I live in entire quiet and solitude, and even though occasional flashes of light arouse me, still since you all left this I feel a hopeless void which even my art, usually so faithful to me, has not yet triumphed over.  Your pianoforte is ordered, and you shall soon have it.  What a difference you must have discovered between the treatment of the theme I extemporized on the other evening and the mode in which I have recently written it out for you?  You must explain this yourself, only do not find the solution in the punch!  How happy you are to get away so soon to the country!  I cannot enjoy this luxury till the 8th.  I look forward to it with the delight of a child.  What happiness I shall feel in wandering among groves and woods, and among trees, and plants, and rocks!  No man on earth can love the country as I do!  Thickets, trees, and rocks supply the echo man longs for!

You shall soon receive some more of my compositions, which will not cause you to complain so much of difficulties.  Have you read Goethe’s “Wilhelm Meister,” and Schlegel’s “Translations of Shakspeare”?  People have so much leisure in the country, that perhaps you would like me to send you these works?  It happens that I have an acquaintance in your neighborhood; so perhaps you may see me some morning early for half an hour, after which I must be off again.  You will also observe that I intend to bore you for as short a time as possible.[1]

Commend me to the regard of your father and mother, though I have as yet no right to claim it.  Remember me also to your cousin M. [Mathilde].  Farewell, my esteemed Therese; I wish you all the good and charm that life can offer.  Think of me kindly, and forget my follies.  Rest assured that no one would more rejoice to hear of your happiness, even were you to feel no interest in your devoted servant and friend,

BEETHOVEN.

N.B.  It would be very amiable in you to write me a few lines, to say if I can be of any use to you here.

[Footnote 1:  Herr v.  Malfatti Rohrenbach, nephew of the renowned physician who was so prominent in Beethoven’s last illness, lately related to me in Vienna as follows:—­Beethoven went to pay a visit to young Frau Therese, Baroness Drossdick, at Moedling, but not finding her at home, he tore a sheet of music-paper out of a book, and wrote some music to a verse of Matthisson’s, and on the other side, inscribed, in large letters, “To my dear Therese.”  The “Mathilde” mentioned farther on was, according to Baermann, a Baroness Gleichenstein. [See No. 45.]]

62.

A MDLLE.  MDLLE.  DE GERARDI.[1]

DEAR MDLLE.  G.,—­