Part 11
In 1796 Beethoven went to Nuremberg, where he met his Bonn friends, the Breuning brothers, and for some reason not clearly known, they were arrested at Linz by the police, but were quickly released. On his return to Vienna he busied himself in overseeing the publication of sonatas (Op. 2), minuets and variations. His brothers were in the city. Johann, "tall, black, handsome, a complete dandy," found a place in an apothecary shop. Caspar, "small, red-haired, ugly," gave music lessons. In February Beethoven was in Prague and in Berlin, the only occasion on which he visited "the Athens of the Spree." Frederick William II. was gracious to him, heard him play, and gave him a snuff-box filled with gold pieces; "not an ordinary box," as Beethoven proudly said when he showed it, "but such a one as they give to ambassadors." Beethoven also met Prince Louis Ferdinand and complimented him by saying, "you play like an artist, not like a prince." He jeered at Himmel's improvisation, and Himmel in turn persuaded him that a lantern had been invented for the benefit of the blind. He saw Fasch and Zelter. When he returned to Vienna the talk was of Napoleon conquering in Italy.
In 1797 Beethoven, through imprudent exposure when he was heated, contracted a dangerous illness, and Zmeskall relates that it "eventually settled in the organs of hearing." He worked at his trade. He entered into a contest with Wölfl, a virtuoso of remarkable technique, and they vied with each other in friendly spirit; whereas in a similar and later trial of skill between Beethoven and Steibelt, the latter sulked at the power of his rival. In 1798 he met Prince Rasumowsky, Count Browne, Rudolphe Kreutzer (who introduced him to Bernadotte, the suggestor of the "Heroic" symphony and the French ambassador), and in the following year he saw Dragonetti, the great player of the double-bass, who without doubt influenced him in his treatment of that instrument, and Cramer the pianist. The few recorded events of the next years are chiefly connected with music. The septet and first symphony were produced in 1800, and April 2 of the same year Beethoven gave the first concert in Vienna for his own benefit. He had left the palace of Prince Lichnowsky and lodged at No. 241 "im tiefen Graben." In the fall he went into the country, the first instance of what was afterward his settled custom. We know of no publication of music by Beethoven in 1800. He finished the first symphony, the septet (which he disliked), the string quartets Op. 18, the C-minor concerto Op. 37, the sonata Op. 22, and other works of less importance, including the horn sonata for Punto. Czerny, ten years old, met him some time in this year, and he has left a curious description of him, although it was written years after the meeting. He mentions the "desert of a room--bare walls--paper and clothes scattered about--scarcely a chair except the rickety one before the pianoforte. Beethoven was dressed in a dark gray jacket and trousers of some long-haired material which reminded me of the description of Robinson Crusoe. The jet-black hair stood upright on his head. A beard, unshaven for several days, made still darker his naturally swarthy face. He had in both ears cotton wool which seemed to have been dipped in some yellow fluid. His hands were covered with hair, and the fingers were very broad, especially at the tips."
In 1801 he was feeling well and he worked hard. His ballet "Prometheus" was given March 28 with success. He changed his lodgings and dwelt in the Sailer-Staette, where he could look over the town-ramparts. When the days lengthened, he went to Hetzendorf, near the shaded gardens of Schönbrunn, modelled after Versailles. "I live only in my music," he wrote Wegeler, "and no sooner is one thing done than the next is begun; I often work at three and four things at once." "The Mount of Olives"; the violin sonatas in A minor and F; the string quintet in C; the pianoforte sonatas, Op. 26, 27, 28, were completed in this year, and other works were sketched. The so-called "Moonlight Sonata" brings before us Giuletta Guicciardi, to whom it was dedicated, and the romance connected with her.
[Illustration: BEETHOVEN LEADING THE PERFORMANCE OF ONE OF HIS QUARTETS.
Reproduced from a photograph of a painting in which the scene is idealized.]
