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While an artist like Herr Schuppanzigh was at the head of the first violins, and by his fiery and expressive mode of conducting kindled the zeal of the whole orchestra, Herr Kapellmeister Salieri did not scruple to give the time to the drums and cannonades; Herr Spohr and Herr Mayseder, each worthy from his talents to fill the highest post, played in the second and third rank.

Apparently very little was done previous to the nineteenth century in the way of quartet concerts, but Baillot founded a series of quartet concerts in Paris, which were highly spoken of, and about the same time Schuppanzigh, an excellent violinist and teacher in Vienna, established a quartet which became famous. In this quartet Mayseder played, in his younger days, second violin.

In 1860, when the leaves of thirty-three autumns had fallen upon the composer's grave and the Countess had gone to her last resting-place, a voice, like an echo from a dead past, linked the names of Beethoven and the woman he had loved. There was at that time in Germany a virtuosa, Frau Hebenstreit, who when a young girl had been a pupil of Beethoven's friend, the violinist Schuppanzigh.

You seem to place me on a level with Schuppanzigh, &c., and have distorted the plain and simple meaning of my words. You are not my debtor, but I am yours, and now you make me so more than ever. I cannot express to you the pain your gift has caused me, and I must candidly say that I cannot give you one friendly glance in return.