Chapter IV: Part 4

Towards the third year of my duties as chapel-master, I myself felt a certain leaning towards an ecclesiastical career. Besides my musical studies, I had dabbled somewhat in philosophy and theology, and had even attended the theological lectures at the seminary at St. Sulpice all through one winter, wearing the dress of an ecclesiastical student.

But I had utterly mistaken my own nature and my proper vocation. I felt, after a time, that existence without my art was quite impossible for me, so, casting off the garb which suited me so ill, I went back into the world again. To this youthful phase of mine, however, I owe a friendship which I make it a point of honour to record in this chronicle of my life history.

During the summer of 1846 I was ordered, with the Abbes Dumarsais and Gay, to take sea baths at Trouville. One day I had a narrow escape from drowning, and so quickly did the press get hold of the fact, that the news was published next morning even in the Paris papers. Luckily I had lost no time in writing to tell my brother I was safe, so he was able to calm my mother's fears by showing her my letter. The papers had calmly announced that "I had been brought home dead on a shutter!" Truly the flimsiest truth travels slower than the weightiest lie! We chanced during this sea-bathing trip to come across a worthy Abbe walking on the beach with a boy, who was his pupil. This boy, some twelve or thirteen years of age, was named Gaston de Beaucourt. His mother, the Comtesse de Beaucourt, owned a fine property some leagues from Trouville, between Pont l'Eveque and Lisieux. She invited us, in the most courteous and kindly way, to go and stay there before returning to Paris.

That charming and lovable boy, now a man of three-and-forty, and one of the best that ever lived, became my lifelong friend, to whose affection, sure and strong and tender, I owe not only the happiness our perfect mutual comprehension brings, but many a precious proof of the deepest and most unselfish devotion.

The Revolution of 1848 had just broken out when I resigned my post as chapel-master of the Missions Etrangeres. My duties during the four and a half years I held it had served me admirably in the development and improvement of my musical education; but they were not calculated to advance my career to any practical extent, for they kept me vegetating in a corner, as it were. There is only one road for a composer who desires to make a real name--the operatic stage. The stage is the one place where a musician can find constant opportunity and means of communicating with the public. It is a sort of daily and permanent exhibition where his works can be perpetually on view.

Religious and symphonic music no doubt rank higher, in the strictest sense, than dramatic composition; but opportunities for distinction in that highest sphere are very rare, and can only affect an occasional audience, not a regular and systematic one like the opera-going public. Then, again, look at the huge variety of subject which lies before the dramatic author! What scope for fancy, for invention! what endless plots!

The stage tempted me irresistibly. I was nearly thirty, and eager to try my fortune on the fresh field I dreamt of. But I had no libretto, and I knew nobody whom I could ask to write me one. Then I had to find an impresario willing to employ me and trust me with a commission; and who was likely to do that, in face of the undoubted fact that my previous training had been mostly confined to sacred music, and that I knew nothing about the stage? Altogether I was in a fix.

But fortune led me to a man who soon shed light upon my path. This was the violinist Seghers, who then managed the concerts of the Societe Ste. Cecile, in the Rue de la Chaussee d'Antin. Some compositions of mine had been performed at these concerts, and very favourably received. Seghers was a friend of the Viardots. Madame Viardot was then at the zenith of her talent and reputation--this was in 1849, just when she had created the _role_ of Fides in Meyerbeer's "Le Prophete" with such tremendous success. Madame Viardot received me with the utmost kindness, and suggested my letting her hear some of my work. I complied, of course, with the greatest delight. We spent a long time at the piano, and after listening to me with the kindest attention, she said--

"But, Monsieur Gounod, why do you not write an opera?"

"Indeed, Madame," I replied, "I would gladly do so, but I have no libretto."

"But surely you know somebody who could write you one?"

"Oh yes, no doubt I do; but 'could' and 'would' are very different words! I know, or rather when I was a child I _used_ to know, Emile Augier; we trundled our hoops together in the Luxemburg. But since those days Augier has grown famous, and I have remained in my native obscurity. I hardly think my old playmate would care to join me in anything more risky than a hoop race!"

"Very well," said Madame Viardot, "go and see Augier, and tell him that if he will write the libretto I will sing the principal part in your opera."

My readers may fancy I did not wait to be told that twice. I tore off to Augier, who accepted my suggestion with enthusiastic delight.

"What! Madame Viardot!" he cried. "I should rather think so! I will set to work at once!"

Nestor Roqueplan was then impresario at the Opera. He was quite willing, on Madame Viardot's recommendation, to give up part of an evening's performance to my work, but he could not, he said, spare more. So we had to look for a subject which would combine three essential points--(1) brevity, (2) interest, (3) a central female figure. We pitched on the story of Sappho. The opera could not, in any case, be put into rehearsal till the following year; besides, Augier had to finish a big work he was then employed on. It was, I believe, his "Diane" for Mademoiselle Rachel.

At all events I held a formal promise, and I awaited the event with mingled impatience and calm. Just as I was about to set to work, a crushing blow fell on me and mine. This was in April 1850. Augier had just finished the poem of "Sappho." My brother was taken ill on the 2nd; on the 3rd I signed my agreement with Roqueplan, whereby I undertook to hand him over the score of "Sappho" by September 30 at latest. This allowed me six months to compose and write a three-act opera, my maiden dramatic effort. On the night of the 6th of April my brother breathed his last. It was a fearful grief to my old mother and to all of us.

