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MUSICAL AND LITERARY MISCELLANY.
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being hard of hearing." We cannot imagine that the
greater composer lost much by the neglect of one
who could thus be decided; but it is to be deeply
regretted that, from one cause or another, he was
condemned to be for ever a stranger to the house-
hold love and care of a wife. To the want of such
a kind and watchful influence, many of his later
eccentricities, and all the blank desolation of the
concluding portion of his life, may certainly be as.
cribed.
But there was yet another and more fatal enemy
to his peace and success as an artist, which was not
slow in making its appearance. So early as 1800,
at the age of thirty, we find him coniiding to his
friend Wegeler the approach of a calamity, which
hp carefully concealed from others, and would fain
have hidden from himself. After describing the
prospects of employment and distinction in his pro-
fession, which then seemed to be opening before
him, he writes: — "Yet that envious demon, ill
health, has thrown a terrible check in my way ; my
hearing, to-wit, for the last three years, has been
continually growing worse ;"— and he goes on to
describe the means he had already taken in the
hopes of relief, but in vain. It was even then so
bad, that
In the theatre I am forced to lean over the orchestra,
in order to hear the actors speak. The higher notes
of instruments and voices escape me at a short distance:
in conversation it is marvellous that no one has yet
observed it : perhaps as I am apt to be absent, they
account for it in this way. Often I can only distin-
guish the general sound, but not the words, of one who
speaks low : and yet when people shout I cannot en-
dure it. What is now to become of me, Heaven only
knows! I have already been often tempted to curse
the day when I was born ; but have learned from Plu-
tarch to practise resignation. If no better may be, I
will defy my ill fortune ; and yet many moments will
come, in which I shall be the most miserable of God's
creatures. I pray you not to breathe a syllable of this
affliction of mine to any one, not even to your wifel
Resignation! a wretched resource, but the only one
that is left me !
It will readily be considered why he thus jealously
attempted to conceal an infirmity, of all others the
most calamitous to a musician. This was one of
the main reasons which made him withdraw from
general society; and explains much that, at the
time, was supposed to proceed from caprice and ill-
humour only. In a paper written by him in 1802,
during a serious illness, when he believed himself
to be dying, and addressed to his two brothers, this
is dwelt upon in a manner profoundly touching : —
My heart and soul were, from infancy, prone to
kindly feelings ; and my ambition was ever to accom-
plish what was great and good. But reflect that, for the
last six years, an unfortunate ailment has fallen upon
me ; and, after hopes have been successively raised
and defeated, I have been forced to contemplate the
certainty of an abiding infirmity. Born with an ardent,
lively disposition — susceptible of social enjoyments, I
was condemned, thus early, to part from them, and
wear out my life in solitude. If, now and then, 1 at-
tempted to break through the prohibition, how bitterly
was I then repulsed by the doubly painful evidence of
my dull hearing ; and yet I could not bring myself to
say to others — "Speak louder; shout, for I am deaf!*'
Alas! how could I declare the feebleness of a sense
which I ought to possess even in greater perfection
than other men? I could not do it. Forgive me, then,
if you see me often retire, when I would fain be amongst
you. My calamity is doubly severe, because it con-
demns me to be misjudged. The delight of society,
cultivated conversation, reciprocal confidences, are for-
bidden to me. I must appear in society almost abso-
lutely insulated,and only when it is quite indispensable.
I must live an exile. "When I approach a circle, a
burning anxiety comes over me, lest I should run the
risk of discovering my condition. It was thus during
the past half- year which I passed in the country. What
was my humiliation when the person at my side listened
to a flute in the distance, or to the song of a peasant,
and I could hear neither! Such occurrences brought
me nearly to desperation : a little more,and I had ended
my life by my own hand. This only — this ai-t which I
love — restrained me. It seemed as though I could not
leave the world before I produced all that I felt I was
able to bring forth. . . . Almighty Power! thou
lookest into my inmost heart ; thou knowest that love
of my fellows, and the desire to do good, dwell there!
You, my brother men, who shall one day read this,
know that you have thought wrongly of me ; and that,
wretched as I am, it comforts me to feel that I have
yielded to none in doing — in spite of every natural im-
pediment — all that lay in my power to place myself in
the hst of worthy artists and good men!
To a picture so graphic and affecting, nothing
can be added by the biographer. We learn from
Ries that this care was so far successful that he was
not aware of the infirmity until after he had been
for some months under Beethoven's tuition.
It was in one of our walks in the country that he
gave me the first striking proof of his want of hearing
. — which had previously been named to me by Stephen
von Breuning. I called his attention to a shepherd,
who was playing in the w^ood, in a very graceful man-
ner, on a rude flute made of the elder tree. Beethoven
could not hear a note for more than half an hour ; and
although, at last, I assured him repeatedly that I had
ceased to distinguish the sound (which was the fact),
he became extraordinarily silent and gloomy.
From this period, 1800, the clouds began to gather
on all sides more darkly around him. The pulses
of that earthquake which convulsed Europe, had
already begun to vibrate throughout Germany; and
the arts, like scared birds, were about to fly from
the approaching storm. Beethoven was a declared
republican. " Plato's commonwealth was incorpo-
rated with his very being;" and at such a time, as
indeed throughout his Eifter life — this peculiarity
was another impediment to his worldly success in
the Austrian capital. He pursued the opening ca-
reer of Napoleon with the eagerest hope ; and had
composed his majestic Sinfonia Eroiea, as a tribute
to the First Consul, when the news of his procla-
mation as emperor reached Vienna; and the in-
tended dedication was thrown with disgust and
disappointment into the fire. Nor was he reconciled
to his former idol, until after his tragic end in St.
Helena had expiated, as he thought, the crime of
rising on the ruins of the republic. From the period
of the empire, he appears to have cared little for the
politics of the day — preserving, to the last, the sturdy
independence of his own opinions, which were, per-
haps, founded on little knowledge of real life, but
cannot be noticed without respect, as they deprived
liim of all chance of advancement, or advantage,
from the court — which, in Germany, is the chief
hope of the musical artist.
Without intending to attempt any catalogue of
his many works, we may here mention that his
grandest compositions begin to date from the com-
mencement of the new century : in 1800, we find
him busy with "The Mount of Olives," the Sym-
phonies began to appear in 1803; in the following
year, also, he commenced "Fidelio," which was
unfortunately represented, for the first time, duri'-if
the occupation of Vienna by the French in 1806;