genius to be traced back to the Bonn period; fate has also made known to us compositions of his youth which, for a long time, were lost in whole or in part, and which, in connection with the three great pianoforte quartets of 1785, not only disclose a steady progress, but also discover the self-developed individual artist at a much earlier date than has heretofore been accepted. Now that we are again in possession of the cantatas and other fruits of the Bonn period, or have learned to know them better as such, we are able to free ourselves from the old notion which presented Beethoven as a slowly and tardily developed master. CANTATA ON THE DEATH OF JOSEPH II The most interesting of Beethoven’s compositions in the Bonn period are unquestionably the cantatas on the death of Joseph II and the elevation of Leopold II. Beethoven did not bring them either to performance or publication; they were dead to the world. Nottebohm called attention to the fact that manuscript copies of their scores were announced in the auction catalogue of the library of Baron de Beine in April, 1813. It seems probable that Hummel purchased them at that time; at any rate, after his death they found their way from his estate into the second-hand bookshop of List and Francke in Leipsic, where they were bought in 1884 by Armin Fridmann of Vienna. Dr. Eduard Hanslick acquainted the world with the rediscovered treasures in a feuilleton published in the “Neue Freie Presse” newspaper of Vienna on May 13, 1884, and the funeral cantata was performed for the first time at Vienna in November, 1884, and at Bonn on June 29, 1885.[50] Both cantatas were then included in the Complete Works of Beethoven published by Breitkopf and Härtel. The “Cantata on the Death of Joseph the Second, composed by L. van Beethoven,” was written between March and June, 1790. The Emperor died on February 20th, and the news of his death reached Bonn on February 24th. The Lesegesellschaft at once planned a memorial celebration, which took place on March 19th. At a meeting held to make preparations for the function on February 28, Prof. Eulogius Schneider (who delivered the memorial address) expressed the wish that a musical feature be incorporated in the programme and said that a young poet had that day placed a poem in his hands which only needed a setting from one of the excellent musicians who were members of the society or a composer from elsewhere. Beethoven’s most influential friends, at the head of them Count Waldstein, were members of the society. Here, therefore, we have beyond doubt the story of how Beethoven’s composition originated. The minutes of the last meeting for preparation, held on March 17, state that “for various reasons the proposed cantata cannot be performed.” Among the various reasons may have been the excessive difficulty of the parts for the wind-instruments which, according to Wegeler, frustrated a projected performance at Mergentheim; though it is also possible that Beethoven,