Nov. 20, 1811.

We are deucedly obliged to you. We beg you to be careful not to lose your
well-earned fame. You are exhorted to pursue the same course, and we remain
once more your deucedly attached

LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN.

76.

TO ZMESKALL.

Jan. 19, 1812.

I shall be at the "Swan" to-day, dear Z. I have, alas! _too much_ leisure,
and you _none_! Your

BEETHOVEN.

77.

TO ZMESKALL.[1]

1812.

CONFOUNDED LITTLE QUONDAM MUSICAL COUNT!

What the deuce has become of you? Are you to be at the "Swan" to-day? No?
... Yes! See from this enclosure what I have done for Hungary. When a
German undertakes a thing, even without pledging his word, he acts very
differently from one of those Hungarian Counts, such as B. [Brunswick], who
allowed me to travel by myself--from what paltry, miserable motive who can
tell?--and kept me waiting, though he did not wait for me!

My excellent little quondam musical Count,

I am now, as ever, your attached

BEETHOeVERL.

Return the enclosure, for we wish to bring it, and something else, pretty
forcibly under the notice of the Count.

[Footnote 1: The date of this and the following note is decided by the
allusion to his compositions written for Hungary (Pesth). See the
subsequent letter to Varenna.]

78.

TO ZMESKALL.

You are summoned to appear to-day at the "Swan;" Brunswick also comes. If
you do not appear, you are henceforth excluded from all that concerns us.
Excuses _per excellentiam_ cannot be accepted. Obedience is enjoined,
knowing that we are acting for your benefit, and that our motive is to
guard you against temptations and faithlessness _per excellentiam--dixi_.

BEETHOVEN.

79.

TO ZMESKALL.

DEAR ZMESKALL,--

The well-known watchmaker who lives close to the Freiung is to call on you.
I want a first-rate repeater, for which he asks forty ducats. As you like
that kind of thing, I beg you will exert yourself on my behalf, and select
a really good watch for me.

With the most enthusiastic admiration for a man like yourself, who is soon
to give me an opportunity of displaying in his favor my particular
knowledge of horn-playing, I am your

LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN.

80.

TO KAMMERPROCURATOR VARENNA,--GRATZ.[1]

1812.

If the wish to benefit the poor were not so evident in your letter, I
should have felt not a little offended by your accompanying your request to
me by the offer of payment. From my childhood, whenever my art could be
s