rightly rejected by Mozart. It is worthy of remark that the violoncello is employed as a leading instrument.
The orchestral workmanship shows that Mozart had not listened to the Mannheim band in vain; the different instruments form a well-ordered whole, in which each has its individual significance. It is only necessary to examine the thematic arrangement in the last movement (score, page 54) to perceive how skilfully the effect of varied tone-colouring is taken into account, while at the same time, by means of contrapuntal treatment, due prominence is given to the purely melodious element. It may well be imagined that Mozart would not let slip the opportunity of trying the splendid effect of a symphony with flutes, oboes, and clarinets (Vol. I., p. 385). But the clarinets are sparely used as a foreign importation, and, together with the trumpets and drums, are altogether omitted from the andante. Large demands are made on the executive delicacy of the orchestra, and in many places the whole effect depends on a well-managed _crescendo_, as it had never done in previous works; in fact, it is not too much to say that many of the subjects would not have been conceived as they are, without the prospect of their performance by a well-organised orchestra.
During this interval Mozart also completed the clavier sonatas, with violin accompaniment, which he had begun at Mannheim (301-306 K.), the fourth bearing the inscription "ä Paris," and busied himself to find a publisher for them who would pay him well.[21] He found leisure, also, to compose a capriccio for his sister's birthday.
Thus we see Mozart, disliking Paris and the Parisians, deriving little practical gain from all his exertions, and yet striving in his own way to attain the position which was his due, when an event occurred which plunged himself and his family into the deepest grief. Paris had never agreed with the Frau Mozart. Their lodging in the "Hötel des quatre fils d'Aymon," in the Rue du Gros-Chenet--a musical quarter
--was bad, as well as the living, and she sat all day "as if under arrest," Wolfgang's affairs necessitating his almost constant absence. She was ill for three weeks in May, and intended, on her recovery, to seek out better lodgings, and manage the housekeeping herself. But in June she fell ill again; she was bled, and wrote afterwards to her husband (June 12, 1778) that she was very weak, and had pains in her arm and her eyes, but that on the whole she was better. But the improvement was only apparent, and her illness took a serious turn; the physician whom Grimm sent in gave up hope, and after a fortnight of the deepest anxiety, which Wolfgang passed at his mother's bedside, she gently passed away on July 3. His only support at this trying time was a musician named Heina, who had known his father in former days, and had often, with his wife, visited Frau Mozart in her solitude. Wolfgang's first thought was to break the news gently to his father, who was ill prepared for so crushing a blow. He wrote to him at once, saying that his mother was ill, and that her condition excited alarm; at the same time he acquainted their true friend Bullinger with the whole truth, and begged him to break the dreadful news to his father as gently as possible. In a few days, when he knew that this had been done, he wrote again himself in detail, offering all the consolation he could, and strove to turn his father's thoughts from the sad subject to the consideration of his own prospects. This letter[22] affords a fresh example of the deep and tender love which bound parents and children together, and of Wolfgang's own sentiments and turn of mind. The consolations he offers, and the form in which he expresses them, are those of one who has himself passed through all the sad experiences of life; but to his father, whose teaching had tended to produce this effect, his expressions were justified and correct. With a natural and genuine sorrow for his irreparable loss is combined a manly composure, which sought not to obtain relief by indulging in sorrow, but to look forward calmly and steadily to the future and its duties.