This was three years after
his marriage to the Archduchess.
The news of the battle of Vittoria reached Vienna on July 13. Beethoven
was importuned by a clever friend, M. Maelzel, a musician, to write a
symphony in commemoration of it, and to call it "Wellington's Victory."
Maelzel was a man of remarkable mechanical ingenuity. He had before this
won his way into Beethoven's good graces by making him an ear-trumpet,
which he used for several years. He was the inventor of the metronome
and a man of considerable intelligence. He had invented a Panharmonicon,
an automaton instrument containing most of the instruments found in full
orchestra, on the principle of the modern orchestrion. Allied to his
talents as musician and inventor were those of good business ability and
a knowledge of human nature. The Battle Symphony appears to have been
written originally for the Panharmonicon. "I witnessed," says Moscheles,
"the origin and progress of this work, and remember that not only did
Maelzel induce Beethoven to write it, but even laid before him the whole
design of it; writing the drum marches and trumpet flourishes of the
French and English armies himself, giving Beethoven hints how he should
herald the English army by the tune of 'Rule Brittania;' how he should
introduce 'Malbrook' in a dismal strain; depict the horrors of the
battle, and arrange 'God Save the King,' with effects representing the
huzzas of the multitude.
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