to express himself, and hoping that by some miracle of inspiration
something like music might come out of it. "I thought it must be all
right if the paper was nice and full," he said. He even went the length
of trying to write a mass in sixteen parts--an effort which Reutter
rewarded with a shrug and a sneer, and the sarcastic suggestion that for
the present two parts might be deemed sufficient, and that he had better
perfect his copying of music before trying to compose it. But Haydn was
not to be snubbed and snuffed out in this way. He appealed to his father
for money to buy some theory books. There was not too much money at
Rohrau, we may be sure, for the family was always increasing, and petty
economies were necessary. But the wheelwright managed to send the boy
six florins, and that sum was immediately expended on Fux's Gradus
ad Parnassum and Mattheson's Volkommener Capellmeister--heavy, dry
treatises both, which have long since gone to the musical antiquary's
top shelf among the dust and the cobwebs. These "dull and verbose
dampers to enthusiasm" Haydn made his constant companions, in default of
a living instructor, and, like Longfellow's "great men," toiled upwards
in the night, while less industrious mortals snored.

Juvenile Escapades

Meanwhile his native exuberance and cheerfulness of soul were
irrepressible. Several stories are told of the schoolboy escapades he
enjoyed with his fellow choristers. One will suffice here. He used to
boast that he had sung with success at Court as well as in St Stephen's.
This meant that he had made one of the choir when visits were paid to
the Palace of Schonbrunn, where the Empress Maria and her Court resided.
On the occasion of one of these visits the palace was in the hands of
the builders, and the scaffolding presented the usual temptation to the
youngsters. "The empress," to quote Pohl, "had caught them climbing it
many a time, but her threats and prohibitions had no effect. One day
when Haydn was balancing himself aloft, far above his schoolfellows,
the empress saw him from the windows, and requested her Hofcompositor to
take care that 'that fair-headed blockhead,' the ringleader of them all,
got 'einen recenten Schilling' (slang for 'a good hiding')." The command
was only too willingly obeyed by the obsequious Reutter, who by this
time had been ennobled, and rejoiced in the addition of "von" to his
name. Many years afterwards, when the empress was on a visit to Prince