CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 MUSIC 
 
Cornell University Library 
 ML 410.B51B47 
 
 Hector Berlioz. 
 
 3 1924 022 354 256 
 
The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
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 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924022354256 
 
MUSIC LIBRARY 
 
 NOVELLO'S PRIMERS OF MUSICAL BIOGRAPHY. 
 
 HECTOR BERLIOZ 
 
 BY 
 
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 PRICE TWO SHILLINGS. 
 
 LONDON: NOVELLO, EWER AND CO., 
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HECTOR BERLIOZ. 
 
 HeCtor Berlioz was born, December n, 1803, in the little 
 town of La C6te Saint Andre", department of the Isere — a 
 place not unfitted to bring forth a musician and a poet. The 
 master himself says of it : — 
 
 La C6te Saint Andre,, as its name indicates, is built upon the 
 side of a hill, overlooking a vast plain, rich, sumptuous, and 
 verdant, the silence of which has I know not what dreamy 
 majesty, heightened by the belt of mountains on the south and 
 east, far behind which range themselves, studded with glaciers, 
 the gigantic peaks of the Alps. 
 
 He came of "respectable" parentage, his father being a 
 medical man of some note in the department, and the owner 
 of a comfortable little property. Louis Berlioz seems to have 
 had a far greater share than his wife in moulding the character 
 of their son ; and it is, therefore, interesting to know what 
 manner of man he was. On this point, Hector is a sufficient 
 witness : — 
 
 He inspired immense confidence, not only in our little town, 
 but also in those near at hand. He worked incessantly, believing 
 the conscience of an honest man pledged when he undertook the 
 practice of an art so difficult and dangerous as medicine, and 
 that, within the limit of his powers, he ought to consecrate all 
 his time to study. . . . He always honoured his functions by 
 discharging them in the most disinterested way, rather as a bene- 
 factor of the poor than as one who lived by his exertions. 
 
 After observing that, at the moment of writing, his father 
 had retired from practice, Hector goes on : — 
 
 He is gifted with a liberal mind — that is to say, he has no 
 social, political, or religious prejudices. He had nevertheless so 
 formally promised my mother never to tempt me away from beliefs 
 which she thought necessary to "my welfare that several times, I 
 
 B 
 
HECTOR BERLIOZ i 
 
 remember, he heard me recite my catechism. . . . When I was 
 ten years old, he put me to a little school at La C&te for the study 
 of Latin ; but he soon took me away, resolved to undertake my 
 education himself. Poor father, with what indefatigable patience, 
 with what minute and intelligent care he was my master in 
 languages, literature, historyj geography, and even music, will 
 soon be seen. 
 
 Over the childhood of Berlioz we may pass lightly. The 
 son of the village doctor of La C6te Saint Andre appears 
 to have been something out of the common from infancy. 
 Highly sensitive to beauty in any form, music began to 
 make a deep impression upon him when, by special favour, 
 he jvas admitted to his first communion, in the chapel of a 
 convent, where singing maidens clothed in white surrounded 
 him : he believed that, like Stephen, he saw the heavens 
 opened, and became so pious that he went to Mass every 
 day, and to confession as frequently as possible. " Father," 
 he would say to his spiritual director, " I have done no- 
 thing;" and the priest would answer, "My son, so con- 
 tinue." Berlioz adds that he too often followed the advice. 
 Of course this sensitive nature fell in love — at twelve years 
 — and, naturally, with a damsel much older than himself. 
 Estelle Gautier was the name of the honoured maiden. She 
 was eighteen, grandly beautiful, and disposed to ridicule 
 her little lover. This made the heart of the boy desolate. 
 "I hid myself," he tells us, "like a wounded bird, mute 
 and suffering." But Estelle went her way, married, bore 
 children, and when Berlioz again met her she did not 
 know him. So does a real world settle the affairs of the 
 ideal. Denied the happfness of reciprocated love, the boy 
 sought the consolation of such music as, after a lesson or 
 two in fingering from his father, he could get out of a 
 flageolet. From the flageolet he rose to the flute, then 
 studied harmony from a book by Alembert, and wrote two 
 quintets, which he burnt. His compositions at this period 
 must have been melancholy things. " Nearly all my melo- 
 dies were in the minor mode. I was conscious of the fault, 
 but could not avoid it. A black veil covered my thoughts. 
 Meanwhile his father would not allow him to study the 
 pianoforte. He intended the boy for his own profession, 
 and feared that the instrument would be too seductive. On 
 this Berlioz characteristically says : — 
 When I consider the frightful quantity of platitudes which it 
 
HIS LIFE. 
 
 (the "pianoforte) facilitates day after day, and that their authors 
 could not, for the most part, write at all if, deprived _of their 
 musical kaleidoscope, they had nothing but pen and paper, I am 
 bound to thank the chance which obliged me to compose silently 
 and freely, shielded me from the tyranny of finger habits, so dan- 
 gerous to thought, and from the seductive influence which the 
 sonority of commonplace always exerts upon a composer. 
 
 In 1822, he being then nineteen years old, Berlioz went 
 to Paris as a medical student, but, despite parental injunc- 
 tions, he gave himself up more and more to the charms of 
 music, and eventually offered himself to Lesueur as a pupil, 
 on the strength of a cantata for voices and grand orchestra* 
 which he had written. The old man looked at the work 
 and said : " There is a good deal of fire and dramatic energy 
 there, but you don't know how to write, and your harmony 
 contains so many faults that it is useless to point any of 
 them out." Upon this Berlioz was sent back to elementary 
 studies in the antiquated system to which Lesueur adhered. 
 No two men could have been more unlike in temperament 
 and taste than were master and pupil, but Lesueur took 
 kindly to the young medical student, walked with him in the 
 public gardens, and even permitted him to assail the very 
 system of harmony which the one taught and the other 
 learned. The self-confidence of Berlioz at this period was 
 sublime. He asked M. Andrieux, his professor of literature, 
 to write him an opera libretto ; tried to borrow 1,200 francs 
 from M. de Chateaubriand, to meet the expenses of bringing 
 out a Mass ; and having composed a 'scena which he thought 
 might be introduced into " Athalie," at the Th6atre Fran- 
 gais, he actually started to open negotiations with Talma on 
 the subject. But the great tragedian was spared an inter- 
 view : — 
 
 Approaching his house, I felt a bad augury in the beating of 
 my heart. The very sight of the door made me tremble, and 
 upon the threshold I stopped in frightful perplexity. Should I go 
 farther ? Should I give up the idea ? Twice I lifted my arm to 
 ring the bell ; twice I let it fall to my side ; the blood rushed to 
 my face and sounded in my ears; a tumult raged within me. 
 Finally, timidity prevailed ; and, sacrificing all my hopes, I went, 
 or rather ran, away as fast as I could. 
 
 The story of the Mass to which reference has already been 
 made shows that Berlioz, though afraid to face Talma, could 
 
 * " Le Cheval Arabe ;" poem by Millevoge. 
 
 B Z 
 
HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 encounter and struggle victoriously against bitter disap- 
 pointment. M. Masson, chapelmaster of St. Roch, having 
 suggested that he should write a Mass for Innocents' Day, 
 Berlioz set to work with all the ardour of his nature, and 
 soon finished a composition which imitated the style of 
 Lesueur. Faithfully promised an orchestra one hundred 
 strong, with voices in proportion, he naturally desired to 
 obtain the services of a conductor accustomed to control 
 large numbers of executants. Hereupon, with the audacity 
 peculiarly his own, he brought the influence of Lesueur to 
 bear upon M. Valentino, of the Grand-Op6ra, and, what is 
 more, succeeded. But alas for the sanguine and unre- 
 flecting confidence of youth ! — 
 
 The day of general rehearsal arrived, and with it our great 
 mass of voices and instruments, which turned out to be fifteen 
 tenors, five basses, two boys, nine violins, a viola, an oboe, a 
 horn, and a bassoon. Judge of my' shame and despair in offering 
 to the renowned chief of one of the first orchestras in the world 
 such a musical phalanx. "Be calm," M. Masson kept saying; 
 "it will be all right at performance." Resigned to circumstances, 
 Valentino gave the signal to commence, but in a few moments 
 everyone began to find his copy full of faults. Here they had 
 forgotten to write the sharps or flats of the key, there they had 
 left out rests, in another place they had omitted thirty bars. . . . 
 I suffered the torments of hell, and was eventually obliged to give 
 up, for that time, the attempt at realising my long-cherished 
 dream of a grand orchestral performance. 
 
 This defeat, however, did the young man good, and he 
 confesses it with the frankness that makes his autobiography 
 so charming. In the little of the Mass that was heard its 
 composer detected many faults, and bravely resolved to write 
 it nearly all over again. Meanwhile, his parents had learned 
 the failure at St. Roch, and added to his troubles by turning 
 his musical pretensions into ridicule. " But," he tells us, " I 
 swallowed all in silence, and persisted none the less." 
 
 Anxious for the rewritten Mass, and failing to borrow 1,200 
 francs of Chateaubriand, Berlioz had become profoundly dis- 
 couraged, when chance — if chance there be in men's affairs 
 — threw him in the way of a young man, Augustin de Pons, 
 with whom he had previously formed some acquaintance. 
 Here was the longed-for 'Deus ex machind. De Pons found 
 the money; the chorus of the Op6ra was engaged, with a full 
 orchestra, Valentino conducted, and the Mass was splendidly 
 
HIS LIFE. 
 
 performed. We may add here that the work was given a 
 second time at the church of St. Eustache, on St. Cecilia's 
 Day, 1827. Writing to his friend Humbert, Berlioz expressed 
 the feelings with which his music inspired him in a passionate 
 manner, soon to become familiar :* — 
 
 My Mass was performed on St. Cecilia's Day with double the 
 success of the previous occasion. The little corrections I had 
 made sensibly improved it, and the piece " Et iterum venturus," 
 which was wanting before, was executed this time in an astound- 
 ing manner by six trumpets, four horns, three trombones, and 
 two ophicleides. The choral theme which follows, given to all 
 the voices in octaves — 
 
 S 
 
 -k 
 
 ® 
 
 fe 
 
 >-fe 
 
 J=i 
 
 =t=t 
 
 -M 
 
 k&r b^bT^. 
 
 lsfe= 
 
 :s5 HfBg 
 
 ±=t 
 
 t*-jV 
 
 ±=i==t--t 
 
 Brass. I 
 
 with a burst of "brass" in the middle, made a terrible im- 
 pression upon everybody. For my part, I had fairly preserved 
 my coolness up to that point, and it was important that I should 
 not be upset. I conducted the orchestra, but when I saw that 
 picture of the Last Judgment, heard that announcement by six 
 deep basses in unison, that terrible clangor tubarum, those cries 
 of fear from the multitude represented by the chorus, all given 
 exactly as I had wished, I was seized with a convulsive trembling 
 that I had the strength to master till the end of the piece, but 
 which then obliged me to sit down, and let the orchestra remain 
 quiet for some minutes. ... I have succeeded beyond my hopes. 
 ... I have received felicitations from all parts. 
 
 Yet Berlioz was not content with his work : — 
 After this new trial I could not entertain a doubt as to the little 
 value of my Mass, and taking out the " Resurrexit," with which 
 I was satisfied., I burned the rest, along with the Beverley scena, 
 ... the opera of " Estelle," and a Latin oratorio, " The Passage 
 of the Red Sea," that I had just finished. A cold, inquisitorial 
 eye made_me discover its incontestable right to figure in that 
 auto-da-fe. 
 
 By the way, Berlioz destroyed the " Resurrexit" itself some 
 * " Lettres Intimes," p. 5- 
 
HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 time after, and a grim fate eventually decided that De Pons 
 should put an end to his life by taking poison. 
 
 Lesueur now wished Berlioz to enter his harmony class 
 at the Conservatoire, but did not think it necessary to intro- 
 duce him just then to Cherubini, the formidable head of that 
 institution. As a matter of fact, Berlioz and the Florentine 
 had met already, under circumstances which the younger 
 man feared his elder would remember. The encounter came 
 about in this way. Responsible for the good order of the 
 Conservatoire, Cherubini had provided separate entrances for 
 the male and female students, of which arrangement Berlioz 
 being ignorant, he, one day, in going to the public library, 
 did so by the door set apart for ladies. A servant tried to 
 stop him, but in vain. Berlioz pushed on, and had soon 
 forgotten the incident in the -delight of reading a score of 
 Gluck. A few minutes later Cherubini entered with the 
 servant, who said, pointing to Berlioz, " There he is " : — 
 
 Cherubini was so angry that he could scarcely articulate. 
 "Ah, ah, ah, ah! it is you," he said at last, with an Italian 
 accent which rage made more droll ; "it is you who enter by the 
 forbidden door !" " Monsieur, I did not know your rule ; another 
 time I will conform to it." " Another time ! What brings you 
 here?" "You see, monsieur, I come to study the scores of 
 Gluck." " How do the scores of Gluck concern you ? Who 
 gave you leave to come to the library ? " " Monsieur — (I began to 
 lose my coolness) — I consider Gluck's scores the most beautiful in 
 dramatic music, and I want nobody's leave to stay here. From 
 ten to three the library is open to the public, and I have a right 
 to profit, by the fact." " The right ! " " Yes, monsieur." "I 
 forbid you to come again." " I shall come, all the same." 
 "What do you call yourself?" cried he, trembling with rage. 
 Pale in my turn, I answered, " Monsieur, you will perhaps know 
 my name some day, but to-day — you shall not learn it." " Stop 
 him, Hottin — (Hottin was the servant) — I will put him in prison." 
 Both master and man, to the stupefaction of the lookers-on, then 
 chased me round the table, upsetting forms and desks, without 
 power to catch me, and I escaped, saying, with a peal of laughter, 
 " You shall have neither me nor my name, and I shall come back 
 soon, again to study the scores of Gluck." 
 
