engagements in this respect. She,
in short, did for Beethoven what Madame Boehme did for Goethe many years
before, when the poet left his native Frankfort and came to Leipsic. He
was but sixteen, and found in her a friend, counsellor, almost a mother,
who not only instructed him about dress and deportment, which soon
enabled him to obliterate his provincialism, but showed a motherly
solicitude for him, which must have been of great help to him in many
ways.

Madame von Breuning interested Beethoven in the classics, as well as in
contemporary philosophical literature. Lessing, Goethe and Schiller
became favorite authors with him. A much-thumbed translation of
Shakespeare was a valued part of his small library in after years. He
devoted much study to Homer and to Plato. Beethoven left school at the
age of thirteen, and could not have given much time to his studies even
when at school, as so much was required of him in his music. He learned
a little--a very little, of French, also some Latin and Italian, and
made up for his deficiencies by studying at home. Intellectual gifts
were valued by the Von Breunings; to the youth, in his formative period,
association with people like these was an education in itself.

About this time the Elector enlarged the sphere of his musical
operations by establishing a national opera at Bonn, modeled after the
one maintained by his imperial brother at Vienna. The works were
produced on a good scale, and some excellent singers were engaged.
Beethoven was appointed to play the viola, and this connection with the
orchestra was of inestimable value to him in many ways. It not only gave
him a knowledge of orchestration; it also made him familiar with the
noted operas, which must have been greatly enjoyed by him. Mozart's
operas were given a prominent place in the _repertoire_, and many others
that were noteworthy were introduced. But it was not opera alone which
was being performed; the drama was also represented, and his connection
with the orchestra gave him an intimate acquaintance with the
masterpieces of literature, which greatly influenced his subsequent
career. The tragedies of Shakespeare were occasionally produced, special
prominence, however, being given to the works of the great Germans,
Lessing, Schiller and other philosophers and poets of the Fatherland,
the exalted sentiments and pure intellectuality of which are unmatched
by any people. This early acquaintance with the best litera