Efforts of the widow van Beethoven to keep in touch with her son, and questions of discipline in his bringing-up and education, were matters which weighed heavily on Beethoven’s mind during the summer of 1817, and occasioned more misunderstandings between Giannatasio and the composer, as also much distress in the minds of the former’s daughters, especially the solicitous Fanny, as is evidenced by entries in her diary under dates June 25 and July 8 and 21. In an undated letter which seems to belong to this period, Beethoven explains to Giannatasio that the mother had expressly asked to see Karl at his, the composer’s, house and that certain evidences of indecision on his part which his correspondent had observed (and apparently held up to him) had not been due to any want of confidence, but to his antipathy to “inhuman conduct of any kind,” and the circumstance that it had been put out of the power of the woman to do the lad harm in any respect. On the subject of discipline he writes:
As regards Karl, I beg of you to hold him to strict obedience and if he does not obey you (or any of those whom he ought to obey) to punish him at once, treat him as you would your own child rather than as a pupil, for as I have already told you, during the lifetime of his father he could only be forced to obey by blows; this was very bad but it was unfortunately so and must not be forgotten.
He requested that the letter be read to his nephew. Beethoven’s “antipathy to inhuman conduct of any kind” seems to have led him to make concessions to the widow of which he soon repented. In a letter to Zmeskall dated July 30, he says: “After all, it might pain Karl’s mother to be obliged to visit her son at the house of a stranger and, besides, there is more harshness in this affair than I like; therefore I shall permit her to come to me to-morrow”; and he urgently begs his friend to be a witness of the meeting. In a note to Giannatasio he informs him of his intention to take Karl to see his mother, because she was desirous to put herself in a better light before her neighbors, and this might help. But a fortnight after the letter to Zmeskall he has changed his mind, as witness a letter to Giannatasio dated August 14, in which he writes:
I wanted this time to try an experiment to see if she might not be bettered by greater forbearance and gentleness ... but it has foundered, for on Sunday I had already determined to adhere to the old necessary strictness, because in the short time she had communicated some of her venom to Karl—in short we must stick to the zodiak and permit her to see Karl only 12 times a year and then so hedge her about that she cannot secretly slip him even a pin. It is all the same to me whether it be at your house, at mine, or at a third place. I had believed that by yielding wholly to her wishes she might be encouraged to better her conduct and appreciate my utter unselfishness.
Notwithstanding the jeremiads in Beethoven’s letters this year, and the annoyance caused him by his sister-in-law, there are indications in plenty that he was not on the whole in that state of dejection which one might suppose. One of these indications is a work which amused him during the summer, the story of which the careful Dehn admitted into the “Cäcilia.” A musician, whose name is not mentioned, brought to Beethoven the Pianoforte Trio, Op. 1, No. 3, which he had arranged for string quintet (two violins, two violas and violoncello). Though the composer, no doubt, found much to criticize in the transcription it seems to have interested him sufficiently to lead him to undertake a thorough remodelling of the score, on the cover of which he wrote the whimsical title:
Arrangement of a Terzett as a
3 voiced Quintet
by Mr. Goodwill
and from the appearance of 5 voices
brought to the light of day in 5 real voices
and lifted from the most abject Miserabilität
to moderate respectability
by Mr. Wellwisher
1817
August 14.
N. B. The original 3 voiced Quintet score has been sacrificed as a burnt offering to the gods of the Underworld.
The score of the arrangement is in the handwriting of a copyist with corrections by Beethoven; the title, however, is his autograph. It is preserved in the Royal Library at Berlin. The work was published by Artaria in February, 1819, as Op. 104. Beethoven evidently attached considerable importance to it. He referred to it in letters to Frau von Streicher, Zmeskall and Ries; it was performed at a musical entertainment of the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde in Vienna on December 13, 1818.
Beethoven having obtained possession of his nephew and placed him in Giannatasio’s institute, very naturally took measures that he should have systematic instruction in music; to this end he employed Carl Czerny as teacher, and to him we now turn for information on this point.[176] Czerny writes:
Pedagogic Suggestions to Czerny