 In prospect of entering the Conservatoire, Berlioz was a 
 little anxious about the retentiveness of Cherubini's memory. 
 Curiously enough, Hottin afterwards became Berlioz' orches- 
 tral attendant, and the most furious partisan of his music. 
 
 Still as audacious as ever, Berlioz now presented himself 
 
HIS LIFE. 
 
 at the annual competition directed by the Institute, but failed 
 to pass the preliminary test. This led to a final struggle 
 with his parents, who continued bitterly opposed to his 
 choice of music as a profession. Ordered to return home, 
 he duly obeyed, and met with a cold reception. For some 
 time both parties were silent and sulky, but at last the 
 father announced hi« resolution to permit the son's return to 
 Paris -for a course of musical study, on the understanding 
 that it should be abandoned if, in a reasonable time, proofs 
 of exceptional talent were not forthcoming. This, however, 
 was to be kept a secret from Madame Berlioz, whose pious 
 horror of everything connected with the stage made her 
 objections immovable. As it happened, she discovered the 
 arrangement and one day there was a very painful scene 
 between her and her boy : — 
 
 "Your father," she said to me, dropping the habitual tutoie- 
 ment, " has had the weakness to consent to your return to Paris ; 
 he favours your extravagant and culpable projects. I will 
 incur no such reproach, and I formally object to your going." 
 " Mother!" "Yes, I oppose it; and I implore you, Hector, not 
 to persist in your folly. Hold ; I throw myself at your knees — I, 
 your mother — and humbly beg you to give it up." " My God, 
 mother, permit me to raise you ; I cannot bear the sight ! " 
 " No, I remain." Then, after a~ moment's silence, " Thou re- 
 fusest, miserable ! Thou canst, without yielding, see thy mother 
 at thy feet ! Well, then, go ! Go to drag thyself through the 
 filth of Paris, to dishonour thy name, to kill thy father and me 
 with shame and vexation. I shall leave the house till thou art 
 gone. Thou art no longer my son ; I curse thee." 
 
 Madame Berlioz kept her word. She left the house for 
 another possessed by the family at some distance, and 
 thither, just before starting for Paris, Hector repaired, with 
 his two sisters, in hope of reconciliation. " My mother, who 
 was reading in the garden, no sooner saw us than she rose 
 and fled. We waited long, we followed her, my father. called 
 her, my sisters and I wept, but all in vain ; and I was com- 
 pelled to go away without embracing my mother, without a 
 word, a look, and charged with her malediction." 
 
 Once more in Paris, Berlioz began to practise habits of 
 strict economy, hoping thus to return the money advanced 
 by De Pons, who was now in want of it. Stopping his 
 dinners at the restaurant, he sat daily at the foot of Henri 
 IV.'s statue on the Pont-Neuf and consumed bread and 
 
HECTOR BERLIOZ . 
 
 dried fruits. Meanwhile he had thoughts of an opera, 
 " Les Francs Juges," words by his friend Humbert. Of 
 the after-fate of this work he says : " The poem was 
 refused at the Op6ra, and my score condemned to obscurity, 
 from which it has never emerged. Only the overture has 
 been able to see the light. I have used here and there the 
 best ideas of the work in later compositions ; the rest will 
 probably meet with the same fate should occasion arise, or 
 be burnt." Winter came on. He could no longer dine al 
 fresco on bread and figs ; he needed fuel and warm clothes. 
 But how to get these things ? The allowance from home 
 had been stopped ; pupils had fallen away through neglect, 
 and no resource was left. Just then the Theatre des Nou- 
 veaut6s opened for comic opera. "I ran to the regisseur and 
 begged the place of flute in the orchestra. All places were 
 filled up. I asked to join the chorus. They needed no more 
 singers. Death and furies ! ! The regisseur, however, took 
 my address, and promised to let me know if they decided to 
 increase the chorus." In a little while this came about, 
 and Berlioz presented himself at the theatre to compete 
 with half-a-dozen " poor devils " for the position of a bass 
 chorister at fifty francs a month. The regisseur acted as 
 judge, and a violinist played the accompaniments on his 
 instrument. Following the half-dozen, who did their best 
 with carefully prepared songs, came Berlioz, and him the 
 regisseur asked what he had brought : — 
 
 " I ? nothing ! " " How, nothing ? What are you going to 
 sing, then ? " " Anything you like. Is there not a score here, 
 or some sheet of vocalises ? " " We have nothing of the kind. 
 Besides," continued the rigisseur, in a tone somewhat contemp- 
 tuous, "you cannot, I suppose, sing at sight?" " Pardon, I will 
 sing at sight anything you like to give me." "Ah, that's different, 
 However, as we have no music, can't you sing some known 
 piece from memory ?" " Yes, I know by heart ' Les Danaides,' 
 ' Stratonice,' ' La Vestale,' ' Cortez,' ' CEdipe ' the two ' Iphi- 
 genias,' ' Orph6e,' ' Armide' " — " Stop, stop. What a memory ! 
 Come, since you know so much, give us the air from Sacchini's 
 
 ' CEdipe '—' Elle m'a prodigufi. Willingly." " Thou canst 
 
 accompany it, Michel." " But I don't know the key." " E flat." 
 " Shall I give the recitative ? " Michel played the chord of E flat, 
 and I began. 
 
 In the result, the half-dozen took a sad departure, and 
 Berlioz entered into the enjoyment of fifty francs a month, 
 
HIS LIFE. 
 
 on the strength of which he shared two rooms with a young 
 student of chemistry, as poor as himself. The incipient 
 pharmaceutist did the cooking and Berlioz -the marketing, 
 carrying his provisions exposed in a basket through the 
 street. " We lived thus like princes — emigrants — for thirty 
 francs a month each, and I had never since my arrival in 
 Paris enjoyed so much ease." He actually bought a piano, 
 though he could not play, and "such a piano!" It cost a 
 hundred and ten francs ! 
 
 About this time Berlioz composed his overture, " Waver- 
 ley," and competed for the Grand Prix de Rome, with no 
 other result than to have his piece* declared " inexecutable " 
 by the jury. To make matters worse, he was attacked by 
 illness in the midst of his disappointment. 
 
 Antoine (the young chemist) spent his time in running after 
 grisettes, and left me alone all day and part of the night ; I had 
 no servant or nurse to wait upon me, and I believe I should have 
 died one evening if, in a paroxysm of anguish, I had not, with a 
 penknife, pierced an abscess in my throat. This unscientific 
 operation was the signal for recovery. 
 
 Then other clouds began to break. Berlioz pere, repenting 
 of having withdrawn his son's allowance, resumed its regular 
 payment, upon which Hector gave up his engagement at 
 the theatre, and devoted himself passionately to study and 
 attendance at the Op6ra, where, with borrowed scores of 
 the works performed, he "read up" instrumentation in a 
 thoroughly practical way. Berlioz was now a fanatical 
 admirer of Gluck. He cared little for the symphonies of 
 Haydn and Mozart, as performed by a thin band in a large 
 hall ; of Beethoven he knew little, and Rossini he detested. 
 The Rossini fever excited in him an anger the more violent 
 because the Italian composer's music was the antithesis of 
 that of Gluck and Spontini : — 
 
 Conceiving nothing more magnificently fine and true than the 
 works of those great masters, the melodic cynicism, the contempt 
 of dramatic expression and requirements, the continual repro- 
 duction of one form of cadence, the eternal and puerile crescendo, 
 and the' brutal grosse-caisse of Rossini exasperated me to such a 
 point that I could not recognise, even in his " Barbiere," the 
 shining qualities of his genius. I more than once asked myself 
 then why I could not undermine the Th6atre Italien and blow all 
 the Rossinians into the air. 
 
 1 Orphee dechire 1 par Ies Bacchantes." 
 
io HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 As a Gluckist and a critical listener at the Opera 
 Berlioz soon showed himself to be a formidable person. 
 He gathered round him a number of young men whom he 
 strove to make as fanatical as himself. He would procure 
 or purchase tickets for these on Gluck nights, and, entering 
 as soon as the doors were opened, call his disciples 
 together and harangue them on the merits of the work 
 about to be performed. Woe to the direction if it ventured 
 to " improve " the favourite master's scores. The young 
 man in the parterre, with the keen face and long black hair, 
 knew them all by heart, and was swift of exposure. One 
 night they introduced cymbals into the Scythian ballet of 
 " Iphigenia in Tauride " : — 
 
 Boiling with anger, I nevertheless restrained myself to nearly 
 the end of the dance, when, profiting by a moment of silence, I ' 
 shouted with all the strength of my lungs, "There should be no 
 cymbals there. Who allows himself to correct Gluck?" The 
 public, who don't see very clearly into these art questions, and 
 concern themselves little whether an author's instrumentation be 
 changed or not, failed to understand the fury of the young fool in 
 the pit. But this was even worse when, in the third act, the 
 trombones that accompany the monologue of Orestes being sup- 
 pressed, the same voice cried out, " The trombones should not 
 ' be silent! This is insupportable!" The astonishment of the 
 orchestra and the house could not compare with the anger (very 
 natural, I grant) of Valentino, who conducted that evening. . . . 
 But I know well that subsequently all was put right ; the cym- 
 bals were silenced, the trombones played, and I muttered be- 
 tween my teeth, " Ah ! that's better." 
 
 It is to be feared that Berlioz and his well-taught, well- 
 drilled band were somewhat of a nuisance at the Opera. 
 They drove the chef de claque wild by applauding such things 
 as a happy modulation or a good accent in recitative, and 
 thus upsetting all his combinations. But in vain he scowled. 
 The impassioned young fellows in the pit were worthy of 
 their leader, who yielded himself body and soul to the 
 influences of the artistic moment. One day Berlioz took to 
 the Op6ra a recruit who was ignorant of music, and, as it 
 soon appeared, insensible to its power : — 
 
 The woes of Antigone and her father touched him very little, 
 and seeing I could do nothing with him, I moved to a bench in 
 front so as not to be troubled by his coldness. But, as though to 
 throw his impassibility into relief, chance placed on his other 
 
HIS LIFE. ii 
 
 hand a spectator as impressionable as he was the reverse. . . . 
 I could not help hearing "the dialogue that went on behind me 
 between my young man, sucking an orange, and his neighbour, 
 a prey to the most lively emotion. " For Heaven's sake, sir, be 
 calm." "No, it is irresistible — it is frightful; it will kill'me." 
 " But, sir, you are wrong to give way like that. You will make 
 yourself ill." " No ; let me alone. Oh ! " " Come, sir, cheer 
 up ; after all, it's only a play. Let me offer you a piece of orange." 
 "Ah! it is sublime!" "It is a Maltese orange." "What 
 heavenly art ! " " Don't refuse me." " Ah, sir ; what music ! " 
 " Yes, it's very fine." 
 
 r Soon after, Berlioz was himself moved to tears by the 
 drama, seeing which the sensitive stranger embraced him 
 from behind, exclaiming in convulsive tones, " Sacre Dieu ! 
 monsieur, how fine it is !" while the public laughed at both, 
 and the impassive recruit went on sucking his orange. 
 
 At this time Berlioz received his first stimulus to that form 
 of musical romanticism wherein he was destined to find his 
 true orbit and to shine as a star. A mutilated version of 
 " Der Freischtitz " having been brought out at the Odeon, 
 under the name of " Robin des Bois," by M. Castil-Blaze, 
 our young musician went to hear it. Let him describe the 
 result in his own words : — 
 
 This new style, against which my intolerant and exclusive 
 cultus of grand classical works had at first prejudiced me, caused 
 extreme surprise and ravishment, -despite the mariner in which 
 fhe opera was presented. Turned upside down as it was, there 
 exhaled from this work a wild aroma, the delicious freshness of 
 which intoxicated me. I had become a little fatigued, I admit, 
 by the solemn manner of the tragic muse, and the rapid move- 
 ments of the nymph of the woods, at times marked by gracious 
 brusquerie, her dreamy attitudes, her naive and virginal love, her 
 chaste smile, her melancholy, overwhelmed me with a torrent of 
 sensations till then unknown. 
 
 Upon this Berlioz neglected the Opera for the Oddon, and 
 they could mutilate Gluck at the greater house without fear 
 of the terrible young man in- the pit. 
 
