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 Döbling—fresh troops are advancing! The wholesalers, 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 pinions[50] 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 relations 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 honorarium. 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. 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.
“A Mass” not “the Mass” for Peters
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 likelihood 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 Olmütz 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 Kyrie in the second mass with wind-instruments and organ only”;[51] 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[52] I should compose 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 Là ci darem la mano—and a Gratulatory Minuet;[53] 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,[54] 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 pianoforte 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 Geimüller. 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 receive 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.