The day after the deed, Stephan von Breuning, himself unable to come, sent Gerhard to his friend with a message: his parents wanted him to take his meals with them so as not to be alone. Then Breuning comes, and now he will receive advice on the advisability of a military life from one fitted to give it, for von Breuning is a court councillor in the war department. “A military life will be the best discipline for one who cannot endure freedom; and it will teach him how to live on little,” is one of Breuning’s first utterances.
Holz continues his visits to the hospital and his reports. His help was now invaluable and he gave it unselfishly and ungrudgingly, winning that measure of gratitude from Beethoven which found expression in the letter empowering him to write his biography. He tells Beethoven that Karl receives visits from four physicians four times a day. That the magistrate is investigating the case and will send a priest to give the patient religious instruction, and that his release from the hands of the police authorities must wait upon his “complete conversion”; but so long as there is danger of too much mental strain this instruction will not be given. At ease in his mind touching the physical condition of his ward, Beethoven is kept in a state of anxiety about the inquiry, which is so protracted as to excite his apprehension that something awful may be disclosed. He wants to go himself to see the “Minister” (of Police, evidently) and dreads the ordeal of examination. “The court will not annoy you,” Holz, tells him; “the mother and Karl at the worst.”
Dr. Bach joined Breuning, Schindler and Holz in advising Beethoven to resign the guardianship; but while the other three favored placing Karl in the army, Bach urged that he be sent off at once to some business house in Trieste, Milan or Hamburg without waiting for him to make up his studies and pass the examination which seems necessary to Beethoven. “Away with him from Vienna!” is the general cry, but Beethoven hesitates; he still thinks that he must keep his ward under his eye. In the Conversation Book he writes: “I wanted only to accomplish his good; if he is abandoned now, something might happen.” Meanwhile von Breuning in pursuance of his plan consulted Baron von Stutterheim and persuaded him to give the young man a cadetship in his regiment, and on September 11 Breuning is able to communicate the success of his efforts to Beethoven who, as soon as he began to consider the military proposition at all, had thought of his old friend, General von Ertmann, the husband of his “Dorothea-Cäcilia.” But the project failed, and Breuning carried the day for his plan and agreed to accept the guardianship which had been laid down by Reisser. The Court Councillor goes at matters in a practical way; he brings to Beethoven von Stutterheim’s advice as to the allowance: he must not give more than 12 florins in silver a month, as that was all that the richest cadet in the service received.
Karl was unwilling to see his uncle, and Beethoven knew it. The latter wrote to his nephew, however, and the affectionate tenor of the letters met with the disapproval of both Holz and Schindler. Beethoven hoped with them to win back his nephew’s love, but his advisers told him they would do no good. He seems to have thought it necessary to learn Karl’s opinion before consenting to von Breuning’s plan. He visited Karl at the hospital, who, after asking his uncle to say as little as possible about that which was past alteration, said that a military life was the one in which he could be most satisfied and that he was entirely capable of making a firm resolve and adhering to it. As a cadet, promotion would be open to him. Beethoven, in planning to keep the young man in Vienna, had suggested to his advisers that the mother might be sent away—to Pressburg or Pesth. After it had been fixed that Karl should enter the army as soon as possible after his discharge from the hospital, the question arose as to what disposition should be made of him in the interim. Beethoven was unalterably opposed to his being with his mother even for a day. In an interview he brought the subject up and began to berate her as usual; but Karl interrupted him:
A Son Defends His Mother
I do not want to hear anything derogatory to her; it is not for me to be her judge. If I were to spend the little time for which I shall be here with her it would be only a small return for all that she has suffered on my account. Nothing can be said of a harmful influence on me even if it should happen, if for no other reason than the brevity of the time. In no event shall I treat her with greater coldness than has been the case heretofore ... let be said what will.... (He tells his uncle that his mother will offer no objection to his new calling.) All the less, therefore, can I deny her wish to be with me now, as I shall in all likelihood not be here again soon. It is self-evident that this will not prevent you and me from seeing each other as often as you wish.
Very reluctantly Beethoven gave his consent that his nephew should become a soldier, and he continued his solicitude for him, as is disclosed by letters to Holz and von Breuning. His first thought was to send him to a military institute and have him graduated as an officer. This proved impracticable. Now he lays down three conditions as to the cadetship: he must not be treated as a culprit, not be compelled to live so meanly as to preclude his advancement, not be too much restricted as to food and drink. The plans for this disposition were made. He was to be presented to von Stutterheim as soon as he was discharged from the hospital, take the oath of service the next day, and leave Vienna for Iglau, where von Stutterheim’s regiment was stationed, within five or six days. He was discharged as cured on September 25. Breuning, who had assumed the guardianship, now found himself confronted by a serious embarrassment. Where should the young man be sent while the preparations for his entry into the military service were making? Karl did not want to go to his uncle’s, nor did von Breuning want to send him there, and frankly tells Beethoven his reason: “If he were here you would talk to him too much and that would cause new irritation; for he testified in the police court that the reason why he had taken the step was because you harassed him too much.” Beethoven feared that the magistrate might allow him to go to his mother’s, and to guard against this he wrote two letters to that official, a man kindly disposed toward him, named Czapka. In the first he wrote:
I earnestly beg of you, since my nephew will be well in a few days, to direct that he be not permitted to leave the hospital with anybody but me and Mr. v. Holz. It must not possibly be allowed that he be near his mother, this utterly depraved person. Her bad and wickedly malicious character, the belief that she often tempted Karl to lure money from me, the probability that she divided sums with him and was also in the confidence of Karl’s dissolute companion, the notice which she attracts with her illegitimate daughter, the likelihood that at his m—’s he would make the acquaintance of women who are anything but virtuous, justify my solicitude and my request. Even the mere habit of being in the company of such a person cannot possibly lead a young man to virtue.
In a second letter he suggests that the magistrate admonish the young man and give him to understand that he will be under police surveillance while he is with his uncle. Beethoven’s brother was again in Vienna. He had repeated his offer to give the composer a temporary home and his nephew a harbor of refuge at Gneixendorf; but haste was imperative, both on account of his business affairs and Karl’s status. In three days the business of finishing the corrections in the manuscript copy of the Ninth Symphony which was to be sent to the King of Prussia, placing it in the hands of Haslinger, who was to have it bound, and writing the letter to the King, was disposed of and on September 28 the two brothers and their nephew set out for Gneixendorf.