266 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



his youth told of how they had seen the boy standing on a stool before 

 the piano, crying, as he practised. Pfeiffer, a teacher who lived with 

 the family, after coming home with the father late at night from the 

 tavern, frequently took young Ludwig out of bed, and kept him prac- 

 tising until morning. 



In later youth, as events in the family produced their influence and 

 as his mind began to go out into the realm of the spirit, he became quiet 

 and reserved. He is described as a boy, as being short in stature, but 

 muscular, "awkward, and with a snub nose." 



With many conditions, including poverty, to depress his soul, and 

 with apparently little to aid in his bodily unfolding, he nevertheless 

 developed into a tremendously vigorous man — " the very image of 

 strength," with a constitution that defied the attacks of disease and the 

 influence of mental depression, for fifty-seven years." 



As early as his seventeenth year he mentions being "troubled with 

 asthma," which he feared would " lead to consumption." Very naturally 

 he thought of such a termination since his mother died in this year. 

 " I also suffer from melancholy which for me is almost as great an evil 

 as my illness itself." Evidently it was his nature to be brave and 

 buoyant, and it was this attitude toward life which constantly finds 

 expression in his music. There is nothing sickly in his art. 



But asthma was but the least of the dark demons of disease that came 

 to dwell with him. At about the same time he had already begun to 

 have symptoms of a depressing malady of the digestive organs which 

 finally brought about his dissolution. 



Worst of all, and before he was twenty-eight, there came the affection 

 of the ears which speedily brought about deafness, the most trying of 

 all his ailments. Already at this age this disease had so progressed that 

 he was in mortal dread lest his infirmity be observed. After three more 

 years he " found himself unable to hear the pipe of a peasant played at a 

 short distance in the open air." His genius was fairly unfolding itself 

 and was receiving the recognition of his contemporaries. And to be 

 rapidly growing deaf ! It is not to be wondered at that his melancholy 

 became profound, and that only deep religious conviction and his ability 

 to live in the glorious realm of the imagination, saved him from 

 taking his own life. 



Many doctors and more cures were tried for his deafness, but with 

 no avail. In 1802 he writes : " For the last two years I have avoided all 

 society, for it is impossible for me to say to people, ' I am deaf.' " 



In 1802 his sense of depression reached its lowest during an acute 

 illness, and his despair found utterance in the letter to his brothers, 

 which is known as " The Will." He bewailed his exile by his deafness 

 from the diversions of society which he had so loved; and lamented his 

 seeming moroseness which this condition had brought about. The 



