It has been asserted by some writers that Beethoven was insensible to the charms of woman, and that love was to him a sealed book! For the refutation of this statement it is only necessary to turn to his works, which breathe a very different story to such as have ears to hear. For those who have not, let the testimony of his friend Wegeler suffice: "Beethoven was _never_ without a love, and generally in the highest degree enamoured." The reason why his love was fated never to expand and ripen will be explained in its own place. Here it is sufficient to say that Beethoven, while glowing with fire and tenderness, eminently calculated to love and be loved, was throughout his whole life, and in every relation, delicacy itself; his nature shrunk instinctively from anything like impurity. To return: Mademoiselle Jeannette, a fascinating little blonde, divided her attentions so equally between Beethoven and his friend Stephan, and sang so charmingly about her heart being _desolé_ when the time for parting came, that each believed himself the favoured one, until it transpired that the "Herzchen had long since been bestowed" in its entirety on a gallant Austrian officer, whom the young lady subsequently married, and who afterwards rose to the rank of general. There does not seem to have been any attachment between Beethoven and Leonore; she was his pupil, his sister,[5] but nothing more; her affections were already given to young Wegeler, whose wife she afterwards became. So our Beethoven was left to gnaw his fingers for the loss of his pretty Jeannette, and to flutter on the outside of the crowd which hovered round fair Barbara Koch, the beauty of Bonn, daughter of a widow, proprietress of a coffee-house or tavern. What! exclaims the reader, is this an instance of the so-called "aristocratic leanings" of Beethoven? We must beg him in reply not to look at things through exclusively British and nineteenth century spectacles. The position of worthy Frau Koch was, if not distinguished, certainly respectable. Lewes, in his Life of Goethe, was obliged to combat with the same prejudice in his account of the poet's student days at Leipzig, and we cannot do better than quote his words with regard to the society to be found in a German Wirthshaus of the period:-- "The _table d'hôte_ is composed of a circle of habitués, varied by occasional visitors, who in time become, perhaps, members of the circle. Even with strangers conversation is freely interchanged, and in a little while friendships are formed, as natural tastes and likings assimilate, which are carried out into the current of life."