nowsky and was a
cultivated man whose greatest delight was music. He lived in great state
in a palace, then on the outskirts of Vienna, now used as the Geological
Institute. He was closely identified with the musical life of Vienna,
and shortly after these quartets appeared, formed a string quartet of
distinguished musicians, which he maintained for many years, taking the
part of second violin himself. It is almost needless to state that
Beethoven's work took precedence in the repertoire.

The first of the three quartets, the one in F, has an Adagio movement on
which Beethoven inscribed in the sketch-book, "Eine Trauerweide oder
Akazienbaum aufs Grab meines Bruders." [A weeping willow or acacia tree
over my brother's grave.] Beethoven had indeed lost an infant brother
twenty-three years before this event, but it is not likely that he was
thus tardily commemorating him. His brother Kaspar Karl was married the
day before this quartet was begun and it is probably a humorous allusion
to that circumstance. But if his brother's marriage was an occasion for
humor at the beginning, it lapsed afterward into the sternest tragedy in
its effect on the master's life, as will be seen further on in these
pages.

These quartets are monuments to Beethoven's genius and are classed among
the best examples of chamber-music. The Adagio of the second one was
thought out by Beethoven one night while contemplating the stars.
Somewhat of the infinite calm and serenity of his mood is imparted to
it. The incident is related by Czerny to whom it was related by
Beethoven himself. The quartets were generally disliked and condemned by
musicians when first produced. Cherubini said that they made him sneeze.
Others said that Beethoven was music-mad, that they could not be called
music, that they were too difficult, unintelligible, and so on. That was
close onto a century ago, and they are still unintelligible to some, but
we now know that this is not the fault of the quartets as was so naively
assumed at that time. The condemnation of them by the performers has a
show of reason in it as they taxed their capacity too severely. Wagner
had the same thing to contend with for the same reason.

After the withdrawal of Fidelio, noted in the last chapter, and with the
advent of summer, Beethoven left Vienna on a visit to Count Brunswick,
at his seat in Hungary. The Count was a man of exceptional intellectual
ability, who had the greatest reverence and admira