Later, August 1 and September 1 are mentioned. Beethoven was firm in his determination to keep faith with his subscribers. He writes to Schindler: “There are only two courses as regards the Mass, namely, that the publisher delay the publication a year and a day; or, if not, we can not accept a subscription.” Later he writes: “Nothing is to be changed in the Diabelli contract except that _the time_ when he is to receive the Mass from me be left undetermined.” The contract in question which was thus to be amended concerned the Variations, but presumably the Mass also. Beethoven writes: From my little book I see that you have doubts in the matter of the Mass and Diab., wherefore, I beg you to come soon, for in that case we will not give him the Var. either, as my brother knows somebody who wants to take them both. We are therefore in a position to talk to him. Either this disagreement or some other in a matter in which Schindler acted as Beethoven’s agent brought out a letter from the latter to the former in which he expresses a belief that the business, “so disagreeable to you,” might be brought to a conclusion soon: “moreover I was not, unfortunately, entirely wrong in not wholly trusting Diab.” Schindler, in a gloss on this note, says that the disagreeable business concerned the Mass. Diabelli had made plans which were not only harmful to the work but humiliating as well to Beethoven. Schindler pointed this out and Diabelli became violent and declared that since the contract was as good as closed he would summon Schindler before a court of law if it were not kept. “But,” says Schindler, “the threat did no good; he had to take back the document.” The numerous notes to Schindler about this period are undated and the times at which they were written have been only approximately fixed by Schindler; there is also some vagueness touching the time and order of the written conversations, but the evidence thus far presented, together with a significant remark in a billet to Schindler, to the effect that he had thought of a project which would “act like a pistol-shot on this fellow,” would seem to justify the assumption that Beethoven had entered into the same kind of obligation with Diabelli as he had with Simrock and Peters so far as the Mass was concerned, and that before the execution of a formal contract, which seems to have been considered necessary in this case, which was to include the Variations on the Diabelli Waltz theme, Beethoven had embarked on his enterprise with the sovereigns, which made the speedy publication of the Mass in the ordinary way impossible with honor; further, that a threat to withhold the Variations had been used to bring the irate publisher to terms. In the April Conversation Book Schindler says: “Won’t Diabelli make wry faces when your brother demands the document back almost as soon as he has received it!” [Sidenote: DUBIOUS ASPECT OF THE NEGOTIATIONS]