[Illustration: ONE OF THE SEVERAL HOUSES IN VIENNA IN WHICH MOZART LIVED.]
One evening in July a strange man called on Mozart with a strange errand. He was tall, gaunt, haggard in face, solemn in demeanor: a fantastic apparition, dressed completely in grey, or, as some affirm in black; such a character as might have appeared to Hoffmann when in the black and dark night, surrounded by spirits of his own conjuring, he wrote wild tales. The visitor gravely handed him an anonymous letter sealed in black, which begged him to write a Requiem as soon as possible, and asked the price. Mozart named 50 ducats, some say 100; the visitor paid the sum, and as Mozart did not name the time for the completion of the work, the unknown man left him, saying, "I shall return, when it is time." The mystery has been solved. The stranger was Leutgeb, the steward of Count Franz von Walsegg of Stuppach; the Count was in the habit of ordering thus mysteriously compositions from different musicians; he would copy them and have them performed as his own; the requiem was ordered in memory of his late wife; and it was sung as Walsegg's work under his direction Dec. 14, 1793. But Mozart knew nothing of the patron or the steward, and he grew superstitious. In the middle of August he received a commission to write a festival opera for the celebration of the coronation of Leopold II. as King of Bohemia in Prague. The subject was Metastasio's "Clemenza di Tito." The music was written hurriedly and first performed Sept. 6. It was not successful; the Empress is said to have spoken bitterly concerning the _porcheria_ of German music. Just as he was stepping into the carriage for his journey to Prague, the thin and haggard man suddenly appeared and asked him what would become of the Requiem. Mozart made his excuses. "When will you be ready?" said Leutgeb. "I swear that I shall work on it unceasingly when I return." "Good," said the solemn stranger, "I rely on your promise." And as soon as the "Magic Flute" was completed and performed Mozart worked eagerly on the Requiem. He postponed his lessons, giving as an excuse that he had a work on hand which lay very near his heart, and until it was finished he could think of nothing else. He had become subject to fainting fits, and in Prague he was not at all well. He became gloomy and superstitious. He thought some one had poisoned him, and indeed, for a long time it was believed foolishly by some that Salieri had hastened his death. He told Constanze that he was writing the Requiem for himself. There was a slight improvement for a time, and Mozart worked on the Requiem, which had been taken away from him, and finished a Masonic cantata. The last of November his feet and hands began to swell; he vomited violently; and he was melancholy in mind. The 28th his condition was critical and his doctor consulted with the chief physician at the hospital. The "Magic Flute" was now successful; he was certain of an annual income of one thousand florins contributed by some of the Hungarian nobility; and of a larger sum each year from Amsterdam in return for the production of a few compositions exclusively for the subscribers; but it was too late. The day before his death he said to Constanze, "I should like to have heard my 'Magic Flute' once more," and he hummed feebly the bird-catcher's song. In the afternoon he had the Requiem brought to his bed, and he sang the alto part. At the first measures of the "Lacrimosa," he wept violently and laid the score aside. Mrs. Haible came in the evening and Mozart said, "I am glad you are here; stay with me to-night, and see me die." She tried to reason with him, and he answered. "I have the flavor of death on my tongue: I taste death. Who will support my dearest Constanze if you do not stay with her?" The story of his ending as told by Otto Jahn is most pathetic. Mrs. Haible went to the priests of St. Peter's and begged that one might be sent to Mozart, as if by chance. They refused for a long time, and it was with difficulty she persuaded "these clerical barbarians" to grant her request. When she returned, she found Süssmayer at Mozart's bedside, in earnest conversation over the Requiem. "Did I not say that I was writing the Requiem for myself?" said he looking at it through his tears. "And he was so convinced of his approaching death that he enjoined his wife to inform Albrechtsberger of it before it became generally known, in order that he might secure Mozart's place at the Stephanskirche, which belonged to him by every right." The physician finally came; he was found in the theatre, where he waited until the curtain fell. He saw there was no hope; cold bandages were applied to the head; and then came delirium and unconsciousness. Mozart was busy with his Requiem.