FOOTNOTES:
[2] We are told on good authority that the elder Beethoven had invested his money in "two cellars of wine," which he bought from the growers of the district, and sold into the Netherlands. An unlucky speculation! Johann, we learn, was early an adept at "wine-tasting."—Thayer, Vol. i. App., p. 328.
CHAPTER II
BOYHOOD.
Birth—Early Influences and Training—Neefe—First Attempts at Composition—The Boy Organist—Max Friedrich's National Theatre—Mozart and Beethoven—Disappointment.
n the 17th of December, 1770, in the old house in the Bonngasse, Ludwig van Beethoven first saw the light. He was not the eldest child, Johann having about eighteen months previously lost a son who had also been christened Ludwig.
Beethoven's infant years flew by happily, the grandfather being still alive, and able to make good any deficiency in his son's miserable income; but in the year 1773 the old man was gathered to his fathers, and the little household left to face that struggle with poverty which embittered Beethoven's youth.
The father, however, was not yet the hardened, reckless man he afterwards became, and could still take pleasure in the manifest joy exhibited by his little son whenever he sat at the pianoforte and played or sang. The sound of his father's voice was sufficient to draw the child from any game, and great was his delight when Johann placed his little fingers among the keys and taught him to follow the melody of the song.