INTELLECTUAL AND PHYSICAL LIFE 55 



affected his general health materially, though his vigor seemed little 

 impaired. 



"Op to the time of his failing sight, in 1747, we have no record of 

 any sickness of Bach, while his untiring energy, as shown in his vast 

 amount of work, bears sufficient testimony to his great vitality. He 

 was able to be, besides a marvelous maker of music, " a particularly 

 excellent father (he had nineteen children), friend and citizen." 



Of Beethoven it is sufficient to know that he was spoken of as the 

 " image of strength," as power personified — that there was concentrated 

 in him " the pluck of twenty battalions." He was a great walker, and 

 no day in Vienna, however busy or stormy, passed without its consti- 

 tutional, " a walk, or rather run, twice round the ramparts ... or 

 further into the environs." Notwithstanding the constant effect of 

 his deafness and the fact that digestive disturbances early began to 

 keep him company, " his splendid constitution and extreme fondness 

 for the open air counteracted his physical defects and even in his last 

 illness " " his constitution, powerful as that of a giant, blocked the 

 gates against death for nearly three months " and during the struggle 

 his fancy seemed to soar more vigorously than ever. 



Of the third of the great B's, Brahms, burly, well-knit, muscular, 

 the " very image of strength and vigor," there is little to say beyond 

 the fact that he was never sick. Widmann says " he displayed an 

 absence of physical sensitiveness of which few could boast." " His 

 constitution was thoroughly sound, the most strenuous mental exertion 

 scarcely fatiguing him," and he could " go soundly to sleep at any 

 hour of the day he pleased." Like Beethoven, Brahms was a lover of 

 nature and a tireless walker. 



If we step down from the company of the greater to that of the 

 lesser gods of music, Mozart, Weber and Chopin are presented by the 

 advocates of the feebler life for genius. Chopin we have already men- 

 tioned. Weber was weakly and tuberculous. With health and strength 

 he might have equaled Beethoven. Mozart, though of inferior bodily 

 presence, did a lifetime's work before his early death from typhus fever. 

 He was trained by his father to take care of himself and would probably 

 have lived the allotted time but for the stress of want, and overwork for 

 thankless and unremunerative patrons. 



Over against these few exceptions we could set quite a company of 

 master musicians full of health and vigor. Handel and Haydn with 

 their " continuous, sunny healthfulness." Spohr, " of sound health 

 and herculean frame," his life filled with uninterrupted success and 

 honors up to seventy years. 



Then there was Wagner, " the best tumbler and somersault-turner 

 of the large Dresden school," an adept at every form of bodily exercise, 

 who "still performed boyish tricks (such as standing on his head) 



