The year 1814 marks the summit of Beethoven's fortunes. At the Vienna Congress he enjoyed European fame. He took an active part in the fêtes, princes rendered him homage, and (as he afterwards boasted to Schindler) he allowed himself to be courted by them. He was carried away by his sympathy with the War of Independence.[41] In 1813 he wrote a Symphony on _Wellington's Victory_ and in the beginning of 1814 a martial chorus, _Germany's Rebirth_ (_Germanias Wiedergeburt_). On November 29th, 1814, he conducted before an audience of kings a patriotic Cantata, _The Glorious Moment_ (_Der glorreiche Augenblick_), and on the occasion of the capture of Paris in 1815 he composed a Chorus, _It is accomplished_ (_Es ist vollbracht_). These occasional pieces did more to spread his fame than all the rest of his music together. The engraving by Blasius Hofel from a sketch by the Frenchman Latronne and the savage-looking cast by Franz Klein in 1812 present a life-like image of Beethoven at the time of the Congress of Vienna. The dominating characteristic of this leonine face with its firm set jaws scored with the furrows of anger and trouble, is determination--a Napoleonic will. One recognises the man who said of Napoleon after Jena, "How unfortunate that I do not know as much about warfare as music! I would show myself his master." But his kingdom was not of this world. "My empire is in the air," he wrote to Franz von Brunswick.[42] * * * * * After this hour of glory comes the saddest and most miserable period. Vienna had never been sympathetic to Beethoven. Haughty and bold genius as he was, he could not be at ease in this frivolous city with its mundane and its mediocre spirit, which Wagner laughed to scorn later on.[43] He lost no opportunities of going away; and towards 1808 he thought seriously of leaving Austria to go to the court of Jerome Bonaparte, King of Westphalia.[44] But Vienna had abundant musical resources; and one must do it justice by saying that there were always noble _dilettanti_ who felt the grandeur of Beethoven, and who spared their country the shame of losing him. In 1809, three of the richest noblemen of Vienna, the Archduke Rudolph, a pupil of Beethoven, Prince Lobkovitz and Prince Kinsky undertook to pay him annually a pension of 4,000 florins on the sole condition that he remained in Austria. "As it is evident," they said, "that a man can only devote himself entirely to art when he is free from all material care, and that it is only then that he can produce such sublime works which are the glory of art, the undersigned have formed a resolution to release Ludwig van Beethoven from the shadow of need, and thus disperse the miserable obstacles which are so detrimental to his flights of genius." Unhappily the results did not come up to the promises. The pension was always very irregularly paid; soon it ceased altogether. Also