My brother left a widow, with a child of two years old, and the prospect of another. It was born seven months later, opening its baby eyes on this sad world on the very day when the Church joins us in mourning the memory of our beloved dead.

These sad circumstances induced many difficulties and complications which demanded close and immediate attention. The guardianship of the children, the carrying on of my brother's business as an architect (for his death left much work still unfinished), every possible consequence, in fact, of such a sudden and unforeseen disaster, forced me to devote my time for quite a month to safeguarding the interests and arranging for the future of my unhappy sister-in-law, whose grief had quite prostrated her, physically and mentally. Besides all this, my poor mother nearly lost her reason under the stunning blow which had fallen on her. Every circumstance, both personal and external, seemed combined to unfit me utterly for an undertaking for which the time at my disposal already seemed so insufficient.

Within about a month, however, I was able to think seriously of making the beginning which was growing so urgently necessary. Madame Viardot, who had been on tour in Germany, and whom I had informed of the sad trouble we were in, wrote at once to urge me to take my mother with me and settle down for a while at a country place of her own in the neighbourhood of La Brie, where, she said, I should have the quiet and calm I needed.

I took her advice, and my mother and I started for Madame Viardot's house, where we found her mother (Madame Garcia, widow of the famous singer), a sister of Monsieur Viardot's and a girl, his eldest child, who is now Madame Heritte, and a composer of considerable note. There, too, I met a most delightful man, Ivan Tourgueneff, the celebrated Russian author, a close and intimate friend of the Viardot family.

I set to work at once. Though--strange fact!--the feelings which had been so lately torn by painful emotion might naturally have been expected to find their first expression in sorrow-laden and pathetic strains, just the reverse took place. The first ideas that came to me were full of gaiety and brightness, and they filled all my brain, as if my inner nature, crushed down by grief and mourning, felt the need of some reaction, and longed to draw a breath of happier life after my long hours of anguish and days of tears and bitter mourning.

Thanks to the calmness of the atmosphere around me, my work progressed much faster than I had dared to hope. After her German tour, Madame Viardot's engagements took her to England, whence she returned in the beginning of September, and found my labour nearly completed. I hastened to play her my work, of which I anxiously desired her opinion. She was quite satisfied with it, and in the course of a few days she knew the score so well, that she was able to accompany the whole of it by heart. This is about the most wonderful musical feat I ever witnessed, and gives some idea of the extraordinary powers of that splendid musician.

"Sappho" was performed for the first time on April 16, 1851, just before my thirty-second birthday. It was not a success, but, all the same, it earned me a good position in the opinion of contemporary artists. It does indeed betray a lack of theatrical instinct, a want of knowledge of stage effect, and of the resources of an orchestra, and some ignorance in handling it. But, on the other hand, the expression is true in feeling, the appreciation of the subject, from the lyrical point of view, is fairly exact, and the general style of treatment is distinctly dignified in tendency. The finale of the first act produced an effect which fairly astonished me. It was loudly and unanimously encored. I could hardly believe my ears, though they were tingling with the unaccustomed emotion, but the encore was repeated at every subsequent performance.

The effect of the second act was not so good as that of the first, in spite of the success of an air sung by Madame Viardot, and of the light duet, "Va m'attendre, mon maitre," sung by Bremond and Mdlle. Poinsot. But the third act made a very good impression. The goatherd's song, "Broutez le thym, broutez mes chevres," was encored, and Sappho's final stanza, "O ma lyre immortelle," were loudly applauded.

The cowherd's song gave the tenor Aymes his first opportunity of appearing in public; he sang it beautifully, and thereby laid the foundation of his reputation. Gueymard and Marie took the parts of Phaon and Alcee.

My mother was present, of course, at the first performance of my opera. As I passed along one of the corridors on the way from the stage to the auditorium, where I was to meet her after the crowd had dispersed, I came upon my friend Berlioz, his eyes still wet with tears. I threw my arm round him, and said--

"Oh, dear Berlioz, come and show those wet eyes of yours to my mother. No newspaper paragraph about my opera will make her half so proud."

He granted my request, and said to her--

"Madame, I do not think anything has touched me so much for the last twenty years."

He afterwards published a notice of my opera, which I still regard as one of the most flattering and precious I have ever had the delight and honour of receiving.

"Sappho" was only acted six times. Madame Viardot's engagement was almost over, and her place in the opera was taken by Mdlle. Masson, who only sang the part three times.

I think it may safely be laid down as a general principle, that a theatrical work always, or almost always, has the public reception it really deserves. Theatrical success so inevitably depends on a variety of small details, that the failure of any one--of the merest accessories even--may (as has frequently happened) counterbalance, and perhaps utterly compromise, the effect of the finest qualities of conception and performance. Staging, ballet, scenery, dresses, book, fifty things go to make or mar an opera. The public, if its interest is to be kept alive, demands constant "variety." Many works of the very highest merit in some respects, have failed, not in rousing the admiration of true artists, but in winning popular favour, simply through their lack of this "spice," so indispensable to that class of the public which is not content with the simple charm of intellectual beauty.

I do not for a moment desire to claim the benefit of this excuse for my "Sappho." The public's right of passing judgment on any work offered to it is based on a prerogative peculiar to itself, and conferring special competence. It would be unfair to ask or expect it to possess that specific knowledge which would enable it to decide as to the technical value of a work of art. But, on the other hand, the public has a distinct right to expect and demand that a play or opera should satisfy those particular instincts the satisfaction and gratification of which it seeks within the playhouse walls. The success of a dramatic work then does not depend solely on the quality of its form and style. Both are no doubt essential--nay, indispensable--to save it from the rapid ravages of Time, whose scythe spares naught that is not essentially true and beautiful. But form and style are not its only, nor even, in a sense, its strongest support. They may and do strengthen and solidify success; they cannot make it.

The theatre-going public is a sort of dynamometer. It has nothing to do with the question of whether the play is in good taste or not. Its sole duty is to gauge what constitutes the true essence of every dramatic work--the strength of passion and the degree of emotion it expresses; its rendering, in fact, of the feelings which sway all human souls, individually and collectively. The consequence is, that author and audience become unconscious instruments in their mutual artistic education. The public is the author's criterion and measure of truth; the author serves his public as an exhibitor of the elements and conditions of the beautiful. This explanation is the only one, to my mind, which can account for the mysterious and incessant changes in public taste. What was madly sought for yesterday is neglected to-day; one evening will see men ready to tear to pieces the very thing the next morning will see them worshipping on bended knees.

Though not exactly a success, "Sappho" brought me some solid advantage, both present and future. On the very night of the first performance, Ponsard asked me to undertake the choral music for "Ulysse," a tragedy in five acts which he was just bringing out at the Theatre Francais. I agreed at once, although I did not know the play. It was quite enough for me to have the chance of collaborating with the author of "Lucrece," of "Charlotte Corday," and of "Agnes de Meranie." I felt quite safe. Arsene Houssaye was then at the head of the Comedie Francaise. He was obliged to add a chorus to the ordinary staff, and increase the orchestra as well.[13]

"Ulysse" was played on June 18, 1852. I had been married a few days previously to a daughter of Zimmerman,[14] the distinguished Professor of the Piano at the Conservatoire. To his school we owe Prudent, Marmontel, Goria, Lefebure-Wely, Ravina, Bizet, and many other fine musicians. By this marriage I became brother-in-law to the young painter, Edouard Dubufe, who was even then successfully following in his father's footsteps. His son, Guillaume Dubufe, seems, at the time I write, to be likely to maintain the reputation of his forefathers right worthily.

The principal parts in "Ulysse" were filled by Mademoiselle Judith, Messieurs Geffroy, Delaunay, and Maubant, Mademoiselle Nathalie, and others. The musical portion of the performance consisted of no less than fourteen choruses, one tenor solo, several melodramatic instrumental passages, and an orchestral overture. There was a certain risk of monotony in the general effect, as the composer was limited to orchestra and chorus; but I was fortunate enough to avoid the difficulty fairly well, and this second work of mine earned me fresh good-will in the artistic world. No publisher had offered to publish the score of "Sappho," but that of "Ulysse" was more favoured. Messieurs Escudier did me the honour and the kindness of printing it free of charge.

"Ulysse" had a run of forty performances. It was the second ordeal, as regards dramatic composition, through which my mother had watched me pass. The choruses of "Ulysse," as far as I can judge them, are fairly correct in character and expression, and are marked by a distinctly personal style. The orchestral treatment still fails from lack of experience, more than in actual colour, the general feeling for which strikes me as being fairly good.

A few days after my marriage I was appointed Superintendent of Instruction in Singing to the Communal Schools of the City of Paris, and Director of the Choral Society connected with them, in the place of Monsieur Hubert, himself the pupil and successor of Wilhem, the original creator of the said society.

This post I held for eight years and a half, and its duties were of the greatest service to me, musically speaking. They taught me to direct and utilise large masses of vocal sound, so as to develop the maxim of sonority under very simple methods of treatment.

My third musical venture on the stage was "La Nonne Sanglante," an opera in five acts, by Scribe and Germain Delarigne. Nestor Roqueplan, who was still Director of the Opera, had taken a fancy to "Sappho" and to me. I was capable, so he declared, of doing great things, and at his wish I wrote a five-act piece for the Opera. "La Nonne Sanglante" was written in 1852-53, rehearsed for the first time on October 18, 1853, put aside and rehearsed again several times over, and finally saw the footlights on October, 18, 1854, just a year after the first rehearsal. It was only acted eight times. Roqueplan was succeeded as Director of the Opera by Monsieur Crosnier, and as the new chief declared he would not allow "such stuff" to be acted, "La Nonne Sanglante" disappeared from the bills, and has never shown her face again.

It was rather a grief to me. The very respectable figure reached by the receipts certainly did not warrant such drastic and summary treatment. But directorial decisions sometimes, so I have heard it whispered, have hidden motives which it is vain to try and discover. In such cases the real reason is concealed, and some other pretext put forward.

