Mozart listened with a benevolent smile; and when he had ended, said, "Come, you must let me hear you play." With that, he led him to an admirable instrument in another apartment; opened it, and invited him to select a piece of music.
"Will you give me a theme?" asked Louis.
The master looked surprised; but without reply wrote some lines on a leaf of paper, and handed it to the young man. Beethoven looked over it; it was a difficult chromatic fugue theme, the intricacy of which demanded much skill and experience. But without being discouraged, he collected all his powers, and began to execute it.
Mozart did not conceal the sur prise and pleasure he felt when Louis first began to play. The youth perceived the impression he had made, and was stimulated to more spirited efforts.
As he proceeded, the master's pale cheek flushed, his eyes sparkled; and stepping on tiptoe to the open door, he whispered to his guests, "Listen, I beg of you! You shall have some thing worth hearing."
That moment rewarded all the pains, and banished all the apprehensions of the young aspirant after excellence. Louis went through his trial-piece with admirable spirit, sprang up, and went to Mozart; seizing both his hands and pressing them to his throbbing heart, he murmured, "I also am an artist!"
"You are indeed!" cried Mozart, "and no common one! And what may be wanting, you will not fail to find, and make your own. The grand thing, the living spirit, you bore within you from the beginning, as all do who possess it. Come back soon to Vienna, my young friend—very soon! Father Haydn, Albrechtsberger, friend Stadler, and I will receive you with open arms; and if you need advice or assistance, we will give it you to the best of our ability."
The other guests crowded round Beethoven, and hailed him as a worthy pupil of art! Even the silly impressario looked at him with vastly increased respect, and said, "I can tell you, I know the public-well, we will talk more of the matter this evening over a glass of wine."
"I also am an artist!" repeated Louis to himself, when he returned late to his lodgings.
Much improved in spirits, and reinspired with confidence in himself, he returned to Bonn, and ere long put in practice his scheme of paying Vienna a second visit.