 A propos to " Robin des Bois," Berlioz launches all the 
 thunderbolts of his invective and sarcasm at those who 
 tamper with the works of great masters. After describing 
 the scandalous fashion in which Mozart's "Die Zauberflote" 
 had been treated by a German, Herr Lachiiith, who pro- 
 duced a garbled version of that masterpiece in Paris as 
 "Les Mysteres d'Isis," he goes on to exclaim :— 
 
HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 Mozart has been assassinated by Lachnith ; Weber by Castil- 
 Blaze, who has also mutilated Gluck, Gr6try, Mozart, Rossini, 
 Beethoven; Vogel, and others. Beethoven has seen his sym- 
 phonies corrected by Felis, Kreutzer, and Habeneck. Moliere 
 and Corneille have been hacked about by unknown people at 
 the Theatre Francais, and Shakespeare is still represented in 
 England as arranged by Cibber. The corrections here are not, 
 it appears to me, made from the high to the low, but from the low 
 to the high, and perpendicularly at that. Let no one say that the 
 arrangers, in their dealing with the masters, have produced some 
 happy results, because no exceptional consequences can justify 
 the introduction into art of a monstrous immorality. No, no, no, 
 ten million times no ; musicians, poets, prose writers, actors, 
 pianists, chefs d'orchesire of the third, second, or even of the first 
 order, you have no right to touch Beethoven and Shakespeare, to 
 make them almoners of your science and your taste. No, no, no, 
 a thousand million times no ; a man, be he who he may, has no 
 right to force another man, be he who he may, to abandon his 
 personality and take another — to express himself in a fashion 
 which is not his own, to wear a form which he has not chosen, 
 to become a manakin moved by another's will living, and gal- 
 vanised after death. If the victim be a mediocrity, why not leave 
 him alone in his mediocrity? If he be a great man, let his equals, 
 and even his superiors, respect him, and let his inferiors bow 
 humbly before him. ... Is not all this ruin, entire destruction, 
 the total end of art ? And ought not we, who are impressed by 
 the glory and jealous for the imprescriptible rights of the human 
 spirit, to denounce the guilty, to pursue him, crying with all our 
 might, " Thy crime is ridiculous ! Despair!! Thy stupidity is 
 criminal ! Die ! ! Be scouted, be spit upon, be accursed ! 
 Despair and die ! ! " 
 
 The seat of such feeling as our worthy " arrangers " 
 possess may not be reached by even the sh'arpest words ; 
 but it is a pleasure to reproduce the French master's 
 anathema, even though he himself scored for orchestra 
 Weber's " Invitation a la Valse." 
 
 After the revelation to Berlioz of Weber and his roman- 
 ticism came that of Shakespeare and his marvellous creations 
 — came also that of irresistible artist -woman in the person 
 of an actress named Henrietta Smithson, one of an English 
 company which ventured to play our national poet in the 
 French capital. Of this new experience Berlioz says : — 
 
 I attended the first performance of " Hamlet " at the Oddon, 
 and saw, in the rdle of Ophelia, Henrietta Smithson, who five 
 
HIS LIFE. 13 
 
 years later became my wife. The effect of her prodigious talent, 
 or rather of her dramatic genius, upon my imagination and heart 
 is comparable only to the revolution wrought in me by the poet of 
 whom she was the worthy interpreter. I can say no more than 
 this. 
 
 Our master now suffered the agony of seemingly hopeless 
 love. The symptoms need not be described, nor need we 
 insist that an attempt to get rid of them by excessive bodily 
 exertion failed. There was some comfort, however, in set- 
 ting music to Tom Moore's " When he who adores thee," 
 and more self-denial than knowledge of human nature in re- 
 solving to keep away from the Od6on. Of course, Berlioz 
 did not keep away, and at every visit his unconscious enslaver 
 riveted closer the chains that bound him. His state of 
 mind at this time is clearly indicated in a letter to 
 Humbert, dated Paris, November 29, 1827 : * — 
 
 I speak of all this with energy, my dear friend, but you know 
 not how little importance I attach to it. For three months past 
 I have been a prey to chagrin which nothing can relieve, and, 
 with me, disgust with life is pushed as far as possible ; even the 
 success I have just obtained lifted only for a moment the sor- 
 rowful weight that oppresses me, and it has fallen back heavier 
 than before. I cannot give you the key to this enigma here ; it 
 would take up too much space, and, besides, I do not think that I 
 should know how to express myself in speaking to you on the 
 subject. When I next see you, you shall learn all. I finish with 
 the phrase which the Ghost of the King of Denmark addressed to 
 his son, " Farewell, farewell, remember me ! " 
 
 Poor young man ! he was very much in love. 
 
 But the tender passion, while it inflicted pain like a spur, 
 stimulated like a spur to renewed effort. How could Berlioz, 
 obscure and unknown, work his way to the side of the dis- 
 tinguished artist and attract her notice ? That was the 
 question which found an answer in the lover's resolution to 
 give a concert of his own music so that thereby he might 
 step out from the ranks of the indiscriminate crowd. It 
 being desirable to give the concert at the Conservatoire, per- 
 mission was asked and obtained from the Department of 
 Fine Arts; but the redoubtable Cherubini proved less com- 
 plaisant than his official superiors. Perhaps he had. not 
 forgotten the chase in the library. Let us see how the two 
 men behaved in presence of each other this tine : — 
 
 * " Lettres Intimes." p. 9. 
 
H HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 C. You want to give a concert ? 
 
 B. Yes, sir. 
 
 C. You must have permission from the Superintendent of Fine 
 Arts. 
 
 B. I have obtained it. 
 
 C. M. de Larochefoucault consents ? 
 
 B. Yes, sir. 
 
 C. But I don't consent. I am against your having the hall. 
 
 B. Why should you refuse ? The Conservatoire holiday is now 
 one, and for fifteen days th place will be free. 
 
 C. But I will not let you give the concert. Everybody is in the 
 country, and you will get no money by it. 
 
 B. I don't expect to do so. The concert is intended to make 
 me known. 
 
 C. There is no need for you to be known. Besides, you will 
 want money for expenses. Have you got any ? 
 
 B. Yes, sir. 
 
 C. Ah ! and what do you mean to perform ? 
 
 B. Two overtures, parts of an opera, and my cantata, " La 
 Mort d'Orph6e." 
 
 C. That was the cantata I rejected. It is bad ; it cannot be 
 executed. 
 
 B. So you say, sir, but I have my opinions. If a bad pianist 
 was unable to accompany it, that doesn't prove a good orchestra 
 unable to play it. 
 
 C. That's an insult to the Acadgmie. 
 
 B. It's a simple experience, sir. If the AcadSmie was right in 
 declaring my work impossible, of course it can't be performed. 
 If, on the contrary, the Acad6mie was wrong, people will say that 
 I have profited by its advice and corrected the score. 
 
 C. You can only give your concert on a Sunday. 
 
 B. I will give it on a Sunday. 
 
 C. But the servants of the Conservatoire want that day for rest. 
 You will kill those poor people with fatigue. 
 
 B. You are, no doubt, joking, sir. Those poor people you so 
 much pity are delighted to earn a little money, and you will do 
 wrong to prevent them. 
 
 C. I won't consent, I won't consent; and I'll write to the 
 Superintendent asking him to withdraw his leave. 
 
 B. You are very good, sir, but M. de Larochefoucault will 
 keep his word. I will write to him also, and narrate exactly 
 the conversation I have had the honour to hold with you. He 
 can then appreciate your reasons and mine. 
 
 So the two parted ; and Berlioz wrote a letter to the 
 Superintendent which made him laugh till the tears ran down 
 
HIS LIFE. 15 
 
 his cheeks. In the result, our young man received a n6"te 
 from the official confirming permission to give the concert, 
 and ending thus : " I charge you to show this letter to 
 M. Cherubini, who has received the necessary orders in the 
 matter." Away ran Berlioz to the Conservatoire without 
 losing a moment, and handed the document to the Floren- 
 tine. " Cherubini took the paper," he tells -us, " read it 
 attentively.; re-read it, with a pale face ; then turned green, 
 and handed it back without a word." 
 
 The concert, thus troublous in preliminaries, was a sad 
 experience for its giver. The services of Bloc as chef 
 d'orchestre, and of Duprez and Dupont as vocalists, were 
 obtained ; but for soprano and bass Berlioz was obliged to 
 be satisfied with two small people from the Opera, without 
 voice or talent. Then rehearsals and performance were 
 alike indifferent, while the proceeds were no more than 
 sufficient to pay bare expenses. And Miss Smithson all 
 this time ! What would poor Berlioz have felt had he known 
 that the fair Irishwoman never heard a word said either of 
 him or his concert ? 
 
 About this time Berlioz became acquainted with some of 
 the symphonies of Beethoven, and his impressionable nature 
 was once more stirred to the most extravagant demonstra- 
 tions. He even, by sheer force of enthusiasm, persuaded 
 his pedantic old master, Lesueur, to go and hear the " C 
 minor " of the extraordinary German who had so recently 
 passed away. After the performance, Berlioz met Lesueur 
 in the lobby. He was very red, and taking long strides : — 
 
 "Well, dear master?" said I. "Ouf! I am going out; I 
 want air. This is unheard-of — marvellous ! It has so moved 
 and upset me that in coming out of the box and essaying to put 
 on my hat, I fancied I could not "find my head. Let me alone 
 now. To-morrow " — 
 
 On the morrow Lesueur was cooler, and did not care to talk 
 about his experience. However, he said, " One must not make 
 music like that " ; to which I answered, " Be easy, dear master, 
 one will not make much like it." 
 
 Berlioz now took what he calls the fatal step of becoming 
 a musical critic on the staff of a new journal called La Quo- 
 tidienne; and, in June, 1828, he gained the second prize for 
 composition at the Institute. This was his third attempt, 
 and his third failure, to reach the Grand Prix de Rome. 
 Meanwhile his passion for Miss Smithson grew and over- 
 
16 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 mastered him. Having no acquaintance with the young 
 lady, he sent her letters, "which frightened rather than 
 touched her," the result being that her servant was ordered 
 to reject any more such amorous epistles. Then, as she 
 was to perform at the Opdra-Comique for an artist's benefit, 
 he offered to enrich the programme with a new overture, 
 so that he might, at least, address her through his music : — 
 
 The director and chef d'orchestre consented. When I went to 
 the theatre the English artists were rehearsing two scenes from 
 " Romeo and Juliet." They were at the scene of the tomb. 
 Just as I entered, Romeo, distracted, bore Juliet in his arms. 
 My eyes fell involuntarily upon the Shakespearian group. I 
 uttered a cry, and ran away wringing my hands. Juliet both 
 saw and heard me — I made her afraid. Pointing me out, she 
 asked the actors on the stage to take notice of the gentleman, 
 whose eyes boded no good. 
 
 The overture was rehearsed in turn, and Berlioz adds, 
 "The executants applauded me, and I hoped something 
 from the effect of the piece on the public and from the in- 
 fluence of my success upon Miss Smithson. Poor fool ! " 
 Poor fool, indeed ! On the night of performance Miss 
 Smithson did not even know that such an overture was to 
 be produced, and, in a day or two, she left with her com- 
 pany for Holland. Berlioz, who resided — by chance, he tells 
 us — opposite her lodging, saw her start, and describes his 
 feelings in burning words : — 
 
 It is difficult to depict suffering like that which I endured — 
 that rending of the heart, that frightful isolation, that empty 
 world, those thousand torments which circulated in the veins as 
 with freezing blood, that distaste for living and that impos- 
 sibility of dying. ... I composed no longer ; my intelligence 
 appeared to diminish as much as my sensibility increased. I 
 could do absolutely nothing — but suffer. 
 
 And he did suffer. Hear how he_ complained to Humbert 
 • (April 9, 1829) :* — 
 
 Ah ! poor dear friend I I have not written to you because I 
 have been unable. 'All my hopes were frightful illusions. She 
 has gone and, in going, without pity for anguish of which she 
 had been two days a witness, she left only this answer, brought 
 me by somebody — " There is nothing more impossible." 
 
 The months rolled on, and, a fourth time (1829), Berlioz 
 
 * " Lettres Intimes," p. 34. 
 
HIS LIFE. ij; 
 
 tried for the Prix de Rome, but again without success. His 
 subject was " Cleopatra after the Battle of Actium," and the 
 music, in its author's opinion, was worthy of the prize.* 
 " Consequently it did not succeed." On the morrow of the 
 failure Berlioz met Boiieldieu in the street, and the two had a 
 conversation worth recording : — 
 
 Boield. Good God, my boy, what have you done? You had 
 the prize in your hand and have thrown it away. 
 ' Berl. I did my best, sir, I declare. 
 
 Boield. That's just what I complain of. You shouldn't do 
 your best ; it is the enemy of the good. How could I approve 
 such things ?— -I, who love above all things music that soothes 
 me. 
 
 Berl. It is difficult, sir, to make soothing music when a Queen 
 of Egypt, devoured by remorse, and poisoned by the bite of a 
 serpent, dies in moral and physical anguish. 
 
 Boield. Oh ! you know how to defend yourself, I don't doubt, 
 but that proves nothing. One can always be graceful. 
 
 Berl. Yes, the old gladiators knew how to die with grace, but 
 Cleopatra was not so clever ; that was not her condition. Be- 
 sides, she did not die in public. 
 
 Boield. You exaggerate. We didn't ask you to make her sing 
 a contredanse. But what necessity was there to use such extra- 
 ordinary harmonies in your invocation of the Pharaohs ? I 
 myself am not a harmonist, and confess that I didn't understand 
 one of your chords from the other world. And, then, why such an 
 unheard-of rhythm in your accompaniment ? 
 
 Berl. I did not think, sir, it was necessary to avoid new forms 
 in composition, when one has the happiness to find them, and 
 they are in the right place. 
 