I cannot say whether "La Nonne Sanglante" would have had any permanent success--I am inclined to think not. Not that the work was poor in effects; there were some most striking situations. But the subject is too uniformly gloomy. It had the drawback, too, of having a plot that was more than fanciful or improbable; it was downright impossible, and depended on a purely imaginary situation, utterly false, and therefore devoid of dramatic interest, which cannot exist without truthfulness, or at all events something approaching thereto.

I think, in the matter of orchestration, I made a forward stride in "La Nonne Sanglante." Some parts show an increased knowledge of instrumentation, and seem to bear the impress of a firmer hand. There is good colour in many scenes--such, for instance, as the Crusaders' Hymn, with Peter the Hermit and the chorus, in the first act; the symphonic prelude in the ruins, and the Ghosts' March, in the second; the tenor air and the duet with the Nun, in the third.

The principal parts were played by Mesdemoiselles Wertheimber and Poinsot, and Messieurs Gueymard, Depassio, and Merly.

I solaced my disappointment by writing a symphony (No. 1 in D) for the Societe des Jeunes Artistes, which had just been started by Pasdeloup, and which held its concerts in the Salle Herz, in the Rue de la Victoire. This symphony was so well received that I wrote another (No. 2 in E flat) for the same society. It too achieved a certain success.

About the same time I composed a Solemn Mass for St. Cecilia's Day, which was successfully performed for the first time on November 22, 1855, by the Association des Artistes Musiciens, in the Church of St. Eustache, and has often been given since. I dedicated this Mass to the memory of my father-in-law Zimmerman, whom we had lost on October 29, 1853.

Yet another misfortune overtook our family; on August 6, 1855, death snatched away my wife's elder sister, Juliette Dubufe, wife of Edouard Dubufe the painter, a rare and gifted creature, full of charming qualities, and of exceptional talent as a sculptress and a pianiste. "Goodness, wit, talent"--these are the words inscribed upon her tomb; a simple epitaph, but eloquent in its simplicity and well deserved, fitly expressing as it does the honour and regret showered on the memory of an exquisite nature, the charm of which fell irresistibly on all who approached her.

Nearly all my time was taken up with the management of the Choral Society. I wrote a number of things for the big concerts of this institution. Some were very well received; among others two Masses, one of which had been performed under my direction on June 12, 1853, at the Church of St Germain l'Auxerrois in Paris. During one of these great annual meetings of the Choral Society, on Sunday, June 8, 1856, my wife presented me with a son. (Three years before, on the 13th of the same month, we had mourned the loss of our eldest child, a girl, who was born dead). On the morning of the day when my boy was born, my brave wife contrived to hide her sufferings from me until I left home for the concert; and on my return in the afternoon, I found my son had opened his eyes upon the world.

The birth of this child, which I had deeply longed for, was a joy and a blessing to us both. He has been mercifully spared to us, is now over one-and-twenty, and hopes to be a painter.

Since the withdrawal of "La Nonne Sanglante" I had done no dramatic work; but I had written a short oratorio, called "Tobie," which George Hainl (then conductor of the orchestra at the Grand Theatre at Lyons) had asked me to compose for one of his annual benefit concerts. This oratorio, as it strikes me, has certain qualities both of sentiment and of expression. Some attention was attracted by a somewhat touching air for the youthful Tobias, and by several other passages which had a good deal of pathos about them. In 1856 I made the acquaintance of Jules Barbier and Michel Carre. I suggested to them to collaborate with me, and trust me with a libretto. They agreed to do so in a very friendly way. The first subject I put forward for collaboration was "Faust." The idea pleased them both. We went to see Monsieur Carvalho, at that time Director of the Theatre Lyrique, in the Boulevard du Temple. He had just brought out Victor Masse's "Reine Topaze," in which Madame Miolan-Carvalho had achieved a striking success. Monsieur Carvalho approved of our notion, and my two friends set to work at once. I had myself done about half my share of the work, when Monsieur Carvalho suddenly informed me that the Theatre de la Porte Saint Martin was on the point of bringing out a melodrama under the name of "Faust," and that this fact completely upset his calculations with regard to our work. He rightly thought we should never be ready before the Porte Saint Martin, and even so, it would be imprudent to enter into competition with a theatre whose well-known splendour as to _mise en scene_ would draw half Paris just before our piece appeared.

He therefore begged us to choose some other subject, but this sudden upset made it impossible for me to turn my thoughts into another channel, and for more than a week I was unable to do any work at all.

At last Monsieur Carvalho asked me to write a comic opera, and to take my subject from Moliere. This was the origin of the "Medecin malgre lui," which was produced at the Theatre Lyrique on January 15, 1858, the anniversary of Moliere's birth.

The announcement of a comic opera from the pen of a musician whose former ventures had been in such a different style seemed to bode disappointment. But these fears (some of them were hopes perhaps?) were not justified by the event, for the "Medecin malgre lui" was, _malgre cela_, my first really successful opera.[15]

But all my delight was shattered by the death of my poor mother. She had been ill for some months, and completely blind for two years previously. She died on January 16, 1858, the very day after the first performance, aged seventy-seven years and a half. Fate did not permit me to brighten her last days with the fruit of my labour, and the just recompense of the life she had so unceasingly devoted to her children and their future. I can only hope that before she left us she knew and foresaw that her struggle had not been in vain, and that her self-sacrifice had brought a great reward.

