the several
propositions made me, not only from Europe, but even North America, and
thus my finances might again prosper."

His naive reference to this country[D] refers to the offer made him by
the Haendel and Haydn Society of Boston for an oratorio, the text of
which was to be furnished by them. His work on the Ninth Symphony
prevented him from accepting it, but it is something that will always
redound to the credit of the society. That the critical faculty should,
already at that time, have been sufficiently well developed in this
country as to lead to such a commission, augurs well for its future
art-history. While one portion were engaged in subduing the wilderness,
fighting Indians, extending the frontier, others were already reaching
out for the highest and best in art and literature.[E] It is a pleasant
reflection that this country is no longer the terra incognita in musical
matters that it was in Beethoven's time. The ready recognition extended
Wagner from the first here, has, no doubt, helped to bring this about.

[D] When writing this letter Beethoven could have had no prevision that
in this aboriginal North America, in a little village called Natick,
there was then living a five-year-old boy, answering to the name of
Alexander W. Thayer, who was eventually to furnish a biography of the
master, so painstaking, exact and voluminous, that it is unique in its
class. The Beethoven biography was Thayer's life-work, to which he
gladly sacrificed his means as well, and was then only brought down to
the year 1816. Thayer's name will always be associated with that of
Beethoven, it is such a record-making work. It is published only in
German at this writing (1904), but an English translation is promised on
completion of the second edition, one volume of which has appeared in
1902. Mr. Thayer died in 1897.

[E] That Beethoven's genius had at an early date impressed itself on the
minds of Americans, was commented on by Margaret Fuller in 1841. She
says:

"It is observable as an earnest of the great future which opens for this
country, that such a genius (Beethoven) is so easily and so much
appreciated here, by those who have not gone through the steps that
prepared the way for him in Europe. He is felt because he expressed in
full tones the thoughts that lie at the heart of our own existence,
though we have not found means to stammer them as yet."

Meanwhile Ries, in London, was making active propaganda for him, wit