thanking her for this rather questionable mark of Imperial
favour!

"Sang like a Crow"

As a matter of fact, the empress, however she may have thought of
Haydn the man, showed herself anything but considerate to Haydn
the choir-boy. The future composer's younger brother, Michael,
had now arrived in Vienna, and had been admitted to the St
Stephen's choir. His voice is said to have been "stronger and of
better quality" than Joseph's, which had almost reached the
"breaking" stage; and the empress, complaining to Reutter that
Joseph "sang like a crow," the complacent choirmaster put Michael
in his place. The empress was so pleased with the change that she
personally complimented Michael, and made him a present of 24
ducats.

Dismissed from St Stephen's

One thing leads to another. Reutter, it is obvious, did not like
Haydn, and any opportunity of playing toady to the empress was
too good to be lost. Unfortunately Haydn himself provided the
opportunity. Having become possessed of a new pair of scissors,
he was itching to try their quality. The pig-tail of the
chorister sitting before him offered an irresistible attraction;
one snip and lo! the plaited hair lay at his feet. Discipline
must be maintained; and Reutter sentenced the culprit to be caned
on the hand. This was too great an indignity for poor Joseph, by
this time a youth of seventeen--old enough, one would have
thought, to have forsworn such boyish mischief. He declared that