The "Medecin malgre lui" had an uninterrupted run of a hundred nights. The work was staged with the greatest care. Monsieur Got, of the Comedie Francaise, was good enough, at the request of the Director, to bestow his invaluable advice as to the traditional mounting of the piece and the declamation of the spoken dialogue. The chief part, that of Sganarelle, was played by the baritone Meillet, whose voice was full and round, and his play spirited. He made a great success both as a singer and an actor. The other male parts were taken by Girardot, Wartel, Fromant, and Lesage (the two latter afterwards replaced by Potel and Gabriel), and all in the very best manner. The two principal ladies' parts were held by Mesdemoiselles Faivre and Girard, both of them full of life and animation.

This score, the first comic work I ever did, is in a light and easy style which savours of the Italian opera-bouffe. I have endeavoured to recall the style of Lulli in certain passages, but the work as a whole keeps to the modern forms, and belongs to the French school. Among the numbers which most took the public taste were the "Chanson des Glouglous," excellently sung by Meillet, and invariably encored; the "Trio de la Bastonnade," the "Sextuor de la Consultation," a "Fabliau," the "Scene de Consultation des Paysans," and a duet for Sganarelle and the nurse.

The Porte-Saint-Martin "Faust" had just been brought out; but all its magnificent staging did not ensure the melodrama a very long run. Monsieur Carvalho consequently reverted to our former plan, and I at once set to work upon the opera which I had laid aside to write the "Medecin."

My "Faust" was first put into rehearsal in September 1858. Before I left Paris for Switzerland, where I was to spend the holidays with my wife and son, then two years old, I had gone through the work with Monsieur Carvalho in the Foyer of his theatre. At that time nothing had been settled as to the cast, and Monsieur Carvalho had asked my leave to bring his wife, who lived opposite the theatre, to hear me play over the work. She was so struck with the _role_ of Marguerite, that Monsieur Carvalho begged me to let her sing it. I was naturally only too delighted, and the result proved my decision to have been something like an inspiration.

All the same, the rehearsals of "Faust" were not fated to pursue "the even tenor of their way" without many checks and difficulties. The tenor who was to have played "Faust," although gifted with a beautiful voice and a handsome presence, turned out not to be equal to so heavy a part. A short time before the date fixed for the first performance, it became necessary to find some one to take his place; and the part was offered to Monsieur Barbot, who happened to be disengaged. Within a month Barbot had mastered it and was ready to perform. So the opera was acted for the first time on March 19, 1859.

Though "Faust" did not strike the public very much at first, it is the greatest theatrical success I have ever had. Do I mean that it is the best thing I have written? That I cannot tell. I can only reiterate the opinion I have already expressed, that success is more the result of a certain concatenation of favourable elements and successful conditions, than a proof and criterion of the intrinsic value of a work. Public favour is attracted in the first instance by outward appearances; all inward and solid qualities can do is to retain and strengthen it. It takes some time to grasp and absorb the innumerable details which go to make up a drama.

Dramatic art is a branch of the art of portraiture; its function is to delineate character, as that of the painter is to present feature and attitude. Every lineament, all those momentary and fleeting inflections which constitute that individual physiognomy known as a "personality," must be grasped and reproduced. Shakespeare's immortal figures of Hamlet, Richard III., Othello, and Lady Macbeth are so true to the type which each expresses, that they hold a real and living place in every mind. Well may they be called "creations."

Dramatic music is ruled by the same laws, and cannot otherwise exist. Its object, too, is to portray feature; but where painting conveys an impression at a glance, music has to tell its story by degrees, and thus often fails to produce the intended effect at a first hearing.

None of my previous works could have led the world to expect anything like "Faust" from me; it was a surprise to the public, both as to style and interpretation.

Of course the part of Marguerite was not the first in which Madame Carvalho had found scope for that marvellous style and power of execution which have set her in the highest place among contemporary singers; but no previous _role_ had given her so fine an opportunity of displaying the lyric and pathetic side of her gifts. Her Marguerite made her reputation in this respect, and will always be one of the glories of her brilliant career. Barbot sang the difficult part of Faust like the great musician he is. Balanque, who created the part of Mephistopheles, was a clever actor, whose gesture, appearance, and voice admirably suited that weird and diabolical personage. Although he somewhat overacted the part, he made a great success. The smaller parts of Siebel and Valentine were very creditably performed by Mademoiselle Faivre and Monsieur Raynal.

As to the score itself, it raised such a whirlwind of debate and criticism, that my hopes of a real success grew faint indeed.

LETTERS

I

MONSIEUR H. LEFUEL, _Poste Restante, Genoa_.

(If Monsieur Lefuel does not call for his letters at Genoa, kindly forward to the Academie de France at Rome.)

VIENNA, _Monday, August 21, 1842_.

MY DEAR HECTOR,--Some week or so ago I had a letter from Hebert, to whom I had written in the first instance from Vienna. He tells me you are somewhere near Genoa, but cannot exactly tell me where. As you have consistently neglected me, my dear fellow, all through my travels, and as I found no news of you at either Florence, Venice, or Vienna, I was obliged to ask a mutual friend whether he happened to know your address and could let me have it. From Hebert's answer I gather he has been luckier than I. He knew your whereabouts at anyrate, and could write to you, and get news of you. Yet you were perfectly well aware, hateful old monster that you are, that your sorrowing relation would have rejoiced over even the veriest line from you. But not a scratch of your pen have I seen all through my journey. So how was I to write to you? I longed to always, and you never gave me a chance of doing it! As likely as not, this letter will arrive and find you flown, which accounts for the extreme precautions you may observe in the directions on my envelope.

If I were anywhere within reach, I should have a real good row with you. What on earth are you thinking of? Has your patriarchal tenderness waxed so faint that you feel no temptation to write your eldest-born a few of those inspiring sentences he so deeply values? Even supposing you had not had time to write, I might at all events have kept you posted about many matters which interested me then, and do so still, and which would not have been indifferent, I think, to you.

However, now I have had my grumble, dearest and best of friends and patriarchs, I will forget your crimes, and grant you my hearty pardon. I know right well how you detest all letter-writing; I know, too, that you never waste your time. That fact was made so clear to me at Rome, that I never dreamt of putting down your silence to laziness. So I will forget everything, except our mutual friendship.

I have wanted for some time to let you hear of a bit of good fortune I have had here. The Mass I wrote in Rome, for the King's fete-day at San Luigi de Francesi, is to be performed, with full orchestra, here in Vienna, on the 6th of September. This is a piece of luck which has never fallen in the way of any other Academy student, and has only come in mine through my having made acquaintance with some kindly artists, who have introduced me to others who have special influence here.

I am working very hard; I see very few people, and seldom go out. I am up to the eyes in a Requiem with full orchestral accompaniment, which will probably be performed in Germany on November 2. The officials of the church where my Roman Mass is to be given have already offered to have my Requiem done as well. But as I am not yet quite certain whether I shall think the rendering of the Mass satisfactory, I give no decided answer for the present. Through my acquaintance with Madame Henzel and with Mendelssohn, I might be able to secure a far finer performance of the work in Berlin, and this would have the advantage of raising me much higher in the opinion of my brother artists. But my hands are still quite free as regards the Vienna performance. If I am satisfied with the way my Mass is given on September 8, I shall let them do the Requiem here; if not, I shall take it to Berlin. When Madame Henzel was in Rome, she said to me, "When you come to Germany, my brother might be of the greatest use to you, if you have any music you wish to have performed."

I wrote to her to Berlin some days ago, and as I mean to leave this on September 12, and make a tour through Munich, Leipzig, Berlin, Dresden, and Prague, I asked her to be good enough to tell me if she thought I might hope to get any of my music performed in Berlin. When I get her answer, I shall see my way clearer. If she says yes, I shall stop in Berlin until the beginning of November, and then go straight back to Paris; if she says no, I shall return to Vienna, to which place the railway would get me back in four days. There is a line from Vienna to Olmutz, which would save me about sixty leagues. If I have to stop in Berlin for my Requiem, I shall travel by a different route; thus, Munich, Prague, Dresden, and Leipzig to Berlin. In any case I will let you know, as soon as I know myself.

I often regret our beautiful Rome, my dear Hector, and cordially do I envy those who have the luck to be there still. I really think my recollection of that lovely land is the chief charm and happiness of my present life. If you only _knew_ what all the other countries I have travelled through look like after Italy!

The last thing I saw, and it made a deep and lasting impression on me, was Venice. You know all its beauties, so I will not go into long descriptions or ecstasies of admiration. You know all my feelings on the subject.

No doubt, dear friend, you have heard of the death of our comrade Blanchard. Deeply as I regret him, I know your grief is greater still, for you knew him far better even than I did. Such shadows are well-nigh sure to fall on every meeting after prolonged separation, and, commonplace as it may sound, there is something terribly indispensable about that word which closes every letter one writes.

Farewell, dear friend, farewell! I greet you as friend greets friend, nay, more, as brother greets brother. I hope _we_, at least, may meet again! Good-bye.--Ever yours,

CHARLES GOUNOD.

II

MONSIEUR CHARLES GOUNOD, _47 Rue Pigalle, Paris_.

_November 19._

MY DEAR GOUNOD,--I have just gone through your choruses for "Ulysse" with the greatest care. The work as a whole seems to me to have considerable merit, and the interest of the music rises as that of the drama intensifies. The double chorus of "the Banquet" is exceedingly good, and will make a powerful effect if properly performed. I do not think the Comedie Francaise can or will be at all stingy in the matter of your orchestra. The music alone, to my mind, will suffice to draw the public for a considerable number of nights, and it should therefore be to the direct and pecuniary interest of the Director that a large proportion of what is laid out on producing the play should be allocated to the musical part of the work. I think this will turn out to be the case. At the same time, do not give an inch on the matter. Get what you want, or take nothing at all. Be very careful who you give your solos to; one bad singer will utterly spoil the chances of a whole song.

Look at the page I have turned down; there is a mistake in the time, just at the opening of a verse, which I think you would be wise to alter. Men like you and me oughtn't to scan like that. We must leave that sort of thing to people who don't know their work. Best and sincerest good wishes.--Yours always,

H. BERLIOZ.

III

MONSIEUR HECTOR LEFUEL, _20 Rue du Tournon, Paris_.

MY DEAR HECTOR,--I called on you about a month ago to tell you a very important piece of news, which you, in your well-earned quality of friend and "father," have a right to know before anybody else. I am to be married next month to Mademoiselle Agnes Zimmerman. We are all as pleased as we can be, and I believe we may look forward to very solid and lasting happiness. My future wife's family is very good and kind, and I am lucky enough to be a general favourite there already.

I know, dear friend, you will be the first to congratulate me on this new and happy prospect. But our joy must be tinged with sadness when we think of the memories it must bring back to our poor Marthe[16], who still mourns the love she prized so much and lost so soon. God grant the sisterly affection my wife will give her may atone for the pangs the sight of our new-found happiness may cause her! I feel quite sure I may hope for this, for their two sweet natures are strongly drawn to each other even now.

Good-bye, dear Hector. Always yours most affectionately. My best regards to Madame Lefuel.

CHARLES GOUNOD.

IV

MONSIEUR PIGNY[17], _Rue d'Enghien, Paris_.

LUCERNE, _Tuesday, August 28, 1855_.

MY DEAR FRIEND PIGNY,--In my mother's letter, received to-day, she speaks with deep and grateful emotion of your more than filial devotion to her since my departure, and of the kindly care with which you offered to see personally to all the details of her move from the country. It is a considerable undertaking for an old lady like her, in spite of her simple wants and habits.

You who worship two mothers, so they tell me--self-sacrifice and renunciation (I use these names advisedly; I can find no other epithets to express my meaning)--will understand me when I tell you that what you do for her is the very tenderest and best thing you can do for me, for you help and complete a work I can never accomplish to my fullest satisfaction--I mean the endeavour to repay a tithe of the care, the sacrifices, the anxiety, the devotion she has lavished on me through many years of noble, patient, faithful toil. We have filled all her life, in fact, and she, alas! can only fill a part of ours.

I assure you, dear Pigny, I am most deeply touched by this proof that you already treat me as your friend. Apart from the universal affection in which all here hold you, nothing could give you greater claim and title to mine than the delicate deference and kindness you have so gracefully shown my honoured and beloved mother.

CHARLES GOUNOD.

LATER LETTERS OF

CHARLES GOUNOD

1870-1871[18]

I

VARANGEVILLE, _Sunday, September 4_.

MY DEARS,--As you may well imagine, our dear grandmother is very uncertain as to what she should do. You know kind Louisa Brown has written pressingly and repeatedly to offer grandmamma a home at Blackheath until she can settle down, and the invitation is specifically extended to _you_ as well as to _ourselves_.

My own responsibility weighs heavy on me at this juncture. Persuasion or dissuasion strike me as being equally serious in their results. I should like to know dear Pigny's mind on the subject. As to my own ideas, here they are.

If cruel fortune gives Prussia the victory (no easy matter, as it seems to me), and if France is to be humiliated under a foreign conqueror, I should never have courage, I confess, to go on living under the enemy's yoke.

Well, granting the Emperor's captivity, MacMahon's defeat, and our loss of eighty thousand men to be undoubted and accomplished facts, my first duty, as it strikes me, is to convey our mother, my wife, and my two children to London, as a _provisional arrangement_. Speak, then, good Pigny! I hearken with all my ears!

II

8 MORDEN ROAD, BLACKHEATH, LONDON.

Yes, my dear fellow, you are perfectly right! The peace proposals Prussia dreams of are a crying shame. But the shame, thank God, lies wholly with the proposing party. They bring glory to those who reject them.

Like you I feel, I will not say humiliated, but cut to the very heart by the horrible misfortunes which have befallen our poor unhappy France. So much so, that I keep wondering, every hour of the day, whether the duty of those who are called to the honour and happiness of defending our country is not less heavy than that you and I have to perform, and which no man would choose if he felt he must blush for the performance of it. Alas! dear friend, this once, at all events, in history, Frenchmen in general have spilt their noble blood so gallantly, that the shame of those who only think of their own personal safety clings to themselves alone. But the glory of victory nowadays (for the first time, perhaps, in this world's history) is won by machinery rather than by men, and disasters will be weighed in the same balance. The Prussians have not been braver than we. We have been less fortunate than they.

You know already, and I say it again, if you decide to re-enter any gate of Paris, I will not let you go alone. Family life means something more than mere family dinner!

Well, here we are at last, dear friend, in our new dwelling, after eighteen days spent in the enjoyment of the simplest and sincerest hospitality. Some Englishmen there are who will not let us Frenchmen feel we are in England. The manner in which our good and kind friend Brown has shared our trouble proves it.

But the external peace we have found here gives us no inward calm. The longer this horrible bloody war of pride and extermination lasts, the more do I feel my very heart-strings wrung with grief for my unhappy country; and anything that seems to rouse me from my sad contemplation of our beloved France, far from comforting me, as with kindness, stings like an insult.

Oh, most unhappy earth! wretched home of the human race! where barbarism not only still exists, but is taken for glory, and permitted to obscure the pure and beneficent rays of the only true glory in existence, the glory of love, of science, and of genius! Humanity yet lingers, it would seem, under the grim shadows of chaos, amidst the monstrosities of the iron age; and instead of driving their weapons into the earth to benefit their fellow-creatures, men plunge them into each other's hearts to decide the ownership of the actual soil. Barbarians! savages!

Ah, dear fellow, let me make an end, or I shall go on for ever, for very sorrow!

The dear ones near me, who are dear to you too, are well. Would we could have hidden them a little less far off--in Paris!

III

8 MORDEN ROAD, BLACKHEATH PARK, LONDON, _Wednesday, October 12, 1870_.

DEAR FRIENDS,--As our correspondence is the only thing we have left to help us struggle against the pain of separation, we ought, so far as circumstances permit, to make the most of it; for we cannot be sure, alas! that what can be done to-day will be possible to-morrow. So we have settled with grandmamma that we will write in turn, as long as you are at Varangeville. My turn falls to-day.

I have just seen a French newspaper, dear Pi, which reports that the Sous-Prefet of Dieppe has posted an order forbidding any Frenchman under sixty years of age to leave the country. So that you are now interned in France, not by your own will only, but by order of the authorities. But as I am not in France, and as I left before any such prohibition was published, I should like you to let me know whether this order is accompanied by another, which seems to me its inevitable corollary, or rather its cause, and its logical explanation--I mean the calling out of all able-bodied men under sixty years of age. For I fail to understand an order not to leave France, as applied to men who are not to be called on to defend the country. So I beg you will send me the best-authenticated information you can come by. I will not let you carry a rifle without shouldering mine alongside of you; and though I am a poor shot, you need not fear my being so clumsy as to shoot you by accident. We _must_ be side by side, if there is any question of either of us going under fire. I have already told you so, and my own inaptitude for military duty has nothing to do or to say in the question. I have looked on the steps I have taken, up to this, as an absolute duty. That duty would become merely relative, consequently less, and therefore null and void, if another and a greater should appear to over-ride it.

Our poor beloved country is in a very serious position--worse, as far as I can see, than in any previous trial. Never before have the two great problems of external struggle and internal union loomed so urgent or so huge. I feel certain that internal union, in the face of the common enemy, does actually exist. Whether it is merely temporary, or whether it will continue after the struggle is over--whatever may be its issue--that's the question! Victor or vanquished, will France emerge a republic? In any case--whatever the resistance Paris makes, and her ultimate fate--it will be long, I think, before France is utterly devoured. The mouthful is a large one, and it may not turn out altogether easy to break up.

Well, we all send our affectionate love. All friendly messages to your kind hosts, and my affectionate respects to M. le Cure, whom I shall never forget.

IV

_October 19, 1870_, 12.30 P.M.

MY DEAR ONES,--We are just going out with Mrs. Brown, who is coming in her carriage to take us to the Crystal Palace. The fountains play to-day for the last time this season, and she has set her heart on our seeing them. As you may fancy, dear Pigny, I shall hardly realise what is going on before my eyes. I can see nothing but our country. I see it clearer, more incessantly than when I was within its borders!

Ah! dear friend, will no one rise up and lead our brave-hearted Frenchmen on some steady line of conduct? Failing that, even the most heroic courage will avail us nothing. See how, one by one, one after the other, as though by some strange unheard-of fate, they all fall into the jaws of that huge automaton, that monstrous hydra-headed artillery! Every one of them founders in that hostile ocean, dashing gallantly and ceaselessly against that ever-growing mountain of cannon, and shot, and shell, and strange engines of war, and battalions that seem to start ready armed out of the earth wherever the enemy chances to need them! and meanwhile our generals are being dismissed, or moved from one command to another,--they are left without orders, and thrown on their own resources, to take the chance of whatever their private or personal inspiration may dictate. Three thousand men cut up, to the last man, in a desperate hopeless defence of the Orleans railway station, all unconscious that the opposing force numbers five-and-thirty thousand!! Surely it is sheer madness thus to cast the blood, and bravery, and downright heroism of these splendid fellows into the outer darkness of what fate (or is it mere chance?) may bring!

We ought _all_ to be standing face to face with the Prussians at this moment. Every one of us, or not a soul! And it astounds me that three million Frenchmen and thirty thousand cannon were not summoned, over a month ago, under one and the same flag (not that of France alone, but of humanity in general), to repulse this invasion of machines rather than of men! Here comes Mrs. Brown. Good-bye for awhile!

V

8 MORDEN ROAD, BLACKHEATH PARK, _Tuesday, November 8, 1870_.

DEAR EDOUARD,--We are just going to change houses again. We leave Morden Road next Saturday for London, where my work and engagements render my presence indispensable. I must get back to work--and to useful work. I cannot let myself pine and dwindle any longer in endless, hopeless sorrow. In another month I should be utterly incapable.

If I can write, and sell what I write, I will sell my work.

If I have to give lessons, I will teach: for the armistice is breaking down, and nobody knows what winter may bring with it. So our poor little flock is scattered, dear fellow! Not in heart indeed, but in body; and "Je ne suis pas de ceux qui disent ce n'est rien!... Je dis que c'est beaucoup!" as old La Fontaine has it.