mass let it be noted that after Johann had expressed a desire to take it in hand we hear nothing more of the correspondence with Peters for a long time. The autograph score was ready ; Beethoven had it copied, but continued making alterations in it; not until the next year was it delivered into the hands of the Archduke and new efforts made towards its publication.
At the beginning of 1822, Beethoven still lived at No. 244 Hauptstrasse, Landstrasse, Vienna. The first significant happen- ing to him in the new year was his election as honorary member of the Musik-Verein of Steiermark in Gratz, whose diploma, couched in the extravagantly sentimental verbiage of the day and country, bore date January 1. He noted the conclusion of the C minor Sonata (Op. Ill) on the autograph manuscript on January 11. Bernhard Romberg, the violoncello virtuoso, was in Vienna in the beginning of the year, giving concerts with his daughter Bern- hardine and a son of 11 years, who was also a budding virtuoso on his father's instrument. On February 12, Beethoven writes to his old friend that if he was not present at the concert, it would be because he had been attacked with an earache, the pain of which
1,1 Wo sich die Pulse," which Beethoven inscribed as having been written "Towards the end of September."