In summer the absent beloved returned, and her heart had happily changed. The village, the castle, the garden, all greeted her with the greatest joy. Roses and lilies, their colours glowing more brightly than ever, gazed up at her in rapture and modest humility, and all the bushes and trees waved her a welcome: but for one of them, alas, the noblest of them all, she had come too late. She found its crown withered, her fingers caressed its lifeless trunk and its dry rustling twigs. The tree no longer saw or recognized its protectress. How she wept, how tender a lament streamed from her lips and eyes!
From far off, Apollo hears his daughter’s voice. He comes, he approaches her, and looks with pity on her sorrow. At once he touches the tree with his all-healing hands: it trembles inwardly, the dry sap in its bark flows with new strength, already it puts forth young leaves and white blossoms cover it in ambrosial abundance. Yes – for what limits are there to the power of the gods? – beautiful round fruit appears, three times three oranges, the number of the nine Muses, the sisters of the god; they grow and grow, their childlike green turning to an ever deeper gold. Phoebus17– for so the poem ended –
Phoebus counts the fruit, he waters
At the mouth, and gazes long
At the precious tree, his daughter’s
Bridal gift. The god of song
Plucks an orange nectar-filled,
And divides it then and there:
‘Here’s a treat, my lovely child,
You and I and Love shall share!’
The poet’s audience rewarded him with a burst of rapturous applause, willingly overlooking his baroque conclusion which so completely nullified the heartfelt character of the piece as a whole.
Francesca, whose high-spirited native wit had already been stimulated more than once by conversational exchanges with her host or with Mozart, now seemed to recall by chance something she had forgotten, and hastened from the room: she returned with a large brown English engraving, glazed and framed, which had long hung unnoticed in a remote little study.
‘So,’ she exclaimed, setting up the picture at the end of the table, ‘what I’ve always been told must be true after all: that there’s nothing new under the sun! Here is a scene from the Golden Age, and haven’t we just relived it today? I certainly hope Apollo will recognize himself in this situation.’
‘Splendid!’ cried Max triumphantly. ‘Why, there he is, the beautiful god, in the very act of stooping pensively over the sacred waters. And not only that – look, don’t you see, an old satyr hiding back there in the bushes, spying on him! Upon my word, I believe Apollo’s just remembered a long forgotten little Arcadian dance, which Chiron18taught him to play on the zither when he was a child.’
‘And so it is! What else can it be!’ replied Francesca, applauding. She was standing behind Mozart, and turning to him she continued: ‘Don’t you also notice this branch loaded with fruit, hanging down to just within the god’s reach?’
‘Of course; it’s the olive-tree sacred to him.’
‘Not at all! Those are the finest oranges! He’s just about to pick one in a fit of distraction!’
‘On the contrary!’ exclaimed Mozart, ‘he’s just about to stop this mischievous mouth with a thousand kisses!’ So saying, he caught her by the arm and vowed he would not let her go again until she offered him her lips, which indeed she then did with little demur.
‘Please tell us, Max,’ said the Countess, ‘what is written here under the picture.’
‘It’s some lines from a famous ode by Horace. The Berlin poet Ramler has just translated it wonderfully for us. It’s quite inspired. How magnificent this one passage is:
… he who on his shoulder
Carries a bow that is never idle;
The Delos-born, who dwells in his Lycian woods
And native grove, and on Pataranian shores;
He who plunges his locks of gold deep
Into Castalian streams, Apollo.’19
‘Beautiful! Quite beautiful!’ said the Count. Just one or two points that need explaining. For instance, “… carries a bow that is never idle”. I suppose that must simply mean: who has always been a very hard-working fiddler. But by the way, my dear Mozart: you are sowing discord between two tender hearts.’
‘I hope not – how so?’
‘Eugenie is envious of her friend, and well she may be.’
‘Aha! You have noticed my weakness already. But what does the bridegroom say?’
‘I will turn a blind eye once or twice.’
