Beethoven was about twenty-five years of age, he began to be afflicted with a complaint, which of all others, must have been most distressing to a musician. We refer to his deafness, which in after years became a dreadful disease, and rendered him inexpressibly wretched. In the autumn of 1802, Beethoven set about the execution of a grand instrumental work in honor of Napoleon, for whose character he had conceived a high admiration. In his political sentiments, he was strictly republican, and he believed that Napoleon had no other design than to place France on a republican basis. In 1804, he finished that gigantic composition known by the name of the "Sinfonia Eroica," a fair copy of which, with a dedication to the First Consul of the French Republic, was on the point of being sent to Paris; when news arrived that Napoleon had caused himself to be proclaimed Emperor of the French. Beethoven instantly on hearing this intelligence, tore off the title page of the symphony, and flung the work upon the floor with a torrent of execrations against the "new tyrant." It was not till the death of Napoleon at St. Helena, that he could forgive him for being Emperor. He was in the habit of conducting almost all his greater works himself, on their first performance; but his success as a music director was indifferent. With his fiery temper, he was perpetually embroiling himself in altercations with the musicians, and at length his increasing deafness rendered it impossible for him to lead an orchestra.

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In his domestic affairs, he presents to us a sorry picture. resided in any one place more than a few weeks. The these constant changes, were generally extremely trivial. A wrong exposure to his apartment, a fancied defect in the water, were enough to send him packing over the city in search of new lodgings. Much of the time he had neither a decent coat nor a whole shirt. The most perfect confusion reigned in his rooms. Books, music, bottles, proof-sheets, letters, here the scribbled hints of a noble symphony, and there a goodly Stracchino cheese, lay strown in every direction. And yet he was perpetually eulogizing his own neatness and love of order.

Beethoven was educated in the Catholic religion. He appears, however, to have inclined rather to a kind of philosophic deism, or natural religion. A striking peculiarity in his character was, that he scarcely ever conversed on religion, or expressed any opinion in regard to the creeds of different sects. Indeed there were two subjects. of conversation which he carefully avoided, namely: thorough bass

and religion. Both he declared were exhausted themes, and admitted of no farther discussion. In the year 1814, the allied Sovereigns met in congress at Vienna. Crowds of distinguished foreigners visited Beethoven, and the Sovereign in the realm of harmony, received the united homage of kings and nobles. Though at all times he was blunt in his manners, and often rude and uncivil; yet he appears not to have lacked in natural kindness of disposition. To his intimate friends, to those who appreciated his character, and humored his peculiarities, he was uniformly kind and gentle. Neglected as had been his early education, soured as his temper was by the unkindness of his brothers, who suffered him often to want the common necessaries of life, and endowed with a temperament of extreme sensitiveness, it is not to be wondered at, that he shrunk with disgust from contact with common, vulgar men Nothing vexed him so much as to be flattered and fawned upon. He was once invited to take up his residence in a beautiful villa, belonging to the Baron Von Pronay, where he had assigned to him a fine suite of apartments. Charmed as he was at first with his new abode, yet he soon took a dislike to the place; and for no other reason, than because the Baron, whenever he met him was continually making profound obeisances to him. Beethoven was very fond of seating himself in the dusk of the evening, at the piano-forte, to improvise; but his playing, especially in the latter years of his life, was most painful to those who heard it. Sometimes he would lay his left hand flat on the key board, and thus drown in discordant noise the music, to which he was giving utterance with his right. Especially disagreeable was it to hear him improvise on the violin, owing to his inability to tune the instrument. The music which he thus produced was frightful, though to his own mind, it was all pure and harmonious. When engaged in composing, his actions were extremely singular. Often in a fit of complete abstraction, he would go to the wash basin, and dabble in the water, till his clothes were entirely wet through; all the while humming and roaring, for sing he could not. Then with his eyes frightfully distended, he would pace the room, jotting down at intervals his sublime conceptions, and again he would dabble and hum. We quote entire from Mr. Moscheles' book, one or two characteristic anecdotes.

"When Beethoven was playing with me at Count Brown's his three marches for two performers, P was carrying on a loud and merry conversation, with a beautiful young lady. Beethoven made several attempts to silence them, without

success, when suddenly, and in the midst of playing, he jumped up and said loud enough to be heard by every body present, I do not play for such swine.' The music accordingly ceased to the vexation of all."

"Beethoven was at all times exceedingly passionate. One day when I dined with him at the "Swan," the waiter brought him a wrong dish. Beethoven had no sooner uttered a few words of reproof, (to which the other retorted in no very polite manner,) then he took the dish, amply filled with the gravy of the stewed beef it contained, and threw it at the waiter's head. Those who know the dexterity of Viennese waiters in carrying at the same time, several plates full of different viands, will conceive the distress of the poor man who could not move his arms, while the gravy trickled down his face. Both he and Beethoven swore and shouted, while all the spectators roared with laughter. At last Beethoven himself joined the chorus, on looking at the waiter, who was licking in with his tongue, the gravy which bedewed his countenance. The picture was worthy a Hogarth.”

