The great music by Beethoven, performed in Beethoven's honour, at this Beethoven Festival, under the conduct of Drs. Spohr and Liszt, consisted of his Mass in C in the Minster, his Missa Solennis and Choral Symphony, his Overture to “Coriolan,” his Symphony in C minor, his pianoforte Concerto in E flat, – “Adelaida,” – the song of the Seraph from his “Mount of Olives,” and the Finale to his “Fidelio.”

To descant on the larger portion of these works would happily be now a most superfluous labour, so far as English readers are concerned. Even the Choral Symphony is now well known in London, with all its brilliant and all its obscure points–its splendours and its crudities (the last, few but striking) ; and such general remarks on the last manner of its composer as I have fancied not unimportant, belong to a subsequent chapter of these journals. Another of his great works selected, however, was, and probably will always remain to be, less familiar ; and thus a few hints on its nature and properties may not be wholly impertinent.

It was at Bonn that many–myself among the number–came to know Beethoven's “Missa Solennis”–by being for the first time present at a correct performance of that stupendous musical work.