 Boield. But, my dear fellow, Madame Debadie, who sang your 
 cantata, is an excellent musician, and she had need of all her 
 talent and attention. 
 
 Berl. Ma foi I I didn't know, I confess, that music was 
 intended to be performed, without talent and attention. 
 
 Boield. Well, well, you will not be content to stop short. 
 Profit by this lesson next year. 
 
 One night at the Op6ra, Auber took the young man aside 
 and advised" him much to the same purport :t — 
 
 You run away from commonplaces, but you should not be 
 always in dread of platitudes. The best council I can give you 
 is to try to write trivially, and when you have produced some- 
 
 * A chorus from this work is now the Chorus of Shadows in " Lelio." 
 ■f " Lettres Intimes," p. 47. 
 
■ 18 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 thing that appears horribly trivial, that will be exactly right. 
 Rest assured that, if you compose music after your own fancy, 
 the public will not understand you and the publishers will not 
 buy you. - 
 
 Sentiments like these grated upon the ears of our ardent 
 and art-loving master, not increasing, we may be sure, his 
 respect for the men who uttered them. He even declined, 
 at this time, a presentation to Rossini :* — 
 
 They have offered to introduce me to Rossini, and I would not 
 consent, as you may well think. I do not like that Figaro, or 
 rather, I hate him more every day. His absurd pleasantries 
 about Weber in the foyer of the German theatref have exaspe- 
 rated me. I much regret I was not in the conversation, so that 
 I might have given him a broadside. 
 
 Before his renewed failure at the Institute, Berlioz had 
 made acquaintance with the " Faust " of Goethe through 
 a French translation, and, setting the lyrics to music, 
 had published them as " Huit Scenes de Faust." Subse- 
 quently the master collected and burned all the copies of 
 this work" on which he could lay hands. It was, however, 
 under Goethe's influence that he composed, in 1830, his 
 " Symphonie Fantastique " — taking three weeks to com- 
 plete the Adagio, but writing the Marche au Supplice in a 
 single night. Arrangements were made for the production 
 of this piece at the Nouveaut6s, but at rehearsal so many 
 chairs and desks were wanted for the big orchestra that the 
 managers backed out of the affair altogether. " Since then," 
 says Berlioz, "I always look well to the materiel of my 
 concerts. I know by experience that the least negligence in 
 that respect may entail disaster." He next produced a 
 dramatic fantasia, with chorus, on Shakespeare's "Tem- 
 pest," J and actually, had it performed at the Opera. A real 
 tempest, however, ruined the concert. The streets were 
 flooded, and, counting every head in the theatre, not more 
 than 300- persons heard the music. Some amend for these 
 repeated disappointments was made when, in the following 
 June (1830), the longed-for Grand Prix came to his hands. 
 A cantata, having for subject " The Last Night of Sarda- 
 napalus," found favour with the judges, was duly performed, 
 and brought to its author 3,000 francs yearly for four years, 
 
 * " Lettres Intimes," p. 40. 
 
 t " Der Freischiitz " was then being performed 
 
 % A part of this work now figures in " Lelio." 
 
HIS LIFE. 19 
 
 with the obligation to reside the first two years in Rome, 
 and the third in Germany. Of course, the performance did 
 not pass off without a hitch — none ever did when our master's 
 music was in hand. Berlioz had arranged a grand effect 
 for the explosion of the King's palace, and upon this he 
 counted much. In order to guard against mistakes he sat 
 by the conductor's side, and Malibran, who could find no 
 room in the hall, occupied a stool in the orchestra exactly 
 facing him. The cantata went on, the King resolved to die, 
 called his women around him, set fire to the palace, and all 
 waited for the explosion : — 
 
 Five hundred thousand maledictions on musicians who don't 
 count their bars ! In my score, a horn gave the cue to the 
 drums, the drums to the cymbals, these to the grosse-caisse, and 
 the first blow on the grosse-caisse brought about the final ex- 
 plosion. My d — d horn missed his note, the drums not hearing 
 it kept quiet ; the cymbals and the grosse-caisse kept quiet also — 
 nothing moved ! nothing ! ! The violins and basses only con- 
 tinued their feeble tremolo ; no explosion — a fire that went out 
 without being lighted. ... A cry of horror escaped from my 
 panting breast ; I flung my score across the orchestra ; I upset 
 two desks ; Madame Malibran jumped back as though a mine 
 had exploded under her feet. All was noise ; the orchestra and 
 academicians were scandalised, the audience mystified, and the 
 composer's friends indignant. This was another musical catas- 
 trophe, and the worst I had experienced. If it had only been the 
 last! 
 
 The explosion was better managed at a second concert, 
 conducted by Habeneck, at which the " Symphonie Fantas- 
 tique " was also performed — Liszt, who had just then made 
 the acquaintance of Berlioz, being among the most appre- 
 
 ' ciative listeners. The effect of Berlioz' music, and of the 
 discussions to which it gave rise, upon Cherubini was not 
 agreeable to the old master. Said some one to him, as he 
 passed the door of the concert-room while the public were 
 entering, " Well, M. Cherubini, you are not coming -to hear 
 
 ; Berlioz' new work ? " The answer was " I don't want to 
 learn what not- to do." Berlioz adds : — 
 
 On the success of the concert he seemed like a cat that had 
 swallowed mustard ; he spoke no more, but sneezed. A few days 
 later he sent for me and said, " You are going to Italy ? " " Yes, 
 sir!" "Your name is to be taken off the •books of the Con- 
 servatoire. Your studies are finished. "But it seems to me that 
 
 C 3 
 
20 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 you ought to pay me a visit. No one leaves here as though he 
 were a groom." I was on the point of saying, " Why not ? since 
 he is treated like a horse," but I had the good sense to restrain 
 myself, and even to assure our amiable director that I never 
 thought of leaving Paris without paying a farewell visit and 
 thanking him for his kindness. 
 
 Here it becomes necessary to dwell somewhat at length 
 upon the master's love affairs. We know that he composed 
 the "Symphonie Fantastique" under the influence of his 
 passion for Henrietta Smithson. Just before taking his pen 
 in hand he wrote to Humbert :* — 
 
 After a period of calm, violently troubled by the composition 
 of the Elegie en prose, which completes my melodies,f I am 
 again plunged in all the anguish of an interminable and inex- 
 tinguishable passion, without motive or subject. She remains 
 in London, yet I feel her always about me ; all my recollections 
 awake and join to distract me ; I hear my heart beat, and its 
 pulsations shake me like the strokes of the piston of a steam 
 engine. Each muscle of my body trembles with pain. Useless ! 
 Frightful ! Oh ! unhappy one ! if she could for an instant 
 imagine all the poetry, all the infinitude of such a love, she 
 would fly to my arms — she would be ready to die in my embrace. 
 I was on the point of beginning my grand symphony (Episode 
 de la vie d'un artiste), in which the development of my infernal 
 passion will be painted ; I have it all in my head, but I can 
 write nothing. Wait ! 
 
 •Berlioz subsequently forwarded to Humbert a sketch of 
 the "argument" of the Symphony, and this appears to have 
 excited the solicitude of his faithful friend, who wrote warning 
 him against the danger of becoming morbid in the excess of 
 his passion. The master replied (May 13, 1830), and in this 
 letter we read, to our astonishment, the following : % — 
 
 I do not intend to revenge myself. I pity her and despise her. 
 She is an ordinary woman, gifted with an instinctive genius for 
 expressing distractions of the human soul which she has never 
 felt, and incapable of imagining such an immense and noble 
 feeling as that with which I have honoured her. 
 
 In another letter he passingly remarks : § — 
 That unhappy girl Smithson remains here. I have not seen 
 her since her return. 
 
 * " Lettres Intimes," p. 63. 
 
 t Irlande : recueil de neuf melodies pour une et deux voix, et choeur, avec 
 accompagnement pour le piano. Op. 2. 
 J ' Lettres Intimes," p. 69. § Ibid., p. 78, 
 
HIS LIFE. 21 
 
 How are we to account for this revulsion ? Simply by 
 referring to the twenty-eighth chapter of the " Memoirs." 
 There we learn that a young German composer, whom 
 Berlioz thinly disguises under the initial H., had fallen in 
 love with a Mdlle. M..(Mdlle. Mooke, afterwards Madame 
 Pleyel), and, during one of his visits, playfully challenged 
 her to try and win the love of Berlioz, expressing no fear of 
 the result. The lady took poor H. at his word, as might 
 have been expected. Meeting Berlioz soon after, at a school 
 where he was engaged as teacher of the guitar, she then, 
 and subsequently, made such use of her power of fascination 
 that Berlioz forgot his Shakesperian love, and became her 
 devoted slave. The sequel as regards H., who received his 
 dismissal, was rather droll. He shed a few bitter tears, and 
 then, reflecting, perhaps, that the fault was more, his own 
 than another's, he shook the hand of his successful rival, 
 wished him joy, and set out for Frankfort. Berlioz 
 naively adds : " I have always admired his conduct on 
 that occasion." 
 
 Our master's passion for his new love burned as fiercely as 
 once did that for the " unhappy girl." Hear how he speaks 
 of Mdlle. Mooke to Humbert :* — 
 
 All that love has of the most tender and delicate is mine. My 
 ravishing sylph, my Ariel, my life, appears to love me more than 
 ever. As for me, her mother unceasingly declares that if she had 
 read in romance of an affection such as mine, she could not have 
 believed it true. 
 
 *Then, after referring to a temporary attack of illness from 
 which his Camille had suffered, he adds : — 
 
 But she will not die. No ; those eyes so full of genius, that 
 slender form, all that delicious being rather appears to be ready 
 to take its flight towards the heavens than to fall withered to the 
 humid earth. 
 
 Hear him once more, in the same strain. He had taken to 
 Mdlle. Mooke the news that the Grand Prix was his, and then 
 wrote to Humbert : t — 
 
 O my friend, what happiness to have a success which enchants 
 an adored being! My idolised Camille was dying of anxiety 
 when I took to her the news so ardently desired. O my 
 delicate Ariel, my beautiful angel, thy wings were drooping: 
 joy reanimated them. 
 
 * " Lettres Intimes," p. 73 et seq. f Ibid., p. 76. 
 
HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 It may naturally be supposed that, under the influence of 
 this ardour, Berlioz did not care to leave Paris for Rome, 
 and he even thought of petitioning the king to make an 
 exception in his favour. Wiser counsel at last prevailing, 
 he sailed from Marseilles for Italy, and after a stormy 
 voyage and some passport troubles, incidental to a time of 
 political tempest, arrived in Rome, taking up his abode, with 
 the other French students, _ at Villa Medici, where Horace 
 Vernet reigned as king. The next day he was introduced to 
 the Cafe .Greci, the headquarters of the student class; and 
 on the morrow he made the acquaintance of Mendelssohn. 
 Three weeks passed and no letters came from Paris, where 
 Berlioz felt that some trouble was brewing. This so harassed 
 him that he resolved upon going back to France, despite the 
 friendly warnings of the director, Vernet. Before he could 
 carry his resolution into effect, however, a letter came : — 
 
 The packet they gave me contained an epistle of such extra- 
 ordinary impudence, and so wounding to a man of my then age 
 and experience, that it had a frightful effect upon me.* Tears of 
 rage filled my eyes, and my course was instantly taken. It was 
 to go to Paris and, without mercy, kill two guilty women and one 
 innocent. After this, of course, I was bound to kill myself. The 
 plan of the expedition was settled in a few minutes. In Paris 
 they would fear my return, and recognise .me. I resolved, there- 
 fore, to take precautions and disguise myself. 
 
 It must be confessed that the Mookes were guilty of rank 
 treachery, inasmuch as a formal engagement had taken place 
 between the young people, and even the date of marriage had 
 been fixed. This we learn from Berlioz himself :t — 
 
 My marriage is fixed for Eastertide, 1832, on condition that I 
 do not lose my pension and that I remain in Italy for a year. It 
 was my music that extorted the consent of Camille's mother. 
 Oh ! my dear symphony, I am indebted to it for her. 
 
 Sympathy, therefore, mingles with astonishment as we 
 regard the conduct of the jilted lover, who, without losing 
 a moment, engaged a friend to procure a passport and 
 a vehicle, and ran himself to a shop where he bought 
 the complete dress of a femme de chambre, which was to 
 be his disguise. But even in this headlong haste and 
 fury the instinct of the composer asserted itsejf. He 
 
 * The letter announced the approaching marriage of Mdlle. Mooke to Pleyel. 
 •f " Lettres Intimes," p. 85. 
 
HIS LIFE. 23 
 
 had been rewriting the " Scene du Bal" of the " Symphonie 
 Fantastique," and could not go on his journey to murder 
 and suicide without leaving directions for the conclusion of 
 the work. Accordingly he wrote on the manuscript : — 
 
 I have no time to finish this. If the Society of Concerts at 
 Paris should care to "perform the piece in the absence of the 
 author, I heg Habeneck to double on the octave below, with 
 clarinets and horns, the passage for flutes at the last reappear- 
 ance of the theme, and to write the chords that follow for full 
 orchestra. That will do for a Coda. 
 
