tion"; for when a man admits his own shortcomings it is
ungracious, to say the least, for an outsider to insist upon them. It is
obvious at any rate that Haydn undertook the composition of the oratorio
in no light-hearted spirit. "Never was I so pious," he says, "as when
composing 'The Creation.' I felt myself so penetrated with religious
feeling that before I sat down to the pianoforte I prayed to God with
earnestness that He would enable me to praise Him worthily." In the
lives of the great composers there is only one parallel to this frame of
mind--the religious fervour in which Handel composed "The Messiah."

First Performance of the Oratorio

The first performance of "The Creation" was of a purely private nature.
It took place at the Schwartzenburg Palace, Vienna, on the 29th of April
1798, the performers being a body of dilettanti, with Haydn presiding
over the orchestra. Van Swieten had been exerting himself to raise
a guarantee fund for the composer, and the entire proceeds of the
performance, amounting to 350 pounds, were paid over to him. Haydn was
unable to describe his sensations during the progress of the work. "One
moment," he says, "I was as cold as ice, the next I seemed on fire; more
than once I thought I should have a fit." A year later, on the 19th
of March 1799, to give the exact date, the oratorio was first heard
publicly at the National Theatre in Vienna, when it produced the
greatest effect. The play-bill announcing the performance (see next
page) had a very ornamental border, and was, of course, in German.

[At this point in the original book, a facsimile of the first play-bill
for "The Creation" takes up the entire next page.]

Next year the score was published by Breitkopf & Hartel, and no fewer
than 510 copies, nearly half the number subscribed for, came to England.
The title-page was printed both in German and English, the latter
reading as follows: "The Creation: an Oratorio composed by Joseph Haydn,
Doctor of Musik, and member of the Royal Society of Musik, in Sweden,
in actuel (sic) service of His Highness the Prince of Esterhazy, Vienna,
1800." Clementi had just set up a musical establishment in London, and
on August 22, 1800, we find Haydn writing to his publishers to
complain that he was in some danger of losing 2000 gulden by Clementi's
non-receipt of a consignment of copies.

London Performances

Salomon, strangely enough, had threatened Haydn with penalties for
pirating his tex