The noble women of Vienna were fond of Beethoven; to say they adored him would not be extravagant. They went to his lodgings or they received him at their palaces. Even his rudeness fascinated them; they forgave him if he roared angrily at a lesson, or tore the music in pieces; they were not offended if he used the snuffers as a tooth-pick. He, too, was constantly in love, but there is no reason to doubt that his attachments were honorable. "Oh God! let me at last find her who is destined to be mine, and who shall strengthen me in virtue," was his prayer. Yet Wegeler says, that he fancied himself a Lovelace and irresistible. He paraded his attachments in dedications. There was the beautiful Hungarian Countess, Babette de Keglevics; the Countess Therese of Brunswick; Baroness Ertmann, the Countess Erdödy; and there were many others. In lesser station was Christine Gherardi, and there was Madeleine Willman, the singer, who, it is said, refused Beethoven's hand because he was "ugly and half-mad." But his passion for the woman Giuletta Guicciardi was deep-rooted, and it deserves more than passing notice. Her family came originally from the Duchy of Modena, and in 1800 her father went to Vienna, an Imperial Counsellor. She was in her seventeenth year, with dark blue eyes, waving brown hair, classic features, and a stately carriage. She was then as good as betrothed to Count Gallenberg, an impressario and a composer of ballets, whom she married in 1803. After Beethoven's death letters of an incoherent and a fiery nature were found in a secret drawer, and it was supposed that they were addressed to the Guicciardi until the ruthless examination of them by Thayer. She herself made light of the dedication by telling Jahn in later years that Beethoven gave her the Rondo in G, but wishing to dedicate something to Princess Lichnowsky, he gave her the sonata instead. Beethoven, when he was very deaf, wrote in bad French to his friend Schindler (for his conversation was necessarily at the time in writing) that he was loved by her; that he raised money for her husband; and that when she returned to Vienna from Italy, she looked Beethoven up and wept; but he despised her. The reader who wishes to investigate the subject and read of her strange adventures with Prince Hermann Pückler-Muskau, even though illusions be thereby dispelled, is referred to the chapter "Julia Guicciardi" in "Neue Musikalische Charakterbilder" by Otto Gumprecht (Leipsic, 1876).
And in this year, 1801, the deafness, which began with violent noise in his ears, grew on him. In a letter to Wegeler, in which he speaks of a pension of about $240, from Lichnowsky, he tells of his infirmities. He connected the deafness with abdominal troubles, with "frightful colic." He went from doctor to doctor. He tried oil of almonds and cold and warm baths. Pills and herbs and blisters were of little avail. He inquired into galvanic remedies. Zmeskall persuaded him to visit Father Weiss, monk and quack. Discouraged, he still had the bravery to write, "I will as far as possible defy my fate, though there must be moments when I shall be the most miserable of God's creatures... I will grapple with fate; it shall never drag me down." At the same time in telling his sorrow to Carl Amenda he swore him solemnly to secrecy.
Dr. Schmidt sent him in 1802 to Heiligenstadt, a lonely village, and there he wrote the famous letter known as "Beethoven's Will," addressed to his brothers, to be opened after his death (see page 331). It is possible that this letter full of gloom and distress was only the expression of momentary depression. The music of this same year is cheerful, if not absolutely joyous--the Symphony in D, for example--and on his return to Vienna he wrote letters of mad humor. He changed his lodgings to the Peters-Platz, in the heart of the city, where he was between the bells of two churches. He corrected publishers' proofs, and was "hoarse with stamping and swearing" on account of the errors, "swarming like fish in the sea." He quarreled with his brother Caspar, who interfered in his dealings with publishers and brought to light compositions of boyhood.
