COMPOSERS SKULL.

Globe, Volume V, Issue 537, 8 March 1876, Page 3

COMPOSERS SKULL.

The Music Trade Review, a New York publication, writes : " An absurd story which appeared in two London papers has found its way into some papers of this city. It is to the effect that ' the skull of Mozart has been discovered in possession of Professor Hyrtl, in Vienna, who received the legacy from his brother, who in turn bought it from the sexton.' All this is incorrect. The sexton himself is said to have 'learned how illustrious was the corpse so carelessly interred in the fosse commune,' and to have stolen the head. The truth is a very plain contradiction to this whole story, and is very sad. The day when Mczart was buried, his hearse was followed to the Church of St Stephan by nobody except by Schikander and by his dog ; Mozart's wife, Constance, being at the same time sick in bed, and unable to get up. It was a very stormy day, and St Stephansplatz, where the church abovementioned stands, is usually very windy. When the coffin came out, Schikaneder, who had no carriage, followed the hearse a few yards, but beaten back by the rain and wind, left and went home. When near the Kohlmarkt, the undertaker turned round and saw that there was no one to follow. He then brought the corpse to the cemetery, where it was interred in a way that can be imagined when the whole expense allowed for the funeral was only eight gulden (4dol). Constance Mozart, three or four days afterwards, as soon as she could get out, went to the 'Friedhof,' and there learned that of the only two men who knew where Mozart's body lay, because they had buried him, the one had left town the day after the burial, and the other one had himself died the day before her arrival. It is, therefore, evident that the monument which has been erected a short time ago to Mozart's memory stands * very likely' near the place of his burial, but where that precisely is, it is just as impossible to say as to credit the story of his body having been disinterred and the head stolen. Moreover, we know Professor Hyrtl, of the Vienna Polytechnic, personally, and can guarantee that he is the last man to authorise or to participate in such a shameful outrage."