"To Herr Schuppanzigh,—
"Come no more to see me. I shall give no concert.
"Beethoven."
"To Herr Schindler,—
"Do not come to me until I send for you. No concert.
"Beethoven."
This did not in the least deter them, however, from doing what they believed necessary for his benefit: the concert took place, and was the scene of a triumph such as few have experienced. The glorious Jupiter Symphony seemed to act upon the immense mass of human beings that thronged the building in every part, like ambrosial nectar; they became intoxicated with delight, and when the refrain was caught up by the choir, "Seid umschlungen Millionen!" a shout of exuberant joy rent the air, completely drowning the singers and instruments. But there stood the master in the midst, his face turned towards the orchestra, absorbed and sunk within himself as usual,—he heard nothing, saw nothing. Fräulein Unger, the soprano, turned him gently round, and then what a sight met his astonished gaze,—a multitude transported with joy! Almost all were standing, and the greater number melted to tears, now for the first time realizing fully the extent of Beethoven's calamity.—Probably in all that great assembly the master himself was the most unmoved. Simply bowing in response to the ovation, he left the theatre gloomy and despondent, and took his homeward way in silence.
Verily, he, like a Greater, knew what was in man. In eight days from this eventful epoch he was completely forgotten; a second concert proved an utter failure, and Rossini's star was again in the ascendant. Nor did the flighty Viennese public cast another thought upon our Beethoven until the news of his death came upon them like the shock of an earthquake, and they hastened, when it was too late, to repair the past.
But if it was painful to meet with ingratitude from the public, how much harder must it have been for the master to endure the same from one nearly related to him! We have said that he adopted his brother's orphan child. This nephew, also a Carl Beethoven, was at his father's death about eight years of age, and a boy of great talent and promise. The four succeeding years, during which the lawsuit dragged its weary length, were extremely detrimental to him, as he seems to have been tossed about from one person to another—now with his mother, and again with his uncle—in a manner very prejudicial to any good moral development. Events showed him only too plainly the character of his mother, but nature—stronger still—urged him to take her part in the contest so far as he dared; and, incited by her evil counsels, he soon began secretly to despise his uncle's authority, and openly to follow a path he had laid down for himself,—the path of self-will and sensual indulgence. Expelled from the University where he was attending the Philosophical Course, his more than father received the repentant prodigal with open arms, and placed him in the Polytechnic School to study for a mercantile career, that he might be under the supervision of Herr Reisser, Vice-President of the Institute, and co-guardian with himself over Carl. In the summer of 1825 the composer wrote no fewer than twenty-nine letters to his erring nephew, every one of which exhibits his character in the most beautiful light. They breathe the cry of a David, "Oh! Absalom! my son! my son!"—but it is a living Absalom who has to be lamented, and the most energetic appeals, the most loving remonstrances are invoked to move that stony heart. In vain,—Carl went from bad to worse, and in 1826 the master was compelled to give up the habit which had been his only solace for years—that of spending the summer in the country—and to remain in Vienna to watch over the young man. Matters soon came to a crisis,—Carl, urged to pass an examination which he had long neglected, attempted, in a fit of despair, to put an end to his own life. Here the law stepped in, and after he had been treated in an asylum where his spiritual as well as his bodily condition was cared for, the miserable youth was restored to his no less wretched uncle, with orders to quit Vienna within four-and-twenty hours. Beethoven's old friend, Stephan Breuning, exerted himself to procure a cadetship for the lad, and he was at length permitted to join the regiment of the Baron von Stutterheim, to whom the composer gratefully dedicated one of his last quartets. Pending this arrangement the unhappy uncle and nephew took refuge at Gneixendorf, the estate of Johann v. Beethoven, who had offered them a temporary asylum. A few days here, however, were enough for the composer; irritated by the unjust reproaches and low taunts of his brother, he determined at once to return to Vienna, taking his nephew with him. It was a raw, cold, miserable day in December; Johann refused to lend his close carriage to him to whom he owed all his prosperity, and Beethoven was obliged to perform a long journey in an open conveyance, with no shelter from the keen wind and pitiless rain. His health, which had long been failing, sank under this exposure, and he arrived in Vienna with a severe attack of inflammation of the lungs, which ultimately caused his death.