We arrived here yesterday evening, and by 6 o`clock - an hour later - we were already at the opera. <sup>11</sup> See letter 158/3[Close] We are well, thank God; Wolfgangerl looks as if he has fought in a campaign, for he`s turned reddish-brown, especially around the nose and mouth, from the air and the open fires. He looks just like His Majesty the Emperor, for example. My own good looks haven`t suffered very much, otherwise I`d be in despair. There`s nothing yet for me to report from here: today we called on the Prince of Taxis, <sup>22</sup> At his palazzo, Contrada di San Vincenzo n. 2062, now Via Pietro Frattini[Close] but he wasn`t at home, and his wife needed urgently to write some letters so that she was unable to speak to her fellow countrymen.
But at the bottom of the house we saw a couple of dirty female kitchen staff jumping for joy at the sight of their compatriots. It seems to me that they`re not really enjoying Italy. Tomorrow we`re invited to have lunch with Count Francesco Eugenio Comte d`Arco, ³³ Presumably at the Palazzo d’Arco, Piazza d’Arco 4. The Mozarts had a letter of recommendation to Francesco Eugenio d’Arco, from his cousin Count Georg Anton Felix Arco at Salzburg, dated 11 December 1769:

Most Illustrious Count Cousin,
Most Noble Father,
Since our deputy Kapellmeister Mozart with his son, whose talent for music will provoke wonder, will travel there to be heard and to become known, I am demanded with insistence to recommend him to your Excellency, with the supplication of recommending the above mentioned to the nobility of the place and thus I could not refuse his very insistent requests – and he will be forever obliged [to you]. With this prayer I can’t but send my most devoted wishes and those of my Countess for next most holy Christmas festivities.
Giorgio Conte d’Arco

See Incontro di Mozart con Mantova, 8, and Bauer-Deutsch, v.220 [Close] after which I`ll be able to tell you more about this place. In the meantime I must tell you one or two things about Verona. We saw the amphitheatre and the Musæum Lapidarium that you can read about in Kaysler`s travel notes. ⁴⁴ For the Arena, see letter 152. The Museo Lapidario is not described in Keyssler as such, but as part of the Accademia Filarmonica palazzo. He also includes a brief description of the Accademia, including the theatre where Mozart may have performed: ‘In the first large Hall are the Portraits of the Presidents of this Society, who are always four in Number. In a Chamber on the Left, are kept the old musical Instruments, formerly used by the Nobility of Venice. . . The Portraits of the principal Members are hung up in the other Apartments, where publick Lectures are read. In a Chamber on the right Hand, the Presidents of the Philoti, instituted for the Improvement of the genteel Exercises, such as Riding, Fencing, Vaulting, Dancing &c. meet. Here also is an elegant Theatre for Operas and Comedies, with Galleries, built from a Design of the celebrated imperial Architect Francesco Bibiena. As the Nobility assemble here several Times a Week to divert themselves, this Theatre may be considered as a Kind of Exchange, for Persons of Rank and the Literari in Verona. . . Without the Palace [the Accademia Filarmonica building] is a great Number of Inscriptions and Antiquities, dug up in the Parts adjacent to Verona, and placed in a long Wall, facing the South, and consequently less exposed to the Injuries of the Weather . . . The first in Order, are Monuments with Inscriptions, the Characters of which are at present unknown, and among them Egyptian, Punick, and Etrurian Antiques. Next follow the Greek, to the Number of sixty; and last the Roman. Among the two last, those representing the Gods and Sacrifices have the Precedence; among these a little Idol in Porphyry, having a Person prostrate before it, is remarkable. Another well executed Bass-Relief, represents Mercury in a standing Attitude, and holding something in his Hand, which he reaches to the Earth, represented by the Figure of a Woman sitting. The proper Arrangement, and daily Augmentation of these Antiques, are owing to the Marquis Scipio Maffei; on which Account a Marble Statue was erected to him over the Entrance of the Palace, by the Philharmonic Academy’ (Keyssler, Neueste Reisen durch Teutschland, Böhmen, Ungarn, die Schweiz, Italien und Lothringen, iv. 123-5)[Close] I`ll also be bringing back with me a book on the antiquities of Verona. <sup>55</sup> According to Basso, I Mozart in Italia, 173 this may be Scipione Maffei’s Museum Veronese hoc est Antiquarum Inscriptionum atque Anaglyphorum collection cui Taurinensis adiungitur et Vindobonensis. Accedunt Monumenta id genus plurima nondum vulgate, et ubicumque collecta (Verona: Seminarii, 1749)[Close] Herr von Helmreich, <sup>66</sup> Ernst Anton o Karl Joseph von Helmreichen zu Brunfeld[Close] to whom I send my best wishes, will presumably lend you the other two parts of Kaysler, so that, even though you`re not with us, you can at least follow our journey from your own front room. It would make my letters too heavy and too expensive if I were to enclose the newspaper cuttings from Mantua and elsewhere about Wolfg.`s appearances. But I`m enclosing one that contains 2 mistakes: it says `actual Kapellmeister` and that he is `not yet 13 years old`, instead of 14. ⁷⁷ Here Leopold refers here to the article published in the Gazzetta di Mantova, where Wolfgang is described as ‘not yet 13 years old’ (see letter 152) although curiously this appeared only on 12 January, that is, the day after Leopold’s letter. Possibly, however, he refers to an as-yet-untraced article; aside from a notice published in the Innsbrucker Montägige Ordinari Zeitung, Innsbruck 18 December 1769 (see letter 150), which Leopold had already sent to his wife on 22 December 1769, other Italian `newspaper cuttings` up to this time are unknown[Close] But you know how it is: journalists write down the first thing that comes into their heads. I could send you some other things, too, for in Verona the poets vied with each other in singing his praises. Here is a copy of a sonnet that a learned dilettante noted down in our presence, ⁸⁸ Presumably Leopold refers here to the poem `Si rapuit sylvas` by Antonio Maria Meschini:

TO AMADEO MOZART
SWEETEST CHILD
AND MOST ELEGANT PLAYER
FROM ANTONIO MARIA MESCHINI
OF VERONA
If Orpheus enraptured the forests, if Tartarus he moved,
Now thou stealest men’s hearts, child, and most the stars.
So, as thou dost for us,
Did fair Apollo play,
Shedding celestial ray,
Upon his lyre thus.
But no: thou with thy singing
Dost set all music ringing.

