enture to express either verbally or in writing, for I am _too far
beneath you_, even if I _could_ or wished ever so ardently _to return like
for like_. May Heaven accept and listen with peculiar favor to my prayers
for Y.R.H.'s health. In the course of a few days I trust I shall myself
hear the masterpiece Y.R.H. has sent to me, and nothing will rejoice me
more than to assist Y.R.H. as early as possible, in taking the place
already prepared for you on Parnassus.

[K.]

[Footnote 1: The "dreadful occurrence" which took place in the end of 1818
in Beethoven's family cannot be discovered.]

260.

TO RIES.

Vienna, April [March?] 30, 1819.

DEAR RIES,--

I am only now able to answer your letter of December 18th. Your sympathy
does me good. It is impossible for me to go to London at present, being
involved here in various ways; but God will, I trust, aid me, and enable me
to visit London next winter, when I shall bring the new symphonies with me.

I every day expect the text for a new _oratorio_, which I am to write for
our Musical Society here, and no doubt it will be of use to us in London
also. Do what you can on my behalf, for I greatly need it. I should have
been glad to receive any commission from the Philharmonic, but Neate's
report of the all but failure of the three overtures vexed me much. Each in
its own style not only pleased here, but those in E flat major and C major
made a profound impression, so that the fate of those works at the
Philharmonic is quite incomprehensible to me.

You have no doubt received the arrangement of the Quintet [Op. 104, see No.
238] and the Sonata [Op. 106]. See that both, especially the Quintet, be
engraved without loss of time. There is no such hurry about the Sonata,
though I should like it to appear within two or three months. Never having
received the previous letter to which you allude, I had no scruple in
disposing of both works here; but for Germany only. It will be at any rate
three months before the Sonata appears here, but you must make haste with
the Quintet. As soon as you forward me a check for the money, I will send
an authority to the publisher, securing him the exclusive right to these
works for England, Scotland, Ireland, France, &c., &c.

You shall receive by the next post the _Tempi_ of the Sonata marked in
accordance with Maelzel's metronome. Prince Paul Esterhazy's courier, De
Smidt, took the Quintet and the Sonata with him. You shall also have my
p