“Mr. Beethoven send word to Mr. Birchall that it is severall days past that he has sent for London, Wellington’s Battel Simphonie and that Mr. B. may send for it at Thomas Coutts. Mr. Beethoven wish Mr. Bl. would make ingrave the sayd Simphonie so soon as possible and send him word in time the day it will be published, that he may prevent in time the publisher at Vienna.
“To regard the 3 Sonatas which Mr. B. shall receive afterwards there is not wanted such a gt. hurry and Mr. B[eethoven] will take the liberty to fixe the day when the are to be published. Mr. B[eethoven] sayd tha Mr. Solomon has a good many tings to say concerning the Simphonie in (?) Mr. B[eethoven] wish for an answer so soon as possible concerning the days of publication.”
The letter here queried, does not belong to the English Alphabet, but the “Battle and Victory Symphony” is meant.
[156] This was an error, as Karl was baptized on April 8, 1774.
[157] A letter, preserved in the Beethoven House Museum at Bonn (Kalischer, “Sämmtliche Briefe” II, 310), to Madame Antonie von Brentano mentions that Karl had been pensioned, but this may have been written after an application had been made and before it had been refused. The letter says: “Among the individuals (whose number is infinite) who are suffering, is my brother who was obliged to have himself pensioned because of his ill health, conditions are very hard just now, I do all that is possible, but that is not much.” He then offers Brentano a pipe-bowl belonging to his brother, who thinks that it might be sold for 10 louis d’or, remarking: “he needs a great deal, is obliged to keep a horse and carriage in order to live (for he is as desirous to keep his life as I am willing to lose mine).”
[158] “Aus dem Schwarzspanierhause,” by Dr. Gerhard von Breuning. Vienna, Rosner, 1874. Dr. Breuning prints the note of reconciliation (which has appeared in this work) as subsequent to this affair. We are unable to agree with him.
[159] Dr. Gerhard von Breuning places this incident in 1804, Thayer in 1815. The cause of the quarrel which was followed by a reconciliation in 1804, has been explained.
[160] Saint Peter was a rock! Bernardus was a Saint!
[161] Nottebohm’s study of the sketchbooks used by Beethoven in 1815 (See “Zweit. Beeth.,” pp. 314-20) discloses that he worked upon sketches for works which were never finished—a Symphony in B minor, Pianoforte Concerto in D, and several Fugues, besides experimenting with the opera “Bacchus.” There are also sketches for compositions written in 1816, such as the song-cycle “An die ferne Geliebte” and the Sonata, Op. 101.
[162] The German original was acquired in 1913 at a sale of autographs by Mr. Richard Aldrich.