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"Beethoven should by no means be offered as a model for directors of orchesThe performers under him were obliged cautiously to avoid being led astray by their conductor, who thought only of his composition, and constantly labored to depict the exact expression required, by the most varied gesticulations. Thus when the passage was loud, he often beat time downwards, when his hand should have been up. A diminuendo he was in the habit of making, by contracting his person, making himself smaller, and when a pianisimo occurred, he seemed to slink beneath the conductors desk As the sounds increased in loudness, so did he gradually rise up, as if out of an abyss; and when the full force of the united instruments broke upon the ear, raising himself on tip-toe, he looked of gigantic stature, and with both his arms floating about, seemed as if he would soar to the clouds."

"If in playing to him, I made a mistake in passages, or if I happened to strike a wrong note, where he required a peculiarly accentuated one, he seldom said anything; but if I showed any want of expression, if I omitted a crescendo, or if I did not succeed in rendering the character of the piece, he became incensed; the former he said, was chance; but the latter, want of knowledge, of feeling, of attention. Indeed he himself might often be reproached with the former defect, even when playing in public."

His personal appearance is thus described:

"Beethoven's height scarcely exceeded five feet four inches. His figure was compact, strong, and muscular. His head, which was unusually large, was covered with long bushy grey hair, which being always in a state of disorder gave a certain wildness to his appearance. His forehead was high and expanded; and he had small brown eyes, which, when he laughed, seemed to be nearly sunk in his head; but on the other hand, they were suddenly distended to an unusually large size, when one of his musical ideas took possession of his mind. On such occasions he would look upwards, his eyes rolling and flashing brightly, or straight forward, with his eye-balls fixed and motionless. There was an air of inspiration and dignity in his aspect; and his diminutive figure seemed to tower to the gigantic proportions of his mind."

Beethoven died on the 26th of March, 1827, in the 57th year of his age. In viewing his character both as an artist, and as a man, we see nothing but originality, of the most strange and startling kind. He introduced a new era in the musical world. At first, many of his works appear, repulsive rather than attractive. They require long and patient study before they can be appreciated. The shrill dissonances, the bold modulations, at first, appear to us strange and incomprehensible; but at length, we learn to love and wonder at them. The "gnome-like pleasantries," the stormy, chaotic masses of sound, first amaze, and then entrance us, as we catch the inspiration, and feel the rush of emotions, called forth by the sublime harmony of the master spirit.

BEAUTY has an enchanting power. Wherever man sees it, he bows and worships. No heart is so insensible as not to feel a thrill of rapture when Beauty waves her majestic wand, and calls up before the vision, the glowing pictures which exhibit her own loveliness. We admire the nodding lily that blooms in the valley, the gold-tinged cloud that floats along the evening sky, the symmetry of the human form; but we stop not here in our admiration. Nature's are the most perfect specimens of skill and beauty, yet we delight to look upon man's attempt to surpass her wondrous glories, or to imitate what she has wrought out to perfection. We yield, then, homage to the beautiful, both in nature and in art. Universal experience declares that the very constitution of the mind requires it.

Homer is remembered for his immortal songs; Plato for his comprehensive philosophy; yet we forget not Pythagoras and Socrates, though they left no written traces of their being, to the world. So is it with the Painters, the Architects, the Sculptors, who inscribed their names centuries since, on the imperishable roll of fame. There may be no vestige left of their works, on which we may gaze and wonder, yet as long as Antiquity sends forth her voice in praise of her depart

ed sons, so long shall there be some to embalm these heroes in their memory, and to draw forth instructive lessons from their successful life.

The scholar's mind is moulded by the works he studies. The dead still speak to him and fasten their own impress on his character. Poets and philosophers may have more power to fashion the youthful mind, than they who chisel out the rough marble, or paint upon the glowing canvass the lineaments of perfect excellence and beauty, but still Apelles, and Phidias, and Zeuxis fail not yet to influence the enlightened world.

The student of their classic age feels his soul fired within him and waking up to glorious action, when he learns that Alexander would allow no one to paint him for immortality but Apelles, and none but Lysippus to cut him out from the eternal rock. He beholds Parrhasius at the Olympic games arrayed in his purple robes, and decked with a garland of gold; he sees a king of Bithynia offering to discharge an immense public debt, for the Venus of Praxiteles; and it is such a sight, though it be imaginary, which elevates his conceptions, and makes him earnest in his efforts to secure for himself equal re

nown.

The painting may have lost its color, the well-wrought marble have crumbled into dust; yet we know that they once drew forth the astonishment and admiration of tasteful and critical minds, and hence they still speak out

Two questions arise:

1. What were the causes of the wonderful development of art among the Grecian people?

2. Should Americans emulate their bright achievements?

In giving an answer to the first of these questions, it may be remarked that they did not, as some have supposed, derive their extraordinary skill from the Egyptians. Their first rough-hewn ideas of image-work may have been transported across the sea from the land of colossal beetles and flat-nosed sphinxes; or they may have acquired them from Phoenician artists. To the latter source we may attribute but very little of their knowledge; but Egypt poured forth her treasures, like her own mighty Nile, to beautify and enrich all Europe. Greece partook of her munificence and the more ancient performan