wrote in 1818, "I am almost reduced to beggary, and I am obliged to pretend that I do not lack necessities"; and at another time, "The Sonata Op. 106 has been written under pressing circumstances. It is a hard thing to have to work for bread." Spohr says that often he could not go out on account of his worn-out shoes. He owed large debts to his publishers and his compositions did not bring him in anything. The Mass in D, published by subscription, obtained only seven subscribers (of whom not one was a musician).[1] He received barely thirty or forty ducats for his fine Sonatas, each one of which cost him three months' work. The Quartets, Opp. 127, 130, and 132, amongst his profoundest works, which seem to be written with his very heart-blood, were written for Prince Galitzin, who neglected to pay for them. Beethoven was worn out with domestic difficulties, and with endless law suits to obtain the pensions owing to him or to retain the guardianship of a nephew, the son of his brother Carl, who died of consumption in 1815.
He had bestowed on this child all the care and devotion with which his heart overflowed. But he was repaid with cruel suffering. It seemed that a kind of special fate had taken care to renew ceaselessly and to accumulate his miseries in order that his genius should not lack for food. At first he
- ↑ Beethoven had written personally to Cherubini, who was "of all his contemporaries the one whom he most esteemed." Cherubini did not reply.
