They were very graciously received, and the Abbé, in compliance with the pressing request of his visitors, sat down to the pianoforte, and played for some time. Beethoven, who had never before heard the instrument touched with the same elegance, listened with the deepest attention, but refused to play when requested to do so in his turn. It has been mentioned that his style was somewhat hard and rough, and he naturally feared the contrast with Sterkel's flowing ease. In vain his companions, who, with true _esprit de corps_, were proud of their young colleague, urged him to the pianoforte, till the Abbé turning the conversation on a work of Beethoven's, lately published, hinted, with disdain either real or assumed, that he did not believe the composer could master the difficulties of it himself. (The work alluded to was a series of twenty-four variations on Righini's Theme "Vieni Amore.") This touched Beethoven's honour; he yielded without further hesitation, and not only played the published variations, but invented others infinitely more complicated as he went along, assuming the gliding, graceful style of Sterkel in such a manner as utterly to bewilder the bystanders, who overwhelmed him with applause. It was perhaps after this display that he was promoted to a higher post in King Lux's service by the royal letters patent, and to this weighty document a great seal--stamped in pitch on the lid of a little box--was attached by threads made of unravelled rope, which gave it quite an imposing aspect. Seven years afterwards Wegeler discovered this _plaisanterie_ carefully treasured among Beethoven's possessions, a proof of the enjoyment afforded him by this excursion. At Mergentheim the sensation created by the Elector's musicians was immense. In an old newspaper exhumed by the indefatigable Thayer, the following notice of Beethoven occurs. The writer is Carl Ludwig Junker, chaplain to Prince Hohenlohe, and himself a composer and critic of no mean reputation. After giving a general account of the whole orchestra, he goes on:--