In April, 1803, a concert was given, the program of which included "The Mount of Olives," the Symphony in D, and the pianoforte concerto in C minor, with the composer as pianist. The so-called "Kreutzer Sonata" for violin and pianoforte, written for the half-breed Bridgetower, was heard this year; there was a quarrel, and the now famous work was dedicated to R. Kreutzer, who was in the train of Bernadotte. In the summer, Beethoven went to Baden near Vienna, and to Oberdöbling, but before he left the city he talked with Schikaneder about an opera for the theatre "_An der Wien_." He had also changed his lodgings again and moved to the said theatre with Caspar. The rest of the year, however, was chiefly given to the composition of the "Heroic" symphony, which was suggested to him in 1798 by Bernadotte. It is true that he went much in society, associating with painters and officials, and with the Abbé Vogler; he also began correspondence with Thomson, the music publisher of Edinburg, concerning sonatas on Scotch themes. At the beginning of 1804, he was obliged to seek new quarters, and he roomed with his old friend Stephen Breuning in the Rothe Haus. At first they had separate sets of rooms; they then thought it would be cheaper to live together. Beethoven neglected to notify the landlord, and he was liable for the two suites. Hence hot words and a rupture. The breach was afterwards healed, but Breuning, who apparently behaved admirably, wrote in a letter to Wegeler of Beethoven's "excitable temperament, his habit of distrusting his best friends, and his frequent indecision. Rarely indeed, does his old true nature now allow itself to be seen." At Döbling he worked at the Waldstein Sonata and the Op. 54. The "Bonaparte" Symphony was finished, and, according to Lichnowsky, the title-page bore simply the inscription "Buonaparte," and the name "Luigi van Beethoven." Beethoven had unbounded admiration for Napoleon as long as he was First Consul, and he compared him often with illustrious Romans, but when the Corsican made himself Emperor of the French, the composer burst into violent reproaches and tore in pieces the title page of the Symphony. When the work was published in 1806, the title announced the fact that it was written "to celebrate the memory of a great man"; and when Napoleon was at St. Helena, Beethoven once cried out, "Did I not foresee the catastrophe when I wrote the funeral march in the Symphony?" When he went back to Vienna for the winter, he lodged in a house of Baron Pasqualati on the Mölker-Bastion; these rooms were kept for him, even when he occasionally moved for a season.
In 1805 Baron von Braun took Schikaneder as manager of the "_An der Wien_," and they made Beethoven an offer for an opera. The story of Leonora suited the composer, although Bouilly's text had been already set by Gaveaux and Paer; he worked diligently at his rooms in the theatre, and later in the fields of Hetzendorf. In the summer he went to Vienna to see Cherubini. In the fall the operatic rehearsal began. The singers and the orchestra rebelled at difficulties. The composer was vexed and angry. For the first time he welcomed deafness. He did not wish to hear his music "bungled." "The whole business of the opera is the most distressing thing in the world." The first performance was November 20th, 1805. Anna Milder, to whom Haydn said, "You have a voice like a house," was the heroine. Louise Müller was _Marcelline_; Demmer, _Florestan_; Meyer, _Pizarro_; Weinkopf, _Don Fernando_; Caché, _Jaquino_; Rothe, _Rocco_. The opera was then in three acts, and the overture seems to have been "Leonora No. II." The time was unfavorable. The French entered Vienna the 13th of November; Napoleon was at Schönbrunn; nearly all of the wealthy and noble patrons of Beethoven had fled the town. The opera was played three nights and then withdrawn--a failure. It was revised, shortened, and with the overture "Leonora No. III.," it was again performed March 29, 1806, and the reception was warmer. It was played April 10th. Beethoven and Braun quarreled, and Vienna did not hear "Fidelio" for seven or eight years. Parts of the pianoforte concerto in G and of the C-minor symphony, as well as the two last of the Rasoumoffsky string quartets Op. 59 were composed at this time.
[Illustration: BEETHOVEN.
After a posthumous Medallion by Gatteux.]
