BEETHOVEN 200 YEARS AGO TODAY: Sunday, December 4, 1825
Conversation Book 99 begins being used today. This is a book comprised of 26 leaves, with writing on every page. Dates can firmly be assigned to December 8 and 11 of 1825, and the others are approximations. This book is used for roughly ten days during December. It’s possible that it was used concurrently with the now dismembered and lost conversation book, a few pages of which survive in the Bonn Beethovenhaus as part of the collection of pages BH 53. Those leaves will be addressed at the times that they seem appropriate.
Nephew Karl visits Uncle Ludwig today, as he usually does on Sunday afternoons. He went to see Theresia Adelmann, who was briefly Beethoven’s housekeeper, to find out what had happened. He says he reproached her for leaving so suddenly, and she answered that Ludwig had come home towards 12:30 the night before and made the most serious accusations against her, that she was cooking with bacon, etc., etc. “She could not sleep at all because of it and that was the reason [she ran away] since she was afraid that you would be even worse” when she encountered him in the morning. In any event, she is back in the position, apparently brought there by Karl.
Ludwig tries to justify himself in that she was cooking things in butter rather than lard. Karl is having none of that. “The difference in the price between butter and lard is really so insignificant that one can easily make everything with butter. Often the lard is even more expensive.”
Karl changes the subject to his uncle’s music. “I well know that there are several chatterers who want to show off by saying that your music is difficult to comprehend, so that the people will admire their acumen. Among them is Herr St. von Felsburg.”
Frau Adelmann asks for the bread money. She will buy the folding screen [it is unclear whether this screen is for Beethoven, or for herself so she can sleep in the kitchen instead of with the maid]. But she initially says she will do it Tuesday, not today.
The dinner is freshly roasted. Karl thinks it is the local style of cooking that she is used to and from which she cannot deviate.
Karl brings up an anecdote about the late Emperor Joseph II (1741-1790), in whose honor Uncle Ludwig had written a cantata some 35 years earlier. “Three years before his death, Emperor Joseph, along with the present Emperor [Franz], was supposed to have gone to see a nun who had the reputation for telling fortunes, and they asked how much longer he would live. She gave him a pencil and asked him to make strokes on a sheet of paper. After the third stroke, the pencil broke. Therefore she said that he would die in 3 years, which is what happened. Our [present] emperor, who at that time was still very young, also wanted to know how many years of life that he had left. He then made a lot of strokes with the same pencil. Finally, after I don’t know how many, the tip broke again. A while ago, he was said to have remembered this and was supposed to have said now he would not last much longer.”
Ludwig gives Frau Adelmann money, and she says she will go directly and get a used folding screen now. But she either does not go out, or she is unsuccessful looking for one as she will buy one tomorrow.
After dinner, the Beethovens visit a tailor (or one comes to the apartment). He asks whether the trousers [probably for Karl] are not too large, and maybe they should have a little taken off below. Ludwig wants to settle up the bill, but the tailor puts him off, until the Spencer short jacket that he is making for Karl is fitted properly.
Conversation Book 99, 1r-3v.