Читать книгу The World's Great Men of Music - Harriette Brower - Страница 7

The Requiem was not yet finished and to this work Mozart now turned. But the strain and excitement he had undergone for the past few months had done their work: a succession of fainting spells overcame him, and the marvelous powers which had always been his seemed no longer at his command. He feared he would not live to complete the work. "It is for myself I am writing the Requiem," he said sadly to Constanza, one day.

On the evening of December 4, friends who had gathered at his bedside, handed him, at his desire, the score of the Requiem, and, propped up by pillows he tried to sing one of the passages. The effort was too great; the manuscript slipped from his nerveless hand and he fell back speechless with emotion. A few hours later, on the morning of December 5, 1791, this great master of whom it was prophesied that he would cause all others to be forgotten, passed from the scene of his many struggles and greater triumphs.