Some months in 1806 were passed in visits. Beethoven stopped at the country-seat of Count Brunswick--and some say that he was in love with Therese, the sister, to whom he dedicated his favorite sonata Op. 78, and that the posthumous love letters were addressed to her. He went to Silesia to see Prince Lichnowsky. There were French officers there who wished to hear him play, and when he refused, the Prince threatened in jest to lock him up. There was an angry scene, and Beethoven, rushing back to Vienna, dashed a bust of the Prince to pieces. The 4th symphony was played at a concert in March, 1807, for Beethoven's benefit. The subscriptions were as liberal as the program, which was made up of two and a half hours of orchestral music. Clementi of London paid him $1,000 down for copyrights. And so he had money and he was cheerful. He worked at the "Coriolan" overture, and, it is believed, the Pastoral and C-minor symphonies. In September the mass in C was brought out under the protection of Prince Esterhazy, who, accustomed to Haydn's music, said to Beethoven, "What, pray, have you been doing now?" Hummel, the Chapelmaster, laughed, and there was no intercourse between the composers for some time. In spite of the failure of "Fidelio," Beethoven looked toward the theatre and offered to supply one grand opera and one operetta yearly at a salary of about $960 with benefit performances, an offer that was rejected. 1807 saw the publication of the "Appassionata" sonata and the thirty-two variations. The pianoforte concerto in G and the Choral Fantasia were performed in 1808.
[Illustration: BEETHOVEN.
From a pencil drawing by Letronne, made in 1814. It has been engraved by several artists. The above is reproduced from the frontispiece of the original full score of "Fidelio," published in Bonn.]
The pension from the Elector had been stopped. Prince Lichnowsky made Beethoven a small allowance, and with this exception, the latter was dependent on his own exertions. Some time in 1808 Jerome Bonaparte, King of Westphalia, offered Beethoven the position of _Maître de Chapelle_ at Cassel, with an annual salary, beside travelling expenses, of about $1,500. This led the Archduke Rudolph, Prince Lobkowitz, and Prince Kinsky to give a joint undertaking in March 1809 to secure Beethoven 4,000 florins, payable half-yearly, a sum nominally worth about $2,000, and really about $1,000; this was lessened by the depreciation of the Austrian paper and the bankruptcy and the death of Prince Kinsky. It was in this year that Beethoven met young Moscheles, began relations with Breitkopf and Härtel, negotiated with Thomson about the harmonization of Scottish melodies, a contract which in the course of years netted him about $1,000. The French were again in Vienna. Wagram was fought. Beethoven, during the bombardment of his town, was in a cellar, and dreading the effect of the explosions on his hearing, called in the aid of cushions. Haydn died in May, and there is no hint of the fact in the letters or journals of his quondam pupil. It was the year of the beginning of the "Les Adieux" sonata, to commemorate the departure of the Archduke.
May, 1810, was the date of the first performance of the music to "Egmont," probably in a private house, and in this month Beethoven first saw Bettine Brentano, "Goethe's child, who seemed the incarnation or the original of Mignon." With her he fell in love, although she was betrothed to Count Arnim. The authenticity of the three letters which she published in after years as his has been a subject of warm dispute. It was in this same year that he contemplated marriage, and wrote for his baptismal certificate. But the name of the possible wife is unknown. Some have called her Therese von Brunswick; others Therese Malfatti.
There was a rumor in Vienna in 1811 that Beethoven thought of moving to Naples in response to advantageous offers. His income was lowered by the depreciation in the value of the Austrian paper money. He suffered from headaches, his feet were swollen, and he hoped that the climate of Italy would bring relief. His physician did not favor the plan. In 1812 the Brentanos lent Beethoven about $920, and he tried the baths at Carlsbad, Franzensbrunn, and Töplitz. At the latter place he fell in love with Amalie Sebald, a soprano from Berlin, about thirty years of age, handsome and intellectual. The affection was deep and mutual; why the intimate relations did not lead to marriage, is an insoluble problem. And here Beethoven met Goethe, whom he reverenced; but the poet saw in him "an utterly untamed character." The acquaintance did not ripen into friendship, although Goethe recognized the "marvellous talent" of the composer; Mendelssohn declared, however, in a letter to Zelter, that the antipathy of the poet to Beethoven's music was poorly disguised. Nor on the other hand did the composer relish the self-effacement of Goethe when he was in the presence of royalty. In October he visited his brother Johann at Linz and found him entangled with a woman; he forced him to marry her by threats of arresting her and sending her to Vienna. 1812 was the year of the composition of the Seventh and Eight symphonies. Beethoven returned to Vienna in gloomy spirits; he was sick in body; he squabbled with his servants; Amalie Sebald was ever in his mind.
