Outside the narrow circle of the playhouse, weightier matters than a new opera now occupied and agitated the minds of the Viennese. On the 20th October, Ulm fell. On the 30th Bernadotte entered Salzburg, on his way to and down the Danube. Vienna was defenceless. The nobility, the great bankers and merchants--all whose wealth enabled and whose vocations permitted it--precisely those classes of society in which Beethoven moved, which knew how to appreciate his music, and of whose suffrages his opera was assured, fled from the capital. On November 9th the Empress departed. On the 10th the French armies had reached and occupied the villages a few miles west of the city. On November 13th, about 11 o’clock in the forenoon, the vanguard of the enemy, Murat and Lannes at the head, 15,000 strong, representing all branches of the service, entered Vienna in order of battle, flags flying and music sounding. On the 15th, Bonaparte issued his proclamation from Schönbrunn, which he made his headquarters. Murat quartered himself in the palace of Archduke Albert; General Hulin, in that of Prince Lobkowitz. It was just at this most unlucky of all possible periods that Beethoven’s opera was produced; on November 20, 21 and 22. Beethoven’s friend, Stephan von Breuning, prepared a pretty surprise for him by printing a short complimentary poem and having it distributed in the theatre at the second performance. It is preserved in the “Notizen” (p. 34).[32] Beethoven desired to retain the original title of the opera, “Leonore,” and the directors of the theatre have been severely censured from that day to this for persisting in giving and retaining the title “Fidelio”; but unjustly; for, considering the relations in which Paër stood to Baron Braun, it was surely enough to have taken his subject, without stealing his title. [Sidenote: RECOLLECTIONS OF A SINGER] A young man, educated at the University of Munich, had for some time past been private secretary to the Bavarian ~Chargé des Affaires~ at Salzburg. The approach of the French armies after the fall of Ulm made his position and prospects very uncertain. It was just then that an agent of Baron Braun came thither in search of a young, fresh tenor to succeed Demmer, whose powers were fast yielding to time. The engagement was offered him and thus it came about, that J. A. Röckel, in the Autumn of 1805, became first tenor in the Theater-an-der-Wien. After appearing in divers characters with much success, considering his inexperience, he was offered the part of ~Florestan~ in the contemplated revival of “Fidelio.” A conversation with the singer at Bath in April, 1861, is authority for these particulars, and a letter from him dated February 26 of the same year adds more. Röckel wrote: