Now I come to the bagatelles—at which I was very surprised. I have had several of them played but not one person wants to believe that these are by you. To be sure, I wished to have small pieces, but really, these are entirely too small. Besides, the majority are so easy that they are not suitable for somewhat better players, and for beginning players there are, now and again, passages that are too difficult…. [He closes by saying] I shall never print the small pieces; I would rather lose the fee paid for them. This declaration will probably shock you but please just consider my reasons, and you will see that my actions are based on them and in no way on whim. The first reason is that I do not want to risk the danger of being suspected of having committed a fraud by placing your name falsely in front of those small pieces, for few will believe these little works are by the famous Beethoven. A second reason is that I do not want just to print [any] compositions of yours; rather, I want to have exceptionally good pieces by you.