The defeat of the French at Vittoria in 1813 provoked the vulgar program-music, "Wellington's Victory," which was suggested also by Maelzel, the famous mechanician; it enjoyed great popularity, although Beethoven himself regarded it as "a stupid affair." Spohr was in Vienna when Beethoven conducted an orchestral concert, the program of which included the 7th symphony in MS. and this Battle Symphony. He and Mayseder, Salieri, Hummel, Moscheles, Romberg and Meyerbeer were in the orchestra. According to Spohr, Beethoven at this time had only one pair of boots, and when they were repaired he was obliged to stay at home. In 1816 the composer recorded in a note-book that he had seven pairs.
In 1814 Anton Schindler first met Beethoven. They grew intimate, and five years later he lived with him as a secretary. They quarreled, but they were reconciled shortly before the death of the composer. "Fidelio" was revived the same year. The new overture (in E) was included in the performance. Prince Lichnowsky died before the opera, which had undergone alteration, was thus produced. Then came a quarrel between Beethoven and Maelzel, which worried sorely the composer. September saw his triumph, when six thousand people waxed enthusiastic at a concert given by him in the Redouten-Saal. There were royal and celebrated visitors, drawn to Vienna by the Congress. Beethoven wrote a cantata for the event. "_Der glorreiche Augenblick_" ("The Glorious Moment"), a work unworthy of his reputation. He was made an honorary member of the Academies of London, Paris, Stockholm and Amsterdam. Vienna gave him the freedom of the city. He was courted in the drawing-rooms of the great. The Empress Elizabeth of Russia made him a present of about $4,600. He bought shares of the Bank of Austria.
[Illustration: BEETHOVEN.
From an engraving by Eichens after an oil painting by Schimon, painted in 1819.]
Caspar Carl Beethoven died in November, 1815, and thus gave final and posthumous anxiety to his brother Ludwig; for he left to him the care of his son Carl. The mother of the eight-year-old boy was not a fit person to rear him, and Caspar had written his last wishes with an affectionate reference to Ludwig, who in fact had ministered generously to his wants and his caprices, and had thus spent at least $4,000. A codicil, however, restrained the uncle from taking his nephew away from the maternal house. The widow did not restrain her passions even in her grief, and Beethoven appealed to the law to give him control of the boy. There were annoyances, changes of jurisdiction, and the decree was not given in his favor until 1820. It was before the _Landrechts_ court that Beethoven pointed to his head and his heart, saying, "My nobility is here and here"; for the cause was in this court on the assumption that the _van_ in his name was an indication of nobility. Owing to these law-suits he composed but little; still it was the period of the great pianoforte sonatas Op. 106, Op. 109, Op. 110. He was in straitened circumstances. In 1816 his pension was diminished to about $550. He had quarreled again with Stephen Breuning. He found pleasure in the thought that he was a father. He was influenced mightily by the death of his brother and the painful incidents that followed, not only in his daily life but in his work. At first there was a time of comparative unproductiveness, and the cantata "Calm Sea and Happy Voyage" and the song-cyclus "To the Absent Loved-one," with the pianoforte sonata Op. 101, are the most important compositions between 1815 and 1818. Texts for oratorios and operas were offered him, but he did not put them to music. In 1818 he received a grand pianoforte from the Broadwoods, and there was vain talk of his going to England.