The expenses incurred in the negotiations, in his journey to Linz, and in taking possession, left the indigent purchaser barely funds sufficient to make his first payment and ratify the contract; in fact, he had only 300 florins left. The profits of his shop and the rents of his house were so small, that Johann was almost at his wit’s end how to meet his next engagements. He sold the iron gratings of the windows--but they produced too little to carry him through. It was a comical piece of good luck for him that the jars and pots upon his shelves were of pure, solid English tin--a metal which Napoleon’s non-intercourse decrees fulminated against England had just then raised enormously in price. The cunning apothecary sold his tin, furnished his shop with earthenware, and met his payments with the profits of the transaction. But it is an ill wind that blows nobody any good; the reverses of the Austrian arms in April, 1809, opened the road for the French armies to Linz, and gave Apothecary Beethoven an opportunity to make large contracts for the supply of medicines to the enemy’s commissariat, which not only relieved him in his present necessities but laid the foundation for his subsequent moderate fortune. This concise record of facts effectually disposes of the current errors, which are, first: that about 1802-3 Beethoven established his brother in Linz as apothecary, advancing to him the necessary capital; second: that, through his personal influence, he obtained for Johann profitable contracts with the Austrian Commissariat for medicines--which contracts were the basis of his subsequent prosperity; third: that consequently, in obtaining monies from his brother, Beethoven was only sharing in the profits on capital furnished by himself; and, fourth: that hence, Johann’s urgent request for payment in 1807 was an exhibition of vile selfishness and base ingratitude! All this is the exact reverse of the truth. No other performances of Beethoven’s works at the Liebhaber Concerts, than those before enumerated, are reported; perhaps none were given, for reasons indicated in a letter from Stephan von Breuning to Wegeler, written in March, 1808: “Beethoven came near losing a finger by a ~Panaritium~ [felon], but he is again in good health. He escaped a great misfortune, which, added to his deafness, would have completely ruined his good humor, which, as it is, is of rare occurrence.”