‘Very well; we shall use our opportunity. But don’t be alarmed, Baron; there’s no danger, unless this god will lend me his features and his long yellow hair. I wish he would! In exchange he could have Mozart’s pigtail and its most handsome ribbon.’
‘But Apollo,’ laughed Francesca, ‘would then have to work out a seemly way of plunging his new French hairstyle into the Castalian stream.’
Amid these and similar pleasantries the general merriment and high spirits continued to increase. The men, as the wine flowed, warmed to the occasion; a number of healths were drunk, and Mozart, as was his habit, began speaking in verse. In this he was backed up by the Lieutenant, and the Count tried his hand as well, occasionally with remarkable success. But such trifles are lost in the retelling, and scarcely bear repetition: for the very thing that made them irresistible at the time and place, the general festive mood, the brilliance and joviality of personal expression in words and looks, is missing.
Among others, a toast in the master’s honour was proposed by the old lady, Francesca’s aunt, promising him a further long series of immortal works. ‘A la bonne heure, and amen to that!’ exclaimed Mozart, heartily clinking glasses with her. Whereupon the Count, with a powerful voice and accurate intonation, began an impromptu song of his own devising:
May the gods inspire his heart
To delightful works of art –
Max (continuing):
Of which Da Ponte and the clever
Schikaneder20 know nothing whatever –
Mozart:
Nor, God bless him, does the composer:
He should know, and he’s no wiser!
The Count:
As for that Italian fop
Signor Bonbonnière,21 the wop,
The arch-crook, let’s wish he
may Live on to hear them all one day!
Max:
May he live a hundred years, say I –
Mozart:
Or may the devil by that time fly –
All three (con forza):
Off with him and his works to we-know-
where,
Our sweet-toothed Monsieur Bonbonnière!
The Count had by now got so much into the way of singing that this improvised trio soon developed from a repetition of its last four lines into a so-called finite canon, and Francesca’s aunt had humour or self-assurance enough to join in with her frail soprano voice, adding a variety of suitable embellishments. Mozart promised afterwards that as soon as he had time he would elaborate this little jest into a musically correct composition, dedicated expressly to the present company; and this indeed he did later on after his return to Vienna.
Eugenie in the meantime had long been carefully studying her precious keepsake from the grove of the fierce Tiberius; the company now with one accord demanded to hear the duet sung by the composer and herself, and her uncle was happy at the chance to show off his voice again in the chorus. And so everyone rose from table and hastened into the big drawing-room next door where the piano stood.
Enchanted though everyone was by this exquisite piece, its very theme led them all, by an easy transition, to a high point of merrymaking at which the music as such was no longer of primary importance; and it was our friend himself who first gave the signal for this by jumping up from the piano, approaching Francesca, and as Max willingly reached for his violin, persuading her to dance a slow waltz with him. Their host was quick to extend a similar invitation to Mozart’s wife. In a trice the
servants, to make more room, had busily shifted all the movable furniture out of the way. By the end of it everyone had had to take their turn, and the old lady was by no means displeased when the gallant Lieutenant led her out to a minuet, indeed it had the effect of entirely rejuvenating her. Finally, as Mozart was dancing the last round with the bride-to-be, he was able to claim in full his promised right to her rosy lips.
Evening had fallen, the sun was about to set, and at last it was pleasant out of doors; the Countess therefore proposed to the ladies that they might like to take the air in the garden. The Count on the other hand invited the gentlemen to the billiard room, for it was well known that Mozart was very fond of the game. The company thus divided into two groups, and we for our part will follow the ladies.
After strolling up and down the main avenue once or twice they climbed a small rounded hill, half surrounded by a high vine-covered trellis, which offered a view of the open country, the village and the highroad. The last rays of the autumn sunlight were glowing red through the vines.
‘Would this not be a quiet and pleasant place to sit,’ said the Countess, ‘if Madame Mozart were willing to tell us something about herself and her husband?’