 Having cared for his work, packed up his feminine dress, 
 and armed himself with a pair of double-barrelled pistols, 
 Berlioz started for Paris. Between Florence and Genoa he 
 lost his disguise, and had some trouble in getting another 
 mad.e within six hours. Moreover the Sardinian police sus- 
 pected him as a- revolutionist, refused to endorse his passport 
 for Turin, and ordered him to enter France by way of Nice. 
 The reply to this was, " By way of Nice ! what does that 
 matter to me ? I'll go by way of hell, if you like, so that I 
 go somehow." Pursuing his route, Berlioz entertained him- 
 self with a mental rehearsal of the tragedy he was going to 
 act : — 
 
 I reach the house of my friends about nine o'clock in the 
 evening, as they are taking tea. I am shown into the parlour 
 
 as the-femme de chambre of Madame la Comtesse M , charged 
 
 with an important message. I hand over a letter, and, as they 
 are reading it, I take my two pistols from my bosom; I shoot 
 one through the head, then another ; then I seize the third by 
 the hair, make myself known to her, and, despite her cries, I 
 give her my third compliment. After that, before the concert 
 of voices and instruments has attracted the curious, I launch at 
 my right temple the fourth irresistible argument, and if the pistol 
 should miss fire (I have provided for that) have recourse to my 
 poison. 
 
 What a bloodthirsty young man, to be sure! Antient 
 Pistol was nothing to this wild -haired musician storming 
 along the fair Mediterranean shore, save that he had a like 
 regard for his own life. Berlioz, as he journeyed on, began 
 to feel some doubts about the expediency of killing himself. 
 He thought the necessity was " shameful"— " Thus to say 
 adieu to the world, to art ; to leave no other reputation than 
 that of a brute who did not know how to' live; not to have 
 finished my first symphony; to have others grander still in my 
 
24 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 head. Ah! 'tis" — Then the spirit of revenge would seize 
 him and urge him on once more. At such a time the young 
 man sprang up in his voiture and uttered a convulsive cry, 
 which made the driver jump aside, in the full belief that his 
 passenger was a " a devil obliged to carry about a piece of 
 the true cross." The struggle between Berlioz' good and 
 evil angels thus went on till, at last, the former induced 
 him, in a moment of calmness, to commit his honour to a 
 prudent course. When changing horses at a village, he 
 hastily wrote a note to Horace Vernet, begging the director 
 to keep his name on the list of students, and adding, " I bind 
 myself upon my honour not to pass the frontiers of Italy till 
 your answer comes to me at Nice, where I shall await it." 
 This done, Berlioz returned to his carriage and discovered 
 all at once that he was hungry. He had eaten very little since 
 leaving Florence. At Nice he received a friendly reply from 
 Vernet. Nothing would be said about his escapade, and, 
 getting rid of his feminine garments and his pistols, Berlioz 
 breathed naturally again. The storm had blown over, and 
 after it came a great calm. Reaction was complete: "I 
 lived entirely alone. I wrote the overture to ' King Lear.' 
 I sang. I believed in God. Convalescence ! " Meanwhile 
 the police kept their eyes upon him and, when they saw 
 him familiar with the officers of the garrison, summoned the 
 suspected before them : — 
 
 P. What are you doing here, sir ? 
 
 B. I am recovering from a cruel malady. I compose, I 
 dream ; I thank God for making such a bright sun, such a beau- 
 tiful sea, and such verdant hills. 
 
 P. You are not a painter ? 
 
 B. No, sir. 
 
 P. But you are seen everywhere with an album in your hand, 
 and drawing a good deal. Are you engaged in collecting plans ? 
 
 P. Yes, I " collect" the plan of an overture to " King Lear." 
 That is to say, I have " collected " it, for the design and instru- 
 mentation are finished. I ,even think that the entr&e of it will 
 be formidable. 
 
 P- What do you mean by the entr'u ? Who is this King 
 Lear ? 
 
 B. Alas, sir, a good old King of England. 
 
 P. Of England? 
 
 B. Yes; he flourished, according to Shakespeare, about eighteen 
 hundred years ago, and was weak enough to divide his kingdom 
 between two wicked daughters, who showed him to the door 
 
HIS LIFE. 25 
 
 when he had no more to give. You see there are so few 
 kings — 
 
 P. Don't speak of the king ! What do you mean by. that word 
 instrumentation ? 
 
 B. It's a musical term. 
 
 P. Always that pretext. I know very well, sir, that people do 
 not compose music without a piano, and with an album and 
 a pencil while walking stealthily along the shore. Therefore, 
 if you will tell me where you are going, you shall have your pass- 
 port. You cannot any longer stop here. 
 
 B. Well, then, I will go to Rome, and still compose without a 
 piano, with your permission. 
 
 So ended what Berlioz calls his " little comedy." 
 The master halted at Florence on his way back to Rome, 
 and renewed his observations of a city which gave him occa- 
 sion for some remarks strongly indicative of his emotional 
 and sensitive nature. Strolling one day into the cathedral, he 
 witnessed the obsequies of a young mother and the infant 
 whose birth had cost her life. Touched by the incident, he 
 followed the procession to a cemetery, where the bodies 
 were deposited in a dead-house till, according to custom, 
 the grave-diggers came, at two a.m., to inter them. For a 
 paola (twe]ve sous) Berlioz was permitted to enter the 
 morgue and look upon the dead girl and her babe. " If I 
 had been alone I should have embraced her; I thought of 
 Ophelia. For a paola!" The next day he attended the 
 funeral service of Napoleon Bonaparte, brother of the late 
 Emperor Napoleon III., and filled his mind with thoughts 
 of the young man's mother, Queen Hortense : — 
 
 My fancy, retracing the course of time, showed her, a joyous 
 Creole child, dancing on the deck of the ship that brought her to 
 the Old World, plain daughter of Madame Beauharnais; later, 
 adopted daughter of the master of Europe, Queen of Holland ; at 
 last exiled, forgotten, orphaned, a distracted mother, a fugitive 
 queen without a State. 
 
 Thinking of all this, what music would he have poured 
 forth^from the solemn organ; but the Italian practitioner at 
 that instrument, instead of rising to the occasion, sank be- 
 neath contempt : — 
 
 Oh ! Beethoven ! . . . where was the grand soul, the pro- 
 found and Homeric spirit which conceived the " Eroica " sym- 
 phony and the " Funeral March for the death of a Hero," and so 
 many other great- and sad musical poems that elevate the spirit 
 
26 HECTOR BERLIOZ ; 
 
 while they oppress the heart ? The organist had drawn his flute 
 stop, and sportively whistled little gay airs in the upper octaves, 
 like wrens perched on a garden-wall, basking in the pale rays 
 of a spring sun. 
 
 This, and the showing of dead bodies for a paolo, stirred 
 his indignation against Italians all round : — 
 
 O Italians, miserables that you are, apes, ourang-outangs, 
 puppets always sneering, who compose operas like those of 
 Bellini, Pacini, Rossini, Vaccaj, and Mercadante ; who play 
 trivial airs at the funeral of the nephew of the Great Man, and 
 who, for a paola . . . ! 
 
 Here wrath seems to choke him, and the uncompli- 
 mentary invocation comes to a sudden end. The Italians, 
 let us add, were never successful in pleasing Berlioz with 
 their music. At the famous Eastertide services in the 
 Sistine chapel he almost laughed, and he denounced with 
 all his might the idea that Palestrina possessed any musical 
 genius whatever : — 
 
 In his psalms for four parts where melody and rhythm are 
 not used, and where harmony takes the form of perfect chords 
 intermixed with suspensions, one must admit that taste and a 
 certain science have guided the composer ; but genius — non- 
 sense, it is a joke. 
 
 It was on his way back to Rome that Berlioz conceived 
 the idea of "Lelio, ou le retour a la vie." He thus described 
 the plan of the work, writing from Rome to Humbert (July 3, 
 1831) :*— 
 
 It is a melologue to follow the Symphonie Fantastique. I 
 have, for the first time, written words and music. How much I 
 regret not being able to show it to. you! There are six mono- 
 logues and six pieces of music: 1st, a Ballad, with pianoforte ; 
 2nd, a Meditation, for choir and orchestra ; 3rd, a Scene of 
 Brigand Life, for solo, chorus, and orchestra ; 4th, the Hymn 
 of Happiness, for solo, accompanied by the orchestra at the 
 beginning and end, and in the middle by one hand on the harp ; 
 5th, the Last Sighs of the Harp, for orchestra alone; and 6th, the 
 overture to the " Tempest " — already performed, as you know, at 
 the Paris Opera. I have used for the Hymn of Happiness a 
 phrase from " La Mort d'Orphee," which you have with you, and 
 for the Last Sighs of the Harp the little orchestral piece which 
 finishes that scene immediately after the Bacchanale. 
 
 • " Lettres Intimes," p. 101. 
 
HIS LIFE. 27 
 
 - At this time, moreover, the master sketched the plan of a 
 grand oratorio, to be called " The Last Day of the World." 
 He gave the scenario to Humbert, requesting him to write 
 the words, as he had already done those of " Les Francs 
 Juges." The details are extremely curious :* — 
 
 A tyrant, all-powerful on the earth ; civilisation and corruption 
 at the last stage ; an impious court ; a few religious people whom . 
 the sovereign's contempt allows to exist in freedom ; war and 
 victory ; combats of slaves in a circus ; female slaves who resist 
 the desires of the conqueror ; atrocities. The chief of the reli- 
 gious people, a kind of Daniel reprimanding Belshazzar, reproaches 
 the despot with his crimes, announces that prophecy is about to 
 be fulfilled, and that the end of the world is near. The tyrant, 
 irritated at last by the boldness of the prophet, compels him to 
 assist in the palace at a frightful orgy, at the close of which he 
 cries, ironically, that he will show the end of the world. Assisted 
 by his women and eunuchs, he represents the Valley of Jeho- 
 shaphat ; a band of winged children sound little trumpets ; sham 
 dead come out of the tombs ; the tyrant represents Jesus Christ, 
 and is. about to judge mankind, when the earth trembles, real 
 and terrible angels sound thundering trumpets, the true Christ 
 comes, and the real Last Judgment begins. 
 
 It was, perhaps, quite as well that Berlioz did not carry 
 out this extraordinary conception. 
 
 At Rome, Berlioz was repeatedly in Mendelssohn's com- 
 pany, and, had the German fully reciprocated the feeling of 
 the Frenchman, a warm -friendship would have sprung up 
 between them. Writing from Nice before expelled by the 
 authorities, and referring to his previous experience in Rome, 
 he said : — 
 
 I have found Mendelssohn. ... He is an admirable lad ; 
 his executive talent is as great as his musical genius*- and really 
 that is saying much. All that I have heard of his delights r-.e ; 
 I believe firmly that his musical capacity is one of the highest 
 of our epoch. He has been my cicerone ; every morning I go 
 to him ; he plays me a sonata of Beethoven ; we sing Gluck's 
 " Armida," and then he takes me to see the famous ruins, which, 
 I must Confess, interest me very little. Mendelssohn is one 
 of those candid souls so rarely met with ; he believes firmly in 
 his Lutheran religion, and I greatly scandalise him sometimes 
 by laughing at the Bible. To him I owe the only supportable 
 moments I enjoyed during my stay in Rome. 
 
 * " Lettres Intimes," p. 109. 
 
28 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 Addressing Ferdinand Hiller, after a second time reaching 
 the Eternal City, Berlioz said : — 
 
 Has Mendelssohn reached you ? He is a man of enormous, 
 extraordinary, superb, prodigious talent. I shall not be sus- 
 pected of comradeship in writing thus, for he has told me frankly 
 that he does not understand my music at all. Say to him a 
 thousand things for me. He has a character wholly virginal, 
 and still has beliefs; he is a little cold in his manner, but, 
 although he may doubt it, I greatly love him. 
 
 • The life of Berlioz in Rome was far from happy. He 
 appears to have suffered from a nervous affection which, 
 stimulated by the melancholy city and its desolate surround- 
 ings, made the routine of common life insupportable. The 
 feeling was connected in his mind with the ideas of isolation 
 and absence, and he has thus described it : — 
 
 A void surrounds my palpitating breast, and it seems then that 
 my heart, under the constraint of an irresistible force, evaporates 
 and tends to break up by expansion. Then the skin of my whole 
 body becomes painful and burning ; I am red from head to foot. 
 I am tempted to cry out ; to call my friends, and even indifferent 
 people, to my aid, to console, defend, and prevent me from being 
 destroyed, to retain the life which goes away to all points of the 
 compass. During these crises one has no thought of death ; no, 
 the idea of suicide is even insupportable ; one would not die : far 
 from that, one would live, willing it absolutely, and desiring a 
 thousand times more of energy. It is a prodigious capacity for 
 happiness, which becomes exasperated by remaining without 
 satisfaction, and can only appease itself by immense, devouring, 
 furious delights, in proportion to an incalculable abundance of 
 sensibility. 
 
 Berlioz struggled hard against his disease, for so we may 
 call it. He sought the pleasures of the chase, wandered 
 alone for days together among the Abruzzi mountains, and 
 spent some time in Naples ; but each return to Rome 
 brought back, with added force, his strange and painful 
 feeling. To this there could only be one end : — 
 
 I had finished my monodrama (" Lelio ") and retouched my 
 " Symphonie Fantastique." It was necessary to have them per- 
 formed. So I obtained from M. Vernet permission to leave Italy 
 before the allotted time ; posed for my portrait ; made a grand 
 tour of some days to Tivoli, Albano, and Palestrina ; sold my 
 gun, broke my guitar, wrote in several albums, gave a grand 
 " punch " to my comrades, caressed M. Vernet's two dogs, my 
 
HIS LIFE.- 29 
 
 companions of the chase, and had a moment of profound sorrow 
 in the thought that I was quitting a poetic country, never perhaps 
 to see it again. Friends accompanied me nearly to Ponte Molle, 
 where I ascended a shockingly bad carriole and started. 
 
 On May 12, 1832, Berlioz crossed Mont Cenis, and directed 
 his steps towards his ancestral home at La Cote St. Andfg. 
 
 It will easily be understood from what has appeared above 
 that the time spent by Berlioz in Rome was not prolific in 
 musical works. He himself tells us exactly what he did : — 
 
 First : An overture to " Rob Roy," long and diffuse, performed 
 at Paris a year later, badly received by the public, and burnt the 
 same day on leaving the concert. Second : The " Scene aux 
 Champs " of my " Symphonie Fantastique," which I rewrote 
 almost entirely when wandering in the Villa Borghese. Third : 
 The " Chant de Bonheur" of my monodrame "Lelio,"* which 
 I dreamt, rocked by my intimate enemy, the south wind, in the 
 tall and bushy box-tree of our classic garden. Fourth: The 
 melody called " Le Captive," of which, when composing it, I was 
 far from anticipating the fortune. 
 
 In addition, when writing to a friend, Berlioz speaks of 
 some concerted vocal pieces, among them " a chorus to 
 words by Moore, with accompaniment for seven wind instru- 
 ments, . composed at' Rome one day when I was dying of 
 spleen, and entitled, ' Psalmody for those who have suffered 
 much, and whose soul is sad nearly unto death.' " A propos 
 to the monodrame " Lelio," Berlioz may here tell one of his 
 amusing stories. The work contains a chorus of spirits : — 
 
 The text of this chorus was written in an unknown tongue, the 
 language of the dead, incomprehensible to the living. When 
 seeking permission to print from the Papal censor, the meaning 
 of the words sung by the ghosts greatly embarrassed the officials. 
 What was the language, and what did the strange words signify? 
 They called in a German, who declared that he could make 
 nothing of them ; an Englishman was not more successful, and 
 Danish, Swedish, Russian, Spanish, Irish, and Bohemian inter- 
 preters alike failed. How the office of the censor was embar- 
 rassed, to be sure ! Meanwhile leave to print could not be 
 given, and the publication remained suspended. At last, one 
 of the censors, after profound reflection, hit upon an idea, the 
 justice of which all his colleagues admitted : " Since the English, 
 Russian, Spanish, Danish, Swedish, Irish, and Bohemian inter- 
 
 , * The remainder of this work, not taken from compositions of an earlier- 
 date, was written while travelling in various parts of Italy. 
 
3 o HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 preters cannot divine this mysterious language, it is likely 
 enough that the Roman people will not understand it either. 
 It appears that we can authorise the impression without danger 
 to morality or religion." The chorus of ghosts was printed forth- 
 with. 
 
 In connection with our master's work at Rome we have 
 now only to record the deception he practised on the 
 authorities of the Institute in Paris. Every holder of the 
 Grand Prix is bound by its rules to forward a composition 
 each year, by way of proof that he is labouring and pro- 
 gressing. Berlioz complied with this regulation ; in what 
 manner he himself confesses : — 
 
 As regards the Resurrexit for grand orchestra and chorus, 
 which I sent to the Academicians in Paris, and in which those 
 gentlemen discovered very remarkable progress, a sensible proof 
 of the influence of Rome upon my ideas, and a complete abandon- 
 ment of my regrettable musical tendencies, it was a fragment of 
 my Messe Solennelle, performed at St. Roch and at St. Eustache 
 several years before I obtained the prize at the Institute. 
 
 The boldness of Berlioz in sending a piece which even 
 some of the Academicians might have heard amounted to 
 recklessness. As to the morality of the transaction, nothing 
 need be said. 
 
 During the stay of Berlioz at La Cote St. Andre, his father 
 wished him to marry and " settle down," having, after the 
 manner of French parents, chosen a young lady, pecuniarily 
 fitted for the alliance. Concerning this matter we read, in 
 a note to Madame Vernet :* — 
 
 My father has just hit upon a singular method of making me 
 wise., He wishes me to marry. Presuming, right or wrong, 
 upon data known to him, that my overtures -would be well re- 
 ceived by a very rich person, he pressed me strongly to present 
 myself, for the peremptory reason that a young man who would 
 inherit but a hundred thousand francs or so ought not to neglect 
 the opportunity of marrying three hundred thousand down and 
 more in expectation. I laughed at the idea as a joke for some 
 time, but as my father's suggestions became more pressing, I 
 was obliged to. declare categorically that I could never love the 
 lady to whom he referred, and that I was not for sale at any 
 price. The discussion ended there, but I was disagreeably 
 affected by it. I thoughtmy father knew me better. At bottom, 
 madame, do you not think I was right ? 
 
 * " Correspondance Inedite," p. 101. 
 
HIS LIFE. 31 
 
 In November, 1832, Berlioz went to Paris for the purpose 
 of producing his mbnodrame " Lelio " aijd the " Symphonie 
 Fantastique." Calling immediately upon Cherubini, he found 
 the master very much enfeebled and looking aged. This was 
 not the only change. So affectionate did Cherubini show 
 himself that Berlioz thought, " Ah, mon Dieu! the poor man 
 is going to die." But there was plenty of life in the " grim 
 Florentine" yet, and the younger composer soon discovered 
 the fact. 
 
 When seeking lodgings a curious coincidence happened, 
 in which Berlioz saw the hand of fate. His old apartment 
 not being free, a " secret impulse " made him look for 
 one in the opposite house, where Miss Smithson had re- 
 sided. Successful here, he said to the domestie in charge, 
 " What has become of Miss Smithson ? Have you any news 
 of her ?" The reply was, " Why, sir, she is in Paris ; she 
 even lodged here a few days ago, and, the day before yester- 
 day, "left the apartment you now occupy for one in the Rue 
 de Rivoli. She is the directress of an English theatre which 
 opens its doors next week." Berlioz tells us : — 
 
 I remained'mute and palpitating at the news of this incredible 
 chance, and this concurrence of fatal circumstances. I then saw 
 well that for me no longer struggle was possible. For two years 
 I was without news of the fair Ophelia ; I knew not if she were 
 in England, Scotland, or America, and I arrived from Italy at 
 the moment when, returning from the north of Europe, she re- 
 appeared in Paris. And we had nearly met in the same house, 
 and I occupied an apartment which she had just quitted. 
 
 This, however, was not the only indication that fate had 
 willed the bringing together of the French musician and 
 the Irish actress : — 
 
 Two days before that fixed for the conceit which, as I thought, 
 was a farewell to art and life, I was in Schlesinger's music- 
 ■ shop, when an Englishman entered, stayed a short time, and 
 left. "Who is that man?" said I to Schlesinger. "That is 
 Mr. Schutter, one of the editors of Galignani's Messenger. 
 Ah! I have an idea," he added, striking his forehead. "Give 
 me a box. Schutter knows Miss Smithson ; I will ask him to 
 take your tickets to her and engage her to be present at the 
 concert." The proposal thrilled me from head to foot, but I had 
 not the courage to refuse it, and I gave him the box. Schlesinger 
 ran after Mr. Schutter, caught him, explained the interest which 
 the presence of the actress would create at the concert, and 
 obtained his promise to bring her if possible. 
 
32 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 At that time Miss Smithson was not in the mood to 
 concede every request, her theatrical enterprise having 
 proved a failure. Nevertheless, to oblige Mr. Schutter she 
 attended the concert, learning only when on the way to the 
 Conservatoire who was the giver of it, and wholly un- 
 suspicious of the fact that she was the heroine of the melo- 
 drame to be performed. From her box she saw Berlioz, and 
 recognised him as her adorer of two years before. " That 
 is surely he," she said to herself; " poor young man, he has 
 forgotten me, no doubt.' I hope so." During the entr'acte, 
 after the " Symphonie Fantastique," some words were 
 dropped in the lady's hearing which renewed her attention 
 to the composer. "If he should love me still!" she mur- 
 mured. Of this there could be no doubt when the actor 
 Bocage, reciting the words put into the mouth of Lelio, 
 spoke pathetically of the lost Juliet-Ophelia. " Mon Dieu! 
 Juliet! Ophelia! I can no longer doubt. He means 
 myself. He loves me still I" The hall seemed to spin 
 round with the excited girl, and she returned home, as she 
 was wont to say herself, with no more consciousness of the 
 waking world than a sleepwalker. The next day Berlioz 
 obtained permission to visit his beloved one, and the letter 
 in which he implored this interview is too characteristic to 
 be passed over : — 
 
 A Mademoiselle Henriette Smithson, Rue de Rivoli, Hotel du 
 Congres. — If you do not desire my death, in the name of pity (I 
 dare not say of love) let me know when I can see you. I beg of 
 you mercy — pardon — on my knees, with tears. Oh ! unhappy 
 one that I am, I cannot think that I deserve what I suffer ; but I 
 bless the strokes which come from your hand. I await your 
 answer as the sentence of my judge. H. Berlioz. 
 
 Meanwhile, the lady's enterprise went from bad to worse, 
 till at last the theatre closed, leaving" Miss Smithson hope- 
 lessly in debt. Nor was this all. The poor girl, in stepping 
 from her carriage to the pavement, slipped and broke her 
 leg. 
 
 Now might Berlioz have shown himself a heartless man 
 of the world. The star of his artist-love had set with the 
 fickle Parisians ; she herself lay on a bed of sickness, and a 
 load of debt pressed her down. Did he leave her in this 
 strait ? To his honour, no. He exerted himself to get up a 
 benefit concert, at which Liszt and Chopin played, and then 
 — but let him speak for himself : — 
 
HIS LIFE. 33 
 
 Finally, in the summer of 1833, Henrietta Smithson being 
 ruined and but half-cured, I married her, despite the violent 
 opposition of her family, and after having beemnyself obliged to 
 resort to extremities with my parents. On the day of our marriage 
 she had nothing in the world but debts and the dread that her 
 accident had disabled her from playing again. On my part, I had 
 only 300 francs, lent me by my friend Gounet, and I was once 
 more out of favour at home. 
 
 All this, if not very wise, was very good and honourable 
 on the part of Berlioz. He should not, however, have told it 
 with such an evident desire to pose as a hero in the circum- 
 stances. It woujd seem from a passage in a letter written 
 to Hiller (July, 1833) that the course of Berlioz' love had 
 fulfilled a well-known proverb. We read : * — 
 
 You infer, no doubt, from the long and absurd silence I have 
 kept towards you, that the state of liberty in which you left me 
 did not last. Two days after you quitted Paris, Henrietta 
 begged me instantly to go to her. I was cold and calm as a 
 statue. She wrote, to me. two hours later; I went to her, and 
 after a thousand protestations and explanations which, without 
 .completely justifying her, exculpated her at least on the principal 
 point, I finished by pardoning her, and since then I have not left 
 her side for a day. 
 
 In the same letter he touches upon his by no means 
 roseate circumstances : — 
 
 My poor Henrietta begins to walk a little. We have already 
 been several times to the Tuileries together. I watch the pro- 
 gress of her cure with the anxiety of a mother looking on the 
 first steps of her infant. But what a frightful position is ours ! 
 My father will give me nothing, hoping by that to prevent my 
 marriage. She has nothing ; I can do little or nothing for her. 
 Yesterday evening we passed two hours together drowned in 
 tears. Urfder no pretext whatever can I make her accept the 
 money I have to give. Happily, I have obtained from the fund 
 for the encouragement of fine arts the sum of 1,000 francs for 
 her, and I am now sending it to her. It was waiting for this 
 money, which I desired to send myself, that delayed my journey. 
 As soon as possible, I start to obtain either from my father, my 
 brother-in-law, my friends, or the money lenders who know my 
 father's fortune, some thousands of francs, which will enable 
 me to extricate her as well as myself from our present terrible 
 position. 
 
 That in view of all this Berlioz had very gloomy thoughts 
 
 * " Correspondance Inedite," p. 109. 
 
 D 
 
34 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 he proves by continuing as follows : " As I know not how 
 the matter will end, I beg you to preserve this letter, so 
 that, should the worst happen, you will be able to claim all 
 my manuscript music, which I leave and confide to you." 
 
 From other communications we learn that terrible and 
 distracting scenes preceded the marriage, caused by the 
 impetuosity of the lover and the feeble, hesitating character 
 of Miss Smithson, who, influenced by her mother and sister, 
 could not make up her mind to take the final step. In a 
 letter to Humbert (August 30, 1833) Berlioz remarks, after 
 referring to some previous events :* — 
 
 Since then the scenes have become more violent. The first step 
 to marriage has been taken — an acte civil, which her execrable 
 sister has torn up. There have been despair on her part, and a 
 reproach of not- loving her ; whereupon, .weary of conflict, I 
 responded by taking poison before her eyes. Frightful cries of 
 Henrietta ! Sublime despair ! Atrocious laughter on my part ! 
 Desire to live on hearing her terrible protestations of affection ! 
 Emetic! Ipecacuanha! Vomitings for two hours! . . . Henrietta, 
 in despair wishes to repair all the wrong that "she has done 
 me. . . . She began well, but she has been hesitating again 
 for three days, influenced by the representations of her mother 
 and sister, and by our situation in point of fortune. She has 
 nothing, and I love her, and she dares not entrust to me her fate. 
 She wants to wait some months. Some months ! Damnation ! 
 I will not wait ; I have suffered too much. 
 
