The tale is amiable, and plausible enough; standing alone there would seem to be no ground for doubting its correctness. But there are circumstances which give our credence pause. Schindler, who was Beethoven’s constant companion in those days, who presents the story of the rehearsal so convincingly, and who waited until it was time to go to the theatre, says not a word about Beethoven’s presence at the representation. Would he, after suffering such a heartbreaking humiliation at the rehearsal, have gone to the theatre and taken a conspicuous place in the orchestra? It does not seem likely. Moreover, in a letter published in the “Neue Berliner Musikzeitung” of July 30, 1851, Schindler, discussing an impersonation of Fidelio by Frau Köster-Schlegel in Frankfort, says: “It may be remarked in passing that Beethoven never saw Schröder-Devrient as Fidelio, but was dissatisfied with her conception of the character as he had learned to know it from the public prints and oral communications. His ideal was not an operatic heroine, etc.” This would seem to be conclusive, were there not evidence that Schindler’s memory had played him false again. “Fidelio” was repeated on November 4, and also on November 26 and December 17, 1822, and March 3 and 18, 1823, and Bäuerle’s “Theaterzeitung” distinctly states that “Beethoven attended the second performance, sitting in a box in the first tier.” Moreover, Louis Schlösser, who was at this performance, adds confirmation by telling how he saw Beethoven leaving the theatre in the company of Schindler and von Breuning. Beethoven may not have been able to form an opinion of a performance which he could not hear, but the testimony of Schindler that he never saw Schröder-Devrient in the role of Fidelio is greatly weakened by this proved fact. But would he have made such a statement if Beethoven had been present at the first performance and paid so spectacular a tribute to the singer? It is easier to imagine that Schindler’s memory was treacherous concerning a later performance. At best, the evidence is inconclusive, because contradictory. In March, 1823, Chapelmaster Reuling remarks in a Conversation Book: “I saw you in the theatre at the first performance of ‘Fidelio’.” Did he mean the first performance in November, 1822, or the first of the two performances in the month in which he was writing—March, 1823? Schröder-Devrient in her prime is reputed to have been the greatest of all Fidelios; but she did not reach her full artistic stature until after Beethoven’s death.

Following Schindler’s narrative we learn that Beethoven’s woeful experience at the rehearsal led to a resolution on his part to make another effort to be healed of his deafness. He went to Dr. Smetana, who prescribed medicaments to be taken inwardly, thereby indicating, as Schindler asserts, that he had no expectation of effecting a cure, but wanted only to occupy Beethoven’s mind, knowing what to expect from so impatient, wilful and absent-minded a patient; for Beethoven was as unready to follow a physician’s advice as a musician’s, and was more likely to injure himself with overdoses of drugs than to invite the benefit which the practitioner hoped for by obedience to the prescription. The usual thing happened; not only with Dr. Smetana’s treatment, but also with that of the priest, Pater Weiss, whom he had consulted some 18 years before and to whom he now returned. For a while he thought that the oil which the priest dropped into his ears was beneficial, and Pater Weiss himself expressed the belief that the left ear, at least, might permanently be helped; but Beethoven grew skeptical, as he always did unless he experienced immediate relief, his work monopolized his attention, and despite the priest’s solicitations he abandoned the treatment and yielded himself to his fate. Thenceforward no one heard him lament because of his deafness.

The compositions which were in Beethoven’s hands at the close of the year were those which had occupied him in the earlier months. The Mass, several times completed but never complete so long as it was within reach, received what must now be looked upon as its finishing touches; progress was made on the Ninth Symphony and thought given to a quartet, perhaps several quartets. The Bagatelles for Pianoforte grouped under Op. 119, some of which had been published a year before (Nos. 7-11), were finished; Nos. 1 to 6 were ready for the publisher by the end of 1822—the autograph manuscript bearing the inscription “Kleinigkeiten, 1822 Novemb.” Nottebohm thinks that Nos. 2 to 5 were conceived between 1800 and 1804; a sketch for No. 5 (C minor, Risoluto) is found among sketches made in 1802 for the Sonata in C minor Op. 30; Lenz says sketches for No. 3 (in D, a l’Allemande) are among sketches for the last movement of the “Eroica” Symphony; No. 6 (G major) is sketched on a sheet containing experimental studies for a passage in the Credo of the Mass; sketches for Nos. 2 and 4 are among suggestions of a melody for Goethe’s “Erlkönig,” indicating an early period which cannot be determined. Of Nos. 7-11, enough has been said in a previous chapter. The piece published as No. 12 and added to the set by Diabelli after Beethoven’s death was originally a song with pianoforte accompaniment and had its origin in 1800 at the latest. Whether or not Beethoven made the pianoforte piece out of the projected song, on which point nothing of significance can be said, it is certain that it does not belong to the set, which consists of 11 numbers only in the old editions and in the manuscripts of the Rudolphinian Collection.

