147.

WRITTEN IN SPOHR'S ALBUM.[1]

Vienna, March 3, 1815.

[Music: Treble clef, F Major, 3/4 time.
Kurz, kurz, kurz, kurz ist der Schmerz, der Schmerz,
e-wig, e-wig ist die Freu-de, ist die Freu-de,
ja die Freu-de, e-wig ist die Freu-de.
Kurz, kurz, kurz, kurz ist der Schmerz, der Schmerz, der Schmerz,
e-wig, e-wig ist die Freu-de, ist die Freu-de,
e-wig ist die Freude, e-wig, e-wig ist die Freu-de.
Kurz, kurz, kurz, kurz ist der Schmerz, der Schmerz, der Schmerz,
e-wig, e-wig ist die Freude, e-wig ist die Freu-de.]

Whenever, dear Spohr, you chance to find true art and true artists, may you
kindly remember

Your friend,

LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN.

[Footnote 1: From the fac-simile in Spohr's _Autobiography_, Vol. I.]

148.

TO HERR KAUKA.

Vienna, April 8, 1815.

It seems scarcely admissible to be on the friendly terms on which I
consider myself with you, and yet to be on such unfriendly ones that we
should live close to each other and never meet!!!!![1] You write "_tout a
vous_." Oh! you humbug! said I. No! no! it is really too bad. I should like
to thank you 9000 times for all your efforts on my behalf, and to reproach
you 20,000 that you came and went as you did. So all is a delusion!
friendship, kingdom, empire; all is only a vapor which every breeze wafts
into a different form!! Perhaps I may go to Toeplitz, but it is not certain.
I might take advantage of that opportunity to let the people of Prague hear
something--what think you? if _indeed you still think of me at all_! As the
affair with Lobkowitz is now also come to a close, we may write _Finis_,
though it far from _fine is_ for me.

Baron Pasqualati will no doubt soon call on you again; he also has taken
much trouble on my account. Yes, indeed! it is easy to talk of _justice_,
but to obtain it from others is _no easy matter_. In what way can I be of
service to you in my own art? Say whether you prefer my celebrating the
monologue of a fugitive king, or the perjury of a usurper--or the true
friends, who, though near neighbors, never saw each other? In the hope of
soon hearing from you--for being now so far asunder it is easier to hold
intercourse than when nearer!--I remain, with highest esteem,

Your ever-devoted friend,

LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN.

[Footnote 1: Kauka evidently had been recently in Vienna without visiting
Beethoven.]

149.

TO HERR KAUKA.

1815.

MY DEAR AND WORTHY K.,--

I have just received from the Syndic Baier