Page:Rolland - Beethoven, tr. Hull, 1927.pdf/29

 in a corner with closed eyes, smoking a long pipe—a habit which grew on him more and more as he approached death. A friend spoke to him. He smiled sadly, drew from his pocket a little note-tablet, and in a thin voice which frequently sounded cracked notes, asked him to write down his request. His face would frequently become suddenly transfigured, maybe in the access of sudden inspiration which seized him at random, even in the street, filling the passers-by with amazement, or it might be when great thoughts came to him suddenly, when seated at the piano. "The muscles of his face would stand out, his veins would swell; his wild eyes would become doubly terrible. His lips trembled, he had the manner of a wizard controlling the demons which he had invoked." "A Shakespearean visage—'King Lear '"—so Sir Julius Benedict described it.

was born on December 16th, 1770, in a little bare attic of a humble dwelling at Bonn, a small University town on the Rhine near Cologne. He came of Flemish