Beethoven offered a number of Bagatelles to Peters—at first four, then a larger number; he sent six to the publisher on February 15, 1823. Peters returned them—Beethoven receiving them on March 19—with the remark that they were not worth the price asked for them and that Beethoven ought to consider it beneath his dignity to waste his time on such trifles; anybody could write them. Schindler says that Peters’s action aggrieved Beethoven, which is easily believed; but Schindler confounded the Bagatelles Op. 119 with the set, Op. 126, works of distinctly a higher order which were not composed at the time. On February 25, 1823, Beethoven sent 11 Bagatelles to Ries in London with instructions to sell them as best he could. Naturally, Op. 119 is meant. On May 7, 1823, six were offered to Lissner in St. Petersburg. Schlesinger published the set in Paris at the end of 1823, as Op. 112, and Sauer and Leidesdorf issued them almost simultaneously in Vienna with the same opus number. The number 119 appears to have been assigned to the set after an agreement had been reached with Steiner concerning the works now numbered 112 to 118. The last known song by Beethoven, “Der Kuss,” was finished at this time, though written down practically as we know it in 1798. Sketches involving the few changes made are found among some for the overture “The Consecration of the House” and the Ninth Symphony. The autograph is dated “December, 1822.” It was sent to Peters, who did not print it; in 1825 it was sent to the Schotts, numbered 128, and they published it.

In the last weeks of the year a connection was established which was destined to be of great influence in Beethoven’s final creative activities. Prince Nicolas Boris Galitzin, born in 1795, who as a young man had taken part in the Napoleonic wars, was an influential factor in the musical life of St. Petersburg. He played the violoncello, and his wife (née Princess Saltykow) was an admirable pianist. Prince Galitzin was an ardent admirer of Beethoven’s music and had arranged some of the works written for the pianoforte for strings. Whether or not he had made the personal acquaintance of Beethoven has not been established, but wanting to have as his private property some composition by the master whom he revered, he addressed a letter to Beethoven on November 9, 1822, saying that as a passionate amateur of music and an admirer of the master’s talent he asked him to compose for him one, two or three string quartets, for which he would be pleased to pay any sum demanded and that he would accept the dedication of the works with gratitude. Beethoven’s answer, dated January 25, 1823, has not been found but it is known that he accepted the commission and fixed the honorarium at 50 ducats each. This is the prologue to the story of the last Quartets.

In Charles C. Perkins’s “History of the Handel and Haydn Society, of Boston,” Vol. I, p. 87, the author writes: “The most interesting matter connected with the history of the society in the year 1823 ... is the fact that Beethoven was commissioned to write an oratorio for it.” The date is obviously wrong; it should be 1822, for in a letter dated December 20, 1822, as will appear in the next chapter of this work, Beethoven tells Ries that he has received requests from all parts of Europe “and even from North America.” The historian of the Boston Society adds:

The passages cited are from a Conversation Book used in the early days of April, 1823. In the fall of that year, on November 5, the “Morgenblatt für Gebildete Leser” closed an article on Beethoven with the words: “A symphony, quartets, a Biblical oratorio, sent to him in English by the consul of the United States, observe the United States, and possibly one of Grillparzer’s poems, may be expected.”