The original of this poem, written in Latin and Italian, does not survive; it is known from a transcription in Nissen, Biographie W. A. Mozart, 163[Close] just as Kapellmeister Daniele Barba improvised the most beautiful verses about Wolfg. etc. ⁹⁹ Barba’s poem is known only in an undated German paraphrase by Ignaz Anton von Weiser that was copied by Aloys Fuchs and published in Jahn, W. A. Mozart, ii.719:

If woods and Hades bowed of old to Orpheus’ strains,
Thy music, wondrous boy, our hearts and senses gains,
The stars themselves, where he but moved the world; in sooth
That which he showed in dreams they art has turned to truth.
If Orpheus’ ancient lyre the underworld could capture,
Thy later taste, O child, affords us greater rapture!
High though the ancient minstrel’s art did once aspire,
Low must he bow to these, as one aspiring higher.
That Orpheus should today be heard and seen in thee
Our ears and eyes proclaim, no need for poetry.
Of old ‘twas Greece alone experienced Orpheus’ ways,
While thou, prodigious boy, knowest universal praise.
O Orpheus, when this child the lyre plays, and sings,
Believe us, thin w own lyre and song but feebly rings.
Then let not too ambitious sound thine ancient fame;
Hear but this youthful voice, which silences they fame.
Behold the wonders done by this precocious youth
And say if thou canst match his worth, in very truth.
Learn, Orpheus, what music can attain today,
And wilt thou enter then against this wonder, say?
‘Tis true that Orpheus brought the stones to life, we learn,
But list’ning to this boy himself to stone he’ll turn.
Compare of these two artists’ lives the mortal span,
Then judge that Orpheus is a child, our child a man.

Another version of Weiser’s version is preserved among Nissen’s Collectanea in A-Sm   Read More   and   Read More   [Close]
On the 16th there`ll be the usual weekly concert <sup>1010</sup> See letter 157[Close] in the hall of the Accademia Filarmonica, to which we are invited: we`ll then go straight on to Milan. If the weather`s cold and the roads frozen, we`ll travel via Cremona, but if it`s warm and the roads in consequence are bad, we`ll have to go via Brescia. ¹¹¹¹ In the event, the Mozarts traveled by way of Cremona. They left Mantua on 19 January and stayed overnight at the Albergo della Posta in Bozzolo. Their brief visit there was reported in the Gazzetta di Mantova for 26 January 1770: ‘They write from Bozolo that towards one o’clock at night on the 19th of this month the celebrated boy Sig. Wolfgango Amadeo Mozart arrived here, who had no sooner alighted at the coaching inn of this town than he was most courteously received by the Archpriest Don Carlo Saragozzi, professor of music, and then taken by the same in a carriage to his house; and that the said famous little boy in the course of some two hours gave proofs of his amazing talent, sight-reading at the harpsichord various sonatas by several worth composers, and especially a trio composed by Giuseppe Saragozzi, also a master and professor of music, giving unspeakable pleasure and satisfaction to both the political and the military authorities there and many other gentlemen who happened to be present; and that when, on the following morning, he had fully satisfied the people of that place, he departed in the direction of Cremona.’ ‘One o’clock at night’, in this context, means one hour after sunset[Close] We feel quite safe here and, as in Germany, have heard nothing to the contrary. Upon my honour, I swear that I barely have time to write this letter - because of it, we had to miss the opera today. I`ll write to you again as soon as we reach Milan; and you should write to me in Milan. You can add at the bottom: per ricapito del Sgr. Troger, Secretario di S: Exllza il Sgr. Comte Carlo de Firmian. I must get to bed now. Farewell to you and Nannerl. We kiss you 1000 times. We drink your health every day, Wolfg. never forgets to do so. Farewell, I am you old
Mzt
All conceivable wishes to all our good friends. I can`t write to any of them as I`m being hounded from pillar to post. Nothing but dressing and undressing, packing and unpacking, on top of which we never have a warm room but freeze like a dog, everything I touch is like ice. And if you were to see the doors and locks in the rooms! Just like prisons! - Please post the enclosed letter to Herr Friderici <sup>1212</sup> Christian Ernst or Christian Gottfried Friederici[Close] in Gera so that it can be forwarded quickly and safely. It`s an order for a harpsichord. ¹³¹³ According to Bauer-Deutsch v.222 this was probably an order placed by Leopold on behalf of an unknown patron; Basso, I Mozart in Italia, 174, on the other hand, states the instrument was intended for Nannerl. Just as likely it was purchased for the Mozart family home. According to the advertisement for Leopold Mozart’s estate auction on 25 September 1787, the items up for sale included ‘. . . a harpsichord by the celebrated Friderizi of Gera, with two manuals of ebony and ivory throughout five whole octaves, with moreover a special cornett and lute stop’ (Salzburger Intelligenzblatt, 15 September 1787; Deutsch , Mozart. A Documentary Biography, 296-7) [Close]