262.—GOAT HAIR FOR HERO WORSHIPERS.
Notwithstanding his gruffness, which frequently became out-and-out rudeness, Beethoven was a favorite with such ladies as happened to know him intimately, and many who were deprived of this privilege worshiped at a distance.
He frequently received requests for a lock of his hair; in fact, so numerous were they that his tangled locks would have showed a sad decimation had he granted all these requests. Some of his intimate lady friends and pupils were thus highly favored, but others were not so well treated, as the following incident will show.
The wife of a Vienna musician, desiring very much to possess one of his shaggy locks, one day induced her husband to ask a friend of the great composer's to intercede for her, and procure her the relic she desired.
This friend told Beethoven of her wish, but persuaded him to send her a wisp of hair from a goat's beard, which Beethoven's coarse gray hair nearly resembled. Some time later, when the lady was exhibiting this peculiar souvenir as a lock of Beethoven's hair, another friend, who was a party to the joke, acquainted her with the deception.
The husband of the hero worshiper wrote a letter to Beethoven charging him with discourtesy and unkindness; and Beethoven, feeling ashamed of the trick, wrote a letter of apology to the aggrieved lady, enclosing in it a real lock of his hair, and refused to receive further visits from the gentleman who had prompted the deception.