Note 171 — Chapter XVI

The anecdote told by Mendelssohn of Beethoven’s playing to relieve the sorrow of the Baroness has a complement in a document found among the posthumous papers of Thayer. On December 25, 1864, Thayer received a poem from Frau von Arneth (Antonie Adamberger) written by Gustav Frank, a production of no literary value but based upon an incident thus told in a note attached to it: After the burial of Baroness von Ertmann’s only child, the grief-stricken woman was unable to find the consolation which comes with tears. Greatly concerned thereat, her husband, General von Ertmann, took her to Beethoven, who without a word sat down to the pianoforte and played until the Baroness’s sobs testified that relief had come. Thayer endorsed on the copy of the poem which he made: “It is a fact in Beethoven’s and Frau Dorothea v. Ertmann’s intercourse.”