 At last Miss Smithson's scruples were overborne, and on 
 September 3, 1833, her lover writes :t — 
 
 We are announced. In fifteen days all will be over, if human 
 laws are good enough to allow it. I dread only their slowness. 
 At last ! ! ! 
 
 In October, shortly after marriage, he confided to the same 
 intimate friend : J — 
 
 Yes, my dear Humbert, I believed in spite of all of you, and 
 my faith has saved me. Henrietta is a delicious being. She is 
 Ophelia herself, not Juliet ; she has no passionate warmth — she 
 is tender, sweet, and timid. Sometimes when we are alone and 
 silent, leaning upon my shoulder, her hand upon my forehead, or 
 in one of those gracious poses which no painter has ever dreamed, 
 she weeps amid her smiles. " What is the matter, my poor 
 
 • " Lettres Intimes," p. 132. •)• Ibid., p. 135. + Ibid., p. 138 et seq. 
 
HIS LIFE. 35 
 
 love?" "Nothing. My heart is so full ! I think that thou hast 
 bought me so dear — that thou hast suffered much for me. Let 
 me weep, or I shall be suffocated ! " And I hear her -weep tran- 
 quilly till she says, " Sing, Hector, sing." I then begin the 
 Scene duBal — 
 
 I 
 
 =S 
 
 S£ 
 
 -^>s 
 
 ■o~i~<o~ 
 
 $ 
 
 ^=P£ 
 
 ^ 
 
 i^-tZ 
 
 which she so much loves ; the Scene aux Champs makes her so 
 sad that she cannot hear it. She is a sensitive. Truly, I never 
 imagined such an impressionable nature. 
 
 Very soon after marriage, Berlioz, having been relieved 
 by the Government from the obligation, as Grand Prix, to 
 spend a year in Germany, began to act what he calls "the 
 painful rdle of benSficiaire," and organised a dramatic per- 
 formance, followed by a concert. In the first, Madame 
 Berlioz played a scene from " Hamlet," her husband noting, 
 with cruel pain, that her freedom of movement had been 
 destroyed by the accident. Moreover, all the applause of 
 the public was reserved for another artist. " Poor Ophelia, 
 thy sun declining ! — I was in despair." As for the concert, 
 it was a complete fiasco. By the then rules of the Theatre 
 Italien the orchestra was not obliged to play after midnight, 
 and on this occasion its members kept to the letter of their 
 bond : — 
 
 While Weber's chorus was being sung these cowardly clowns, 
 unworthy to be called musicians, slipped away. It was midnight. 
 The other players, whom I paid, remained at their posts, and 
 when I went up to begin the symphony I found myself sur- 
 rounded by five violins, two violas, four basses, and a trombone. 
 I knew not what to do in my fright. The public showed no 
 inclination to go away; they even began to be impatient and to 
 demand the symphony. ... At last, in the midst of the 
 tumult, a voice cried from the balcony, " The ' Marche au Sup- 
 plice ! " ' I answered, " I cannot play the ' Marche au Supplice ' 
 with five violins. It is not my fault; the orchestra has gone 
 away. I hope that the public " — ... I was flushed with shame 
 and indignation. The audience then went away disappointed, 
 the concert ended, and my enemies did not forget to say that my 
 music put the musicians to flight. 
 
 The concert, nevertheless, brought in 7,000 francs, which 
 sum immediately disappeared in the gulf of Madame Berlioz' 
 debts. Hereupon the master resolved to try again, and give 
 
 D 3 
 
36 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 a concert at the Conservatoire with a more trustworthy 
 orchestra. This proved a complete success : — 
 
 Finally, to crown good fortune, a man, when the public had 
 gone away — a man with long hair, piercing eyes, strange and 
 ravaged face, a son of genius, a colossus among giants, whom 
 I had never seen, and of whom the first sight troubled me 
 profoundly — waited for me in the hall, stopped me to shake my 
 hand, and crowded upon me burning eulogies which set me on 
 fire both at heart and head. This was Paganini. 
 
 • A few weeks later Paganini called upon Berlioz and said, 
 " I have a wonderful viola, an admirable Stradivarius, and I 
 wish to play upon it in public. But I have no fitting music, 
 and I am sure that you could provide it." In vain Berlioz 
 protested that such a virtuoso should write for himself. " No, 
 no, I insist," replied the great man. " You will succeed. 
 As for me, I am suffering too much to compose, and could 
 not dream of it." This was the origin of the symphony 
 " Harold en Italie " with viola solo, produced at the 
 Conservatoire, November 23, 1834. 
 
 The letters to Humbert make mention of this work in an 
 interesting manner. In one (May 16, 1834) we read :* — 
 
 I have finished the first three parts of my new symphony with 
 viola principal, and I am about to conclude the fourth. I believe 
 that it will be good, and, above all, very curiously picturesque. . . . 
 There is a " March of Pilgrims singing the Evening Prayer," 
 which I hope will have a reputation in the month of December. 
 
 » 
 
 Subsequently (August 31, 1834) ne wrote :t — 
 
 I think I have told you that my symphony with viola principal, 
 entitled " Harold " was finished two months ago. Paganini, I 
 believe, will find that the viola is not sufficiently treated en 
 concerto. It is a symphony upon a new plan, and not a com- 
 position written for the purpose of showing off individual talent 
 like his. I shall always be indebted to him for having made me 
 undertake it. It is being copied at this moment, and will be 
 performed in November at the first concert which I shall give 
 at the Conservatoire. 
 
 Men with decided character always make decided enemies, 
 and we have seen against what opposition and intrigue 
 Berlioz had sometimes to contend. Now a fresh example 
 presents itself. In 1836 the Minister of the Interior set 
 
 * " Lettres Intimes,' - p. 148. f Ibid., p. 150. 
 
HIS LIFE. 
 
 37 
 
 apart an annual sum of 3,000 francs for the encourage- 
 ment of sacred compositions, and resolved to begin by 
 asking" Berlioz to write a Mass.* The master received un- 
 official news of this, and, overjoyed, at, once sought an 
 interview with M. Gasparin. " I am just leaving the 
 Government," said the Minister, "and this measure will 
 be my musical testament. You have received the order 
 for the Requiem?" " No, sir, and it was only by chance 
 that I heard of your good intentions towards me." " How 
 can that be ! I directed the order to be sent to you eight 
 days ago. This is owing to the negligence of the office. 
 I will see to it." But the fact was that the Director of Fine 
 Arts, who did not like the Minister's project and loved 
 Berlioz but little, had purposely kept back the order, hoping 
 that, when M. Gasparin left the Government, the whole 
 matter would drop. His mean trick failed, as it deserved 
 to fail. On the last day of office M. Gasparin sent for 
 the Director, and, in severe terms, commanded him to for- 
 ward the commission to Berlioz at once. \Yhich was done. 
 In revenge, the master allows us to see how fitted the 
 Director was for his post : — 
 
 This arbiter of the destinies of art condescended to recognise 
 no value in any music save Rossini's. One day, however, after 
 having in my presence passed under the saw of his disdainful 
 appreciation all the ancient and modern masters of Europe, with 
 the exception of Beethoven, whom he had forgotten, he bethought 
 himself all at once and said, " However, there is one of them, I 
 think — his name is — what does he call himself? — a German, whose 
 symphonies they play, at the Conservatoire." " Beethoven ? " 
 " Yes, Beethoven. He is not without talent." I myself heard 
 the Director of Fine Arts say this. He admitted that Beethoven 
 was not without talent ! 
 
 The " Requiem " was composed in a fury of haste, Berlioz 
 eyen adopting a sort of musical shorthand to catch up his 
 crowding ideas, and, after a good deal of fuss and pother, 
 it was performed at the Invalides in commemoration of the 
 fall of Constantine. Habeneck conducted, and Berlioz de- 
 liberately charges him with trying to ruin the work, because 
 at its most critical moment he laid down his baton and took 
 
 * From the letters to Humbert (" Lettres Intimes ") it would appear that the 
 Requiem was ordered for the anniversary funeral service of the victims of 
 Fieschi, that the price agreed upon was 4,000 francs, and that the performance 
 took place towards the end of 1837. 
 
38 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 a pinch of snuff. " I had my eye upon him," says the master, 
 " and in a moment, pivoting upon one foot, I threw myself 
 before him, stretched out my arms, and marked the time of 
 the new movement. The orchestra followed me in due 
 order; I conducted the movement to its end, and the effect 
 I desired was produced. When, at the last words of the 
 chorus, Habeneck saw the ' Tuba Mirum ' saved, he said, 
 ' What a cold sweat I was in ! Without you we should 
 have been lost.' ' Yes, I know it well,' I replied, looking at 
 him steadily." Berlioz had great difficulty in obtaining the 
 promised 2,000 francs for the expenses of performance, and 
 still more in securing the 3,000 francs which were his by the 
 terms of M. Gasparin's ordonnance. At last he would wait 
 no longer: — 
 
 One morning I went to the Home Office, blue, pale with rage, 
 resolved to make a row, resolved upon anything. On entering, 
 I said to the Director, " It decidedly appears that you will not 
 pay me! " "My dear Berlioz," he answered, "you know it 'is 
 not my fault. I have taken all care, and made severe investiga- 
 tions. The money destined for you has disappeared, and gone 
 somewhere else. I don't know in what office it is to be found. 
 Ah! if such things happened in mine!" "What! the funds 
 destined for fine arts go out of your office without your knowing 
 it ! Your budget is then at the disposition of the first comer ? 
 But no matter. I am not going to trouble myself with such 
 questions. A Requiem was ordered by the Minister of the 
 Interior at the price of 3,000 francs ; I must have 3,000 francs." 
 "Man Dieu! have a little patience. The 'matter shall be con- 
 sidered. Besides, there is talk of the Cross for you." "A fig 
 for your Cross ! Give me my money." " But " — " There is 
 no but," I replied, upsetting a chair. " I give you till to-morrow 
 noon, and if at twelve o'clock precisely I have not received the 
 amount, I will make a scandal with the Minister such as you 
 have never experienced. You know that I am able to do it." 
 Upon this the Director, quite upset, and forgetting his hat, 
 ran towards the Minister's room, I following and shouting, 
 " Tell him that I should be ashamed to treat my bootmaker as 
 he is treating me, and that his conduct towards me will soon 
 enjoy a rare celebrity." This time I had found a crack in the 
 Minister's armour. Ten minutes later the Director returned 
 with 3,000 francs, taken from the chest of the Fine Arts Depart- 
 ment. They had found the money. 
 
 Soon after the events just narrated, a professorship of 
 harmony became vacant at the Conservatoire, and Berlioz 
 
HIS LIFE. 39 
 
 applied for it. This brought about another interview with 
 Cherubini, who, we are told, began the conversation in the 
 sweetest voice at his command : — 
 
 C. You offer yourself for the harmony ciass ? 
 
 B. Yes, sir. . 
 
 C. Ah ! — but, you see — you will have that class !— your reputa- 
 tion, however — your connections — 
 
 B. So much the better, sir ; I have asked for it in order to 
 have it. 
 
 C. Yes, but — this is what troubles me — I have wished to give 
 the place to another. 
 
 B. In that case, sir, I withdraw my application. 
 
 C. No, no ; I don't desire that, because, you see, it will be 
 declared that I was the cause, of your action. 
 
 B. Well, then, I remain in the ranks. 
 
 C. I tell you that you will have the place if you persist, and — I 
 never intended it for you. 
 
 B. What is to be done ? 
 
 C. You know that it is necessary — it is necessary — it is neces- 
 ' sary to be a pianist to teach harmony at the Conservatoire ; you 
 
 know it, my dear — 
 
 B. It is necessary to be a pianist? Ah! I never suspected 
 that. That is an excellent reason. I will write to you and say 
 that, not being a pianist, I cannot aspire to profess harmony at 
 the Conservatoire, and that I withdraw my candidature. 
 
 C. Yes, my dear — but — but — but I do not wish to be the cause 
 of your — 
 
 B. No, far from that. Of course I ought to withdraw, having 
 been stupid enough to forget that one must be a pianist to teach 
 harmony. 
 