Chapter IV

When the year 1823 opens, the Mass in D is supposedly finished and negotiations for its publication have been carried on in a manner the contemplation of which must affect even the casual reader grievously. The work had been originally intended for the functions attending the installation of Archduke Rudolph as Archbishop of Olmütz—not merely as a personal tribute to the imperial, archepiscopal pupil, but for actual performance at the ceremony of inthronization—a fact which ought to be borne in mind during its study, for it throws light upon Beethoven’s attitude towards the Catholic Church (at least so far as that church’s rubrics are concerned) as well as towards religion in general and art as its handmaiden and mistress. Archduke Rudolph had been chosen Cardinal on April 24, 1819, and Archbishop on June 4 of the same year; he was installed as head of the see of Olmütz on March 20, 1820; but the fact of his selection for the dignities was known in Vienna amongst his friends as early as the middle of 1818. When the story of the year 1823 opens, therefore, Beethoven’s plan is nearly five years old and Archduke Rudolph has been archbishop nearly a year. We first hear of the Mass this year in a letter dated February 27, when Beethoven apologizes to his august pupil for not having waited upon him. He had delayed his visit, he said, because he wanted to send him a copy of the Mass; but this had been held back by corrections and other circumstances. Accompanying the letter were the copies of the overture to “The Consecration of the House” and the “Gratulatory Minuet.” Finally, on March 19, 1823, on the very eve of the first anniversary of the installation, Beethoven placed a manuscript copy of the Mass in the Archduke’s hands. In the catalogue of the Rudolphinian Collection, now preserved by the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde in Vienna, it is entered thus: “Missa Solemnis. Partitur. MS. This beautifully written MS. was delivered by the composer himself on March 19, 1823.”

The plan to write the Mass for the installation ceremonies seems to have been original with Beethoven; it was not suggested by the Archduke or any of his friends, so far as has ever been learned. He began work upon it at once, for Schindler says he saw the beginning of the score in the fall of 1818. Nottebohm’s study of all the sketches which have been discovered (save a number now preserved in the Beethoven House in Bonn which do not add materially to our knowledge) led him to conclusions which may be summed up as follows: The movements were taken up in the order in which the various portions of the text appear in the Roman missal, but work was prosecuted on several movements simultaneously. The Kyrie was begun at the earliest in the middle of 1818, i. e., shortly after the fact of the Archduke’s appointment became known; the Gloria was completely sketched by the end of 1819, the Credo in 1820; the entire Mass was complete in sketch-form in the beginning of 1822. While sketching the Mass Beethoven composed the Pianoforte Sonatas, Op. 109, 110 and 111, the Variations, Op. 107, No. 8, and several other small pieces, including the canons “O, Tobias,” “Gehabt euch wohl,” “Tugend ist kein leerer Name,” and “Gedenkt heute an Baden.” But with the elaboration of the sketches the Mass was not really finished, for subsequently Beethoven undertook many changes. The Allegro molto which enters in the Credo at the words et ascendit is shorter in the autograph than in the printed edition. At the entrance of the words et iterum and cujus regni the autograph is in each case two measures shorter than in the printed score. In the autograph, and also in the copy which Beethoven gave to the Archduke, the trombones do not enter till the words judicare vivos et mortuos. There are no trombones in the Gloria. The trombone passage which now appears just before the entrance of the chorus on judicare was formerly set for the horns. After the words et mortuos the trombones are silent till the end of the Credo in the autograph; they enter again in the beginning of the Sanctus, but are silent at the next Allegro. They occur in the Benedictus, but are wanting in the Agnus Dei. From the nature of these supplementary alterations it is to be concluded that considerable time must have elapsed before they could all be made and the Mass be given the shape in which we know it. Holding to the date on which the copy was delivered to the Archduke (March 19, 1823), the earliest date at which the Mass can have received its definitive shape must be set down as the middle of 1823. Beethoven, therefore, devoted about five years to its composition. He made so many changes in the tympani part of the Agnus Dei that he wore a hole in the very thick paper, his aim being, apparently, by means of a vague rhythm to suggest the distance of the disturbers of the peace. That he was sincere in his purpose to provide a mass for the installation ceremonies is to be found, outside of Schindler’s statement, in a letter to the Archduke written in 1819, in which he says:

Something was said, in the conclusion of the chapter of this biography devoted to a review of the incidents of the years 1807 to 1809, concerning the views Beethoven entertained on the subject of religion and dogmatic and sectarian Christianity. His attitude towards the Roman Catholic Church becomes an almost necessary subject of contemplation in a study of the Solemn Mass in D; but it is one into which the personal equation of the student must perforce largely enter. The obedient churchman of a Roman Catholic country will attach both less and more importance, than one brought up in a Protestant land, to the fact that he admonished his nephew when a lad to say his prayers and said them with him (as the boy testified in the guardianship proceedings), that he himself at least once led him to the door of the confessional,[68] that he consented to the summoning of a priest when in extremis and that he seemed to derive comfort and edification from the sacred function. It is not necessary, however, to go very deeply into a critical study of the Mass in order to say that while the composition shows respect for traditions in some portions and while it is possible to become eloquent without going beyond the demonstration contained in the music itself, in describing the overwhelming puissance of his proclamation of the fatherhood of God and belief in Him as the Creator of all things visible and invisible, the most obvious fact which confronts the analytical student is that Beethoven approached the missal text chiefly with the imagination and the emotions of an artist, and that its poetical, not to say dramatic elements were those which he was most eager to delineate.[69] One proof of this is found in what may be called the technical history of the Mass, and is therefore pertinent here. It was scarcely necessary for Beethoven to do so, but he has nevertheless given us an explanation of his singular treatment of the prayer for peace. Among the sketches for the movement is found the remark: “dona nobis pacem darstellend den innern und äussern Frieden” (“delineating internal and external peace”), and in agreement with this he superscribes the first Allegro vivace in the autograph with the same words. In the later copy this phrase is changed to “Prayer for internal and external peace,” thus showing an appreciation of the fact that the words alone contain the allusion to peace which in its external aspect is disturbed by the sounds of war suggested by the instruments. The petition for peace is emphasized by the threatening tones of military instruments accompanying the agonizing appeal for mercy sent up by the voices. The device is purely dramatic and it was not an entirely novel conceit of Beethoven’s. When the French invaded Styria in 1796, Haydn wrote a mass “In tempore belli” in which a soft drum-roll entered immediately after the words “Agnus Dei” and was gradually reinforced by trumpets and other wind-instruments “as if the enemy were heard approaching in the distance.”

Whence came the plan of postponing the publication of the mass for a period in order to sell manuscript copies of it by subscription to the sovereigns of Europe does not appear. Beethoven had it under consideration at the beginning of 1823, for the year was only a week old when he sent his brother Johann with a letter to Griesinger of the Saxon Legation asking him to give advice on the subject to the bearer of the letter, apologizing for not coming in person on the ground of indisposition. Whether or not Griesinger came to his assistance we do not know, but within a fortnight work on the project had been energetically begun. Schindler was now called upon to write, fetch and carry as steadily and industriously as if he were, in fact, what he described himself to be—a private secretary. Among his papers in Berlin are found many billets and loose memoranda bearing on the subject, without date, but grouped as to periods by Schindler himself and provided with occasional glosses touching their contents. Beethoven took so much of his time in requisition, indeed, that he offered to pay him 50 florins after the collection of one of the subscription fees, but Schindler records that he never received them nor would he have accepted them. He was, as he informed the world for many years afterward on his visiting card, “L’Ami de Beethoven,” and his very considerable and entirely unselfish labors were “works of friendship” for which he wanted no remuneration; but he was very naturally rejoiced when Beethoven presented him with several autograph scores, and we have seen how, after the death of Beethoven, Breuning gave him many papers which seemed valueless then but are looked upon as invaluable now. Moreover, he disposed of his Beethoven memorabilia to the Royal Library of Berlin for an annuity of 400 thalers—all of which, however, does not detract from the disinterestedness of his labors for Beethoven, alive, suffering and so frequently helpless.

The invitations to the courts were issued in part before the end of January. A letter to Schindler, evidently written in that month, asks him to draw out a memorandum of courts from an almanac in which the foreign embassies stationed at Vienna were listed. The invitations were posted on the following dates: to the courts at Baden, Wurtemburg, Bavaria and Saxony on January 23; “to the other ambassadors” (as Beethoven notes) on January 26; to Weimar on February 4; to Mecklenburg and Hesse-Darmstadt on February 5; to Berlin, Copenhagen, Hesse-Cassel and Nassau on February 6; to Tuscany on February 17, and to Paris on March 1. The invitation to the court at Hesse-Cassel had been written on January 23, but it was not sent because, as Schindler says, “it had been found that nothing was to be got from the little courts.” The letter came back to Beethoven and its preservation puts in our hands the formula which, no doubt was followed in all the formal addresses. We therefore give it here:

Only the signature was in Beethoven’s handwriting. It is not known how many of these invitations were issued; Schindler’s account goes only to the subscriptions received and even here it is not entirely accurate. There were ten acceptances. The first came from the King of Prussia. Prince Hatzfeld acted in the matter for Berlin and Beethoven also invoked the aid of Zelter. Court Councillor Wernhard, Director of the Chancellary of the Embassy at Vienna, brought the report to Beethoven and asked him if he would not prefer a royal order to the 50 ducats. Without hesitation, Beethoven replied “50 ducats,” and after Wernhard had gone he indulged in sarcastic comments on the pursuit of decorations by various contemporaries—“which in his opinion were gained at the cost of the sanctity of art.” Beethoven received the money, but the score was not delivered, owing, no doubt, to delay in the copying, and in July Prince Hatzfeld feels compelled to remind the composer of his remissness. Prince Radziwill in Berlin also subscribed, but he did not receive his copy till more than a year later. On June 28, 1824, a representative of the Prince politely informed Beethoven that he had sent a cheque for 50 ducats to him with a request for a receipt and a copy of the score, but had received neither. On July 3, Schindler informed Beethoven that Hatzfeld had earnestly inquired whether he was now going to receive the Mass. He was being so pestered about the matter from Berlin that it was becoming burdensome. He asked that Beethoven write to the Prince without delay, telling him when he should receive the Mass, so that he might show it in his own justification in Berlin. Schindler says the fault lay with the copyists; in every copy many pages had to be rewritten.

Much to Beethoven’s vexation and impatience the Saxon court was very tardy in its reply, or rather in subscribing, for at first the invitation was declined; but Beethoven was not thus to be put off by a court with which his imperial pupil was closely connected. He called in the help of Archduke Rudolph, to whom on July 1, 1823, he wrote a letter. He complains in this letter of pain in the eyes from which he has been suffering for a week. He was forced to make sparing use of them and therefore had not been able to look through some variations composed by the Archduke, but had been obliged to leave the task to another. He continues:

This letter was written in Vienna, but from Hetzendorf he sent a postscript in which he said:

Beethoven’s impatience with the Saxon Court was so great that some time before his hopes had been reanimated, probably by the application for his opera, he had said in a note to Schindler: “Nothing from Dresden. Wait till the end of the month then an advocate in Dresden.” These words led Schindler to the singular conclusion that Beethoven had thoughts of compelling the King of Saxony to reach a decision by judicial means. Obviously, all that Beethoven meant by “advocate” was a pleader, an intercessor. He could have contemplated legal measures only if he had sent a copy of the Mass to the King with the invitation, and this we know he did not do from a letter written by Archduke Rudolph, which says, that the King of Saxony had not received a score by July 31. Archduke Rudolph became the advocate through his brother-in-law Prince Anton, brother to the King, and so did the Director General v. Könneritz, to whom Beethoven wrote on July 17 and again on July 25. In the first letter he promises to send the invitation to the King and in the next he does so. This must have been a second invitation, for Beethoven tells v. Könneritz that the original one had been declined. A paragraph from each letter deserves reproduction.

These last efforts were successful; King Friedrich August subscribed for the Mass, and on July 31 Archduke Rudolph wrote to his music-master: “My brother-in-law Prince Anton has already written to me that the King of Saxony is expecting your beautiful Mass.” On September 12, Prince Anton wrote to Beethoven that he had no doubt his royal brother would grant his wish, especially as he had spoken to him on the subject in the name of his brother-in-law, the Cardinal. The money must have arrived soon afterward and Beethoven set Schindler’s mind at ease by writing to him:

According to Fürstenau the manuscript copy of the Mass is still in the private music collection of the King of Saxony in Dresden.

The Grand Duke of Hesse-Darmstadt was appealed to directly under date of February 5, the letter, probably following the formula and signed by Beethoven, being forwarded through the Hessian ambassador, Baron von Türckheim, a cultured art connoisseur and subsequently Intendant of the Grand Ducal Theatre in Darmstadt. Louis Schlösser was in Vienna at the time, and Baron von Türckheim, knowing that he wanted to make Beethoven’s acquaintance, gave him the opportunity by asking him to carry the information that the invitation had been accepted, to Beethoven, handing him the dispatch with the Grand Ducal seal affixed for that purpose. Schlösser went to Beethoven, “No. 60 Kothgasse, first storey, door to the left,” and has left us a description of the visit, which must have been made in April or early in May, 1823. Beethoven read the document with great joy and said to Schlösser:

No success was met with at the cultivated Court of Weimar, though here Beethoven invoked the assistance of no less a dignitary than Goethe. His letter to the poet is still preserved in the Grand Ducal archives and is worthy of being given in full:

According to Schindler, who surely was in a position to know, no answer to this letter was ever received; nor did the Grand Duke subscribe. That the invitation reached its destination may safely be assumed from Beethoven’s remark about the interest displayed in the plan at the embassy; but the document is not to be found in the archives. Goethe’s indifference, if he was indifferent in the premises, may be explained on a number of grounds. If he ever was thoroughly appreciative of Beethoven’s music, it was only later in life. He was in the prime of life with fixed tastes in music as well as the other arts before Beethoven came with his new evangel. Reichardt, Zelter and men of their stamp produced the music which was most to his liking. It is true that in July, 1812, he wrote a letter in which he said that he had never seen a more self-contained, energetic and sincere artist than Beethoven and that he could well understand why he appeared singular in the eyes of the world; but it is doubtful if he ever felt any real attachment to the man, and not altogether impossible, if the Teplitz stories are true, that he resented the bad manners of which Beethoven is said to have been guilty. But a long time had elapsed since the two great men came together in 1812.

Bavaria’s story is a short one. In a Conversation Book towards the close of May, Schindler writes: “A negative answer has come from Bavaria.” To the King of Naples, Beethoven sent a French copy of the letter of invitation practically identical with the formula, and also to the King of France.[72] In the latter case Cherubini was asked to be the advocate. The draft of Beethoven’s letter to him is still preserved among the Schindler papers in Berlin:

The letter was despatched on March 15. Cherubini did not receive it, and as late as 1841 expressed his great regret at the miscarriage which, however, worked no harm to the enterprise. King Louis XVIII not only subscribed for the Mass but within less than a year sent Beethoven a gold medal weighing twenty-one Louis d’ors, showing on the obverse side the bust of the King and on the reverse, within a wreath, the inscription: Donnée par le Roi à Monsieur Beethoven. Duke d’Achâts, First Chamberlain of the King, accompanied the gift with the following letter:

“This was a distinction,” says Schindler, “than which one more significant never fell to the lot of the artist during his life”; but the biographer certainly is in error when he intimates that the medal was given in payment of the subscription price. Beethoven informed Archduke Rudolph that the King had accepted the invitation in his letter of June 1, 1823; the medal was received early in 1824, over eight months later. Beethoven’s needs and the reply which he gave the messenger from Prussia when he offered a decoration instead of the 50 ducats, indicate plainly enough how he felt as to the remuneration. Moreover, in a billet which he sent to Schindler instructing him to call upon von Obreskow of the Russian Embassy to tell him how to pay the subscription of the Czar, Beethoven says: “let him know incidentally, when opportunity offers, that France simply sent the money to you.” Evidently King Louis XVIII paid the money in the regular way and sent the medal as a special mark of distinction.

No subscription was received from the King of Naples. The negotiations with the Grand Duke of Tuscany were more successful, though they dragged on into the next year. They were a subject of discussion in the Conversation Book in which Count Lichnowsky, Brother Johann and Nephew Karl took part. From remarks there recorded it appears that an appeal was also made to Ex-Empress Maria Louisa, Duchess of Parma. Here the agent was Odelga and there was a plan to interest Countess Neuberg. Count Lichnowsky seems to have suggested the name of Maria Louisa and offered to write to Count Neuberg, whom he knew, on the subject. It looks also as if the case of the Grand Duke of Tuscany had been exceptional, in that the Mass had been forwarded before the subscription had been received; this at least might be the interpretation of a remark noted by Karl: “I shall go to Odelga on Sunday. We must get to work, or they will keep the Mass and send nothing.”

Schindler says that Beethoven sent a carefully written letter to the King of Sweden to accompany the invitation; but nothing came of it. The King of Denmark subscribed, but as we hear nothing of the particulars, it is most likely that everything went smoothly in his case.

Prince Galitzin was asked to make a plea to the Russian Court and reported in a letter to Beethoven, dated June 2, that the invitation had been accepted and the official notification would follow in due course through the Russian Embassy. The money came soon afterwards. On July 9, Schindler writes in a jocular vein, using a metaphor which had already done service in Beethoven’s correspondence: