Yours truly,
LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN.
[Footnote 1: The “Queen of the Night” was the name given to Carl’s mother by Beethoven. She was a person of great levity of conduct and bad reputation, and every effort was made by Beethoven to withdraw her son from her influence, on which account he at once removed him from her care, and placed him in this institution. She consequently appealed to the law against him,—the first step in a long course of legal proceedings of the most painful nature.]
173.
TO G. DEL RIO.[1]
1816.
I send you, dear sir, the cloak, and also a school-book of my Carl’s, and request you will make out a list of his clothes and effects, that I may have it copied for myself, being obliged, as his guardian, to look carefully after his property. I intend to call for Carl to-morrow about half-past twelve o’clock, to take him to a little concert, and wish him to dine with me afterwards, and shall bring him back myself. With respect to his mother, I desire that under the pretext of the boy being so busy, you will not let her see him; no man on earth can know or judge of this matter better than myself, and by any other line of conduct all my well-matured plans for the welfare of the child might be materially injured. I will myself discuss with you when the mother is henceforth to have access to Carl, for I am anxious on every account to prevent the occurrence of yesterday ever being repeated. I take all the responsibility on myself; indeed, so far as I am concerned, the Court conferred on me full powers, and the authority at once to counteract anything adverse to the welfare of the boy. If they could have looked on her in the light of an estimable mother, they assuredly would not have excluded her from the guardianship of her child. Whatever she may think fit to assert, nothing has been done in a clandestine manner against her. There was but one voice in the whole council on the subject. I hope to have no further trouble in this matter, for the burden is already heavy enough.
From a conversation I had yesterday with Adlersburg [his lawyer], it would appear that a long time must yet elapse before the Court can decide what really belongs to the child. In addition to all these anxieties am I also to endure a persecution such as I have recently experienced, and from which I thought I was entirely rescued by your Institution? Farewell!
I am, with esteem, your obedient
L. V. BEETHOVEN.
[Footnote 1: Beethoven’s arbitrary authority had been previously sanctioned by a decree of the Court, and the mother deprived of all power over her son.]
174.
TO FERDINAND RIES,—LONDON.
Vienna, March 8, 1816.