Constanze was quite willing to do so, and they all sat down very comfortably on chairs which had been drawn up and placed in a circle.
‘I will gladly oblige,’ she said, ‘with something you would have had to hear in any case, as I am planning a little jest in connection with it. I have taken it into my head to make the young Countess, as a happy memento of her betrothal day, a rather special kind of present, which is so far from being an object of luxury or fashion that only a knowledge of its history can make it halfway interesting.’
‘Whatever can it be, Eugenie?’ said Francesca. ‘I think it must be a certain famous man’s inkpot, at least.’
‘Not a bad guess! You will see the treasure very shortly, it’s packed in our trunk. Now I’ll tell you my story, which with your permission shall go back a little way.
‘The winter before last I was getting more and more worried about Mozart’s state of health: he was feverish, and increasingly irritable and frequently depressed. His spirits rose sometimes when he was in company, often higher than was really natural, but at home would mostly be turned in on himself, brooding and sighing and complaining. The doctor recommended a diet and Pyrmont water and country walks. The patient paid little attention to this good advice; such a cure was inconvenient and time-consuming and ran clean contrary to his daily routine. So then the doctor put the fear of God into him, gave him a long lecture on the properties and circulation of human blood and the little round things in it, and on breathing and phlogiston – a whole lot of things you never heard of; and on what nature’s intentions really are when we eat and drink and digest, which Mozart had been as innocent about until now as his little five-year-old son. And indeed, this lesson made a certain impression on him. The doctor had scarcely been gone half an hour when I found my husband in his room looking pensively but happily at a walking-stick, which he’d searched for in a cupboard among other old things and luckily found; I’d never have thought he’d even have remembered it. It had belonged once to my father – a fine cane with a big knob made of lapis lazuli. No one had ever seen Mozart with a walking-stick, and I couldn’t help laughing.
‘“You see,” he cried, “I’m just about to throw myself wholeheartedly into my cure. I shall drink that water, take some open-air exercise every day, and use this stick to do so. And I’ve had a few ideas in this connection. It’s not for nothing, I thought, that other people, respectable mature men, can’t do without a walking-stick. Our neighbour the Commercial Councillor never crosses the street to visit his old crony without taking his stick with him. Professional men and officials, lawyers, merchants and their clients – when they take a walk out of town with their families on a Sunday, every one of them’s accompanied by his well-used, honest cane. In particular I’ve often noticed those worthy citizens standing around in groups in front of St Stephen’s Cathedral, having a bit of a gossip just before the sermon and the Mass begin: you can see it very well there, you can see every one of their quiet virtues, their industry and orderliness and equable temper and contentment, leaning, half sitting, well propped up as it were on their trusty sticks. In short, there must be something of a blessing and a special consolation in this age-old habit, rather tasteless though I must say it is. Believe it or not, I can hardly wait for my first constitutional outing with this good companion, my first walk over the bridge to the Rennweg! We’ve made each other’s acquaintance now, and I hope we shall be partners for life.”
‘That partnership didn’t last long. From their third outing together he returned without his good companion. Another was purchased, which kept faith for a little while longer, and it was certainly to this fancy for walking-sticks that I gave much of the credit for the fact that for three weeks Mozart persevered tolerably well in following his doctor’s advice. And the consequent improvements were soon to be seen: we’d almost never known him so fresh, so cheerful and in such an equable temper. But alas, before long he went back to his old excesses, and I was in constant trouble with him about this. And then it happened that one evening, exhausted by the work of a busy day and when it was already late, he went out to a musical soirée to please a few inquisitive visitors – only for an hour, he vowed and swore to me. But it’s on those very occasions, once he’s settled at the piano and in the mood, that people most misuse his good nature; for there he sits, like the little man in a Montgolfier, hovering six miles above the earth where he can no longer hear bells chime. I sent our servant twice to him in the middle of the night, but it was no use, he couldn’t get to his master. So at last my husband came home at three in the morning. I made up my mind that I would be seriously cross with him for the rest of the day.’
