At all events, his delay in Vienna after coming from Nuremberg was short and was doubtless occupied with the last corrections of the Sonatas, Op. 2, dedicated to Haydn, the six Menuets (second part), the Variations on the theme from “Le Nozze disturbate” and those on “Nel cor più non mi sento,” all of which works are advertised in the “Wiener Zeitung” in the course of the next two months, while their author was again in Prague or cities farther North. For the following letter we are indebted to Madame van Beethoven, widow of the composer’s nephew, Carl:
to be delivered at the apothecary shop at the Kärnthner Thor Mr. von Z.[77] will please hand this letter to the wig-maker who will care for its delivery.
So that you may at least know where I am and what I am doing I must needs write you. In the first place I am getting on well--very well. My art wins for me friends and respect; what more do I want? This time, too, I shall earn considerable money. I shall remain here a few weeks more and then go to Dresden, Leipsic and Berlin. It will probably be six weeks before I shall return. I hope that you will be more and more pleased with your sojourn in Vienna; but beware of the whole guild of wicked women. Have you yet called on Cousin Elss? You might write to me at this place if you have inclination and time.
F. Linowsky will probably soon return to Vienna; he has already gone from here. If you need money you may go to him boldly, for he still owes me some.
For the rest I hope that your life will grow continually in happiness and to that end I hope to contribute something. Farewell, dear brother, and think occasionally of
Your true, faithful brother L. Beethoven.
Greetings to Brother Caspar. My address is The Golden Unicorn on the Kleinseite.
A debt of gratitude is certainly due Johann van Beethoven for having carefully preserved this letter for full half a century and leaving it to his heirs, notwithstanding all the troubles which afterwards arose between the brothers, since it is hardly more valuable and interesting for the facts which it states directly than for what it indicates and suggests more or less clearly.
It, with other considerations, render it well nigh certain that Beethoven had now come to Prague with Prince Lichnowsky as Mozart had done, seven years before, and that upon leaving Vienna he had had no intention of pursuing his journey farther; but encouraged by the success thus reported to his brother, he suddenly determined to seek instruction and experience, pleasure, profit and fame in an extended tour. Had he projected this journey already in Vienna, how could all recollection of it have been lost by Wegeler? How could von Breuning in the letter cited above have omitted all mention of it? Nor is it possible to think that Beethoven, still so young and still so unknown outside the Austrian and Bohemian capitals, having so many powerful and influential friends there, and there only, could at this time have gone forth to seek elsewhere some permanent position with a fixed salary. The remarks which have been preserved, made by him in writing or conversation, expressing a desire for such an appointment, all belong to a later period, and cannot by any torture of language be made to refer to this, when he was looking into the future with well-grounded hopes and serene confidence of advancement in his new home. Vienna seemed to offer him all his ambition could crave; why should he seek his fortune beyond her walls?