Madame Mozart here passed over certain details in silence. The fact is that another of the guests at that soirée would in all likelihood have been a young singer, a certain Signora Malerbi, to whom Constanze had good reason to object. This lady from Rome had been appointed at the Opera thanks to Mozart’s intervention, and there was no doubt that it was largely by her coquettish wiles that she had won the master’s favour. Some even said that she had had him seriously in tow for several months and led him a terrible dance. Whether this was entirely true or much exaggerated, it is certain that she later behaved with great insolence and ingratitude and would even make mocking remarks about her benefactor. It was entirely typical of her that she once described him outright to one of her more fortunate admirers as un piccolo grifo raso, a shaven little pig-snout. This witticism, worthy of the arts of Circe, was all the more wounding for containing, it must be admitted, a modicum of truth.22
On his way home from that same soirée, at which as it happened the singer had in any case failed to appear, one of his friends, in a convivial moment, indiscreetly let fall to the master her malicious remark. Mozart did not take this in good part, for it was in fact the first clear proof he had had of the complete heartlessness of his protégée. In sheer indignation he did not at first even notice the chilly reception he was given at his wife’s bedside. Without pausing to think, he poured out his story of the insult, and from this candour it may no doubt be concluded that there was no great guilt on his conscience. She even felt rather sorry for him. But she had made up her mind, he was not to get away with it so easily. When he woke from a heavy sleep just after midday, he found that neither his little wife nor the two boys were at home, but that the table had been neatly laid for him with a solitary lunch.
Few things ever made Mozart so unhappy as when all was not going smoothly and well between him and his better half. And if only he had known what further burden of anxiety she had carried about with her for the last few days! It was indeed serious trouble, and as always she had been sparing him the knowledge of it for as long as possible. Their ready cash was all spent, and there was no immediate prospect of any further income.
Although he was unaware of this domestic crisis, his heart was nevertheless despondent in a way that seemed in keeping with her state of constriction and helplessness. He had no appetite and no wish to stay indoors. He at once got fully dressed, if only to escape from the stifling atmosphere of the house. He left an open note for her with a few lines written in Italian: ‘You have roundly rebuked me and it serves me right. But please, I beg you, forgive me, and be laughing again when I get back. I’ve a good mind to become a Carthusian and a Trappist; I promise you, I could cry my eyes out.’ And off he went, taking his hat but leaving his stick behind; it had served its turn.
Having taken over our narrative from Constanze up to this point, let us continue it in the same fashion a little further.
Leaving his lodging by the market and turning right towards the Civic Arsenal, our good friend sauntered – it was a warm, rather overcast summer afternoon – in a pensive and leisurely manner across the so-called Hof or Court Square and then past the parish church of Our Lady in the direction of the Schottentor; here he walked up the Moelkerbastei on his left on to the fortifications and thereby avoided meeting several acquaintances who were just entering the city. Although unmolested by a sentry who paced silently to and fro between the cannon, he paused here only briefly to enjoy the fine view across the green expanse of the glacis, beyond the suburbs to the Kahlenberg and southwards towards the Styrian Alps. The tranquil beauty of the natural scene was out of keeping with his inner state. With a sigh he continued his walk, along the esplanade and then through the Alser district, without any particular destination in mind.
At the end of the Währinger Gasse there was an inn with a skittle-alley; its landlord, a ropemaker, was well known to passing neighbours and countrymen for the fine quality both of his wares and of his wine. The sound of bowling could be heard, but with a dozen guests at most little else was going on. A scarcely conscious impulse to forget himself for a while among simple and natural people moved the composer to join this company. At one of the tables, which were partly shaded by trees, he sat down beside an inspector of wells from Vienna and two other worthy citizens, ordered a glass and joined with a will in their very commonplace conversation, from time to time rising to walk about or watch the game in the skittle-alley.
Mozart's Journey to Prague and a Selection of Poems Page 9