 C. Yes, my dear— come, let us embrace. You know how I 
 love you. 
 
 B. Oh ! yes, sir, I know. 
 
 The exquisite humour of this scene would be spoilt by 
 comment, but we should add that Berlioz, who enjoyed it 
 immensely, went away priding himself on the consideration 
 which kept him from saying to Cherubini, " Since you can- 
 not play the piano, how do you yourself contrive to teach 
 harmony?" He did better to wait, and, as he waited* the 
 opportunity came, after its manner in such cases : — 
 
 I had a seat in the parterre of the Opera when his (Cherubini's) 
 " AH Baba " was produced. This work, everybody agrees, is one 
 of the palest and most empty from his pen. Towards the end of 
 the first act, tired of listening to nothing in particular, I could 
 
40 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 not help saying, loud enough to be heard by my neighbours, 
 " I'll give twenty francs for an idea." In the middle of the 
 second act, irritated by the same musical mirage, I went on 
 bidding, " Forty francs for an idea." The finale began : " Eighty 
 francs for an idea." The finale ended, I rose, threw out these 
 words, " Ah ! ma foi, I am not rich enough ! I withdraw," 
 and went away. Two or three young men, seated near me 
 on the same bench, looked indignant. They were pupils of 
 the Conservatoire who had been placed there to admire usefully 
 their director's work. They did not forget, as I learned after- 
 wards, to go the next day and tell him of my insolent offer, 
 and my more insolent discouragement. 
 
 At this time our master was a very busy man, and worked 
 hard, stimulated, perhaps, by the birth of a son. His " Francs 
 Juges" was scarcely completed, yet he undertook the compo- 
 sition of another opera on the subject of " Benvenuto Cellini," 
 libretto by Leon de Wailly — " a young poet of great talent " 
 —and Auguste Barbier. The poem was read to M. Crosnier, 
 the manager of the Op6ra-Comique, and by him refused. As 
 to this Berlioz remarks, addressing Humbert :* — 
 
 Despite the protestations of Crosnier, we think that I am the 
 cause of the refusal. They look upon me, at the Op6ra-Comique 
 as a sapeur, an upsetter of the national "form," and will not have 
 me. Wherefore they refuse the words, so as not to have to admit 
 the music of a madman. 
 
 There was also talk with De Wailly of a grand opera in three 
 acts on an historical subject, and some portions of this work 
 appear to have been written, since we read in a subsequent 
 letter (November 30, 1834) to Humbert,:! — 
 
 If you like, I will have copied for you in score the romance 
 which Mdlle. Falcon sang at the last concert. It is the one you 
 know under the name of " Le Paysan Breton," with new words, 
 by Auguste Barbier, set to the music. This little piece is part of 
 an opera which we at one time believed we should see represented 
 at the Op6ra this winter ; but the intrigues of Habeneck and his 
 fellows, and the stupid obstinacy of Veron, after some hesitations, 
 have adjourned the matter indefinitely. 
 
 On December 16, however, Berlioz was able to write that 
 his " Benvenuto Cellini " had been accepted at the. Op6ra by 
 the new director, Duponchel. 
 
 Berlioz was just now almost as busy with the literature of 
 
 * "Lettres Intimes," p. 151. •)• Ibid., p. 153. 
 
HIS LIFE. 41 
 
 music as with music itself. The publisher Coste com- 
 menced the issue of a work entitled, "Les Hommes Illustr6s 
 de l'ltalie," and it seems that Berlioz was applied to for 
 biographies of the Italian musicians. At any rate he speaks 
 more than once to Humbert of Coste's enterprise, and there 
 is a letter extant in which we clearly find him engaged upon 
 a biographical task. That letter now appears in print for the 
 first time ,:* — 
 
 My dear Bottee de Toulmon, — You, who are the pearl of 
 biblical monomaniacs, can you help to relieve me from an 
 embarrassment ? I believe in your learning as much as in 
 your readiness to oblige, and I now ask the help of both. 
 Here are. the facts. I have been asked to write for a journal 
 some biographies of Italian musicians, and (if I except Marcello) 
 I do not know where to find material for these " illustrations 
 macaroniques." Aid me a little. Have you. any Italian articles 
 that I can translate ? What can be found in Choron, or in the 
 biography of Micaud ? If you have discovered any treasure of 
 this kind, write me a line ; I shall take it as an infinite kindness. 
 I am so overwhelmed with work of all kinds, with my articles, 
 with my rehearsals at Notre Dame, which never end, and with 
 the completion of my opera, that I know not how to find the time 
 to come and see you. I will do so, however, when you are good 
 enough to give me a rendezvous at the libraryf or at your own 
 house on the morning of one of my rehearsal days — for example, 
 Thursday, Friday, Saturday, or Sunday, at your choice. 
 
 Adieu ! Pardon my new intrusion. 
 
 Your entirely devoted, 
 
 Hector Berlioz. 
 
 12, Rue St. Denis, Montmartre, November n. 
 
 And after Saturday next, 35, Rue de Londres, Paris. 
 
 In addition to all his other labours the master contributed 
 musical articles to no less than four journals— " the Reno- 
 vateur, which pays badly; the Monde Dramatique and the 
 Gazette Musicale, which pay little; and. the Bebats, which 
 pays well." 
 
 It is singular that the man who used his pen with so much 
 vivacity and distinctiveness hated the employment beyond 
 measure, and professed that the announcement of a first per- 
 formance requiring his attendance and notice made him ill. 
 On this matter, let us give his own wor,ds : — 
 
 * Autograph kindly lent for translation by Julian Marshall, Esq. 
 f M. de Toulmon was librarian at the Conservatoire, a post afterwards filled 
 (1839) by Berlioz himself. 
 
42 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 This task, always renewing itself, poisoned my life. However, 
 apart from the pecuniary means it brought me — means I could 
 not afford to sacrifice — it was almost impossible for me to give it 
 up, under pain of being helpless in presence of the furious and 
 nearly countless hatreds it had raised against me. For the press, 
 in a certain connection, is more precious than the lance of 
 Achilles. Not only does it cure, at times, the wounds which it 
 has made, but, again, it acts as a defence to those who serve it. 
 However, to what miserable shifts am I not driven ! — what cir- 
 cumlocution in order to avoid telling the truth ! — what concessions 
 made to social relations, and even to public opinion ! — what rage 
 repressed ! — what shame swallowed ! And they find me pas- 
 sionate, wicked, contemptible ! Ah ! cads who treat me thus, if 
 I were to speak, my full mind, you would see that the bed of 
 nettles upon which you say I stretch you is a bed of roses 
 compared with the grill whereon you would frizzle. 
 
 To this last adjuration every man prominent among 
 critics, as was Berlioz, adds, we doubt not, his fervent 
 " Amen." On the same subject, our master continues : — 
 
 I must do myself the justice to say that on no account what- 
 ever have I withheld the fullest expression of esteem, admiration, 
 or enthusiasm for works and for men who have inspired me with 
 those feelings. I have warmly praised men who have done me 
 injury, and with whom I had ceased to have personal relations. 
 Indeed, the only compensation that the press has afforded me for 
 much suffering has been the way opened for my sympathy with 
 the grand, the true, and the beautiful wherever I have found them. 
 It appears to me sweet to praise a talented enemy, and, besides, 
 it is a duty which an honest man should be proud to discharge; 
 just the same as a misleading word written in favour of a friend 
 without ability should cause pain. In both cases, however, as all 
 critics know, the man who hates you, furious at the merit you 
 seem to acquire by publicly and warmly praising him, execrates 
 you more ; and the man who loves you, always discontented with 
 the credit you have painfully given him, loves you less. 
 
 The connection of Berlioz with the Journal des Debate 
 brought him, however, a prospect of more than shame and 
 suffering. One day, the editor, M. Bertin, said to his 
 musical critic, " My dear friend, your position is now made. 
 I have spoken about you to the Minister of the Interior, and 
 he has decided to give you, notwithstanding Cherubini's 
 opposition, a composition class at the Conservatoire, with a 
 salary of 1,500 francs, and, more, a pension of 4,500 francs 
 from the funds of his department destined for the encourage- 
 
HIS LIFE. 43 
 
 ment of fine arts. With 6,000 francs a year you will be 
 free from all disquietude, and able to give yourself up freely 
 to composition." M. Bertin's words were repeated to Berlioz 
 by the chief of the division of fine arts, and naturally called 
 forth the warmest gratitude. But " put not your trust in 
 princes " or in their ministers. Berlioz tells us (using large 
 capitals): "This promise, made spontaneously to a man 
 who asked nothing, was no better kept than so many others, 
 and from that time to the present moment I have heard no 
 more about it." 
 
 Belonging to this period of the master's career are several 
 letters not unworthy of attention here. One, addressed to 
 Hofmeister, the Leipzig publisher, contains a strong re- 
 monstrance against the injustice done to the overture "Les 
 Francs Juges," in an arrangement issued by him for four 
 hands, arid actually attributed to the composer. About the 
 particulars we need not trouble ourselves, but the following 
 passages are of interest :* — 
 
 Your arranger has cut my score, pared ' it, trimmed it, and 
 stitched it in such a fashion that I see in many parts only some- 
 thing to laugh at, the honour of which I beg him to keep to 
 himself. If a Beethoven or a Weber had taken a similar liberty 
 in my case, I should have submitted to that which, nevertheless, 
 I could only regard as a cruel humiliation ; but neither Weber or 
 Beethoven would ever have made me suffer thus. If the work is 
 bad, they would not trouble to touch it ; if it had seemed to them 
 good, they would have respected the form, the thought, the 
 • details, and even the faults. Besides, men of that stamp not 
 being more common in Germany than elsewhere, I have reason 
 to believe that my overture has not fallen into the hands of a 
 very extraordinary musician. 
 
 After pointing out the particular faults of the arrange- 
 ment, and indicating the only adaptation of which he 
 approved, Berlioz thus concludes : "As for every other pub- 
 lication of the same kind dealing with this work, whether 
 attributed to me or not, I disown it formally, and upon this 
 I pray God to pardon the arrangers as I pardon them." The 
 petition is perhaps scarcely definite enough to satisfy those 
 whom it directly concerns, but others can sympathise with the 
 righteous indignation of a composer who sees his music 
 maltreated, and the guilt of the maltreatment laid at his 
 own door. 
 
 * " Correspondance In£dite," p. 113 et seq. 
 
44 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 Another letter, addressed to Robert Schumann, expresses 
 the gratitude of Berlioz for the production at Leipzig by 
 that master of the overture just named. Schumann, having 
 carefully studied and rehearsed the work, introduced it with 
 success to the German audience, and the result, by comparison 
 with failure elsewhere, gave our composer a text upon which 
 he did not fail to preach. At least one part of the sermon 
 has an interest for English readers : * — 
 
 Willyou convey my thanks to the artists ? Their patience in 
 studying this difficult piece has the greater value in my eyes 
 because I have not had much occasion to praise that of several 
 musical societies who have made the same attempt. Save those 
 of Douai and Dijon, they have become discouraged after a first 
 rehearsal, and the work, after being lacerated in a thousand ways, 
 has perforce returned to the bookshelves as worthy, at most, to 
 figure in a collection of monstrosities. It even appears that a 
 trial of this kind diverted the London Philharmonic Society. . . . 
 Picture to yourself, in effect, movements forced at the double in 
 the adagio ; dragged back proportionately in the allegro, so as to 
 produce that flattened out (aplatissant) mezzo termine insupport- 
 able to all who possess the smallest musical sentiment ; imagine 
 violins deciphering at first sight passages difficult enough despite 
 the tempo comfortabile at which the allegro is taken ; the trom- 
 bones starting ten or twelve bars too soon ; the drummer losing 
 his head in the rhythm a trois temps— and you will have an idea 
 of the delectable charivari resulting. I do not dispute the ability 
 of " MM. les Philharmoniques de l'Argyle Room " (sic). Heaven 
 preserve me from doing so ! I point out only the strange way in 
 which they conduct their rehearsals. No doubt we here often 
 make bad music at the first trial of a new piece ; but as, in our 
 judgment, nobody, not even English artists, possesses inborn 
 science, and there is no shame in studying with attention and 
 courage that which cannot be understood all at once, we begin 
 again three times, four times, ten times, if necessary, and that 
 for several days in succession. In that way we secure a per- 
 formance nearly always correct ; sometimes surprising. 
 
 Berlioz then goes on- to tell Schumann that he regretted' 
 the publication of his overture, that he had declined offers to 
 print his symphonies, and that he held it better for a com- 
 poser to keep his works for a long while under fatherly care : — 
 
 I love them, these poor children, with a paternal love which has 
 nothing Spartan about it, and I a thousand times prefer keeping 
 them in obscurity, but intact, to sending them abroad in search of 
 
 • " Correspondance Ingdite," p. 116 et seq. 
 
HIS LIFE. 45 
 
 glory or of frightful wounds and death. At the risk of appearing 
 ridiculous, I must say that I have never understood how rich 
 painters are able, without internal gripings, to separate them- 
 selves from their finest works for a certain number of crowns, and 
 to spread them over the four quarters of the world, as is their 
 constant practice. . . . The writers of poetry and prose are alone 
 able to sell their works without running too much risk of seeing 
 them disfigured, like musicians, and without the pain of never 
 seeing them again, like painters. ... It is an intense joy for the 
 composer to brood over his work, so to speak ; to shield it. as long 
 as possible from the storms which bad orchestras, bad singers, 
 bad directors, and the traders in contredanses call up around it ; 
 there is for him an unspeakable happiness in letting it see day- 
 light only at long intervals, when assiduous care has given to its 
 beauty all its distinction, when the air is pure, the weather soft 
 and serene, and the society select. The number of compositions 
 that one is able, without condemning them to absolute obscurity, 
 thus to tear for long out of the teeth of the press, that lion qucerens 
 quern devorat, is unhappily but few ; let us not further limit them. 
 
 A third letter is one in which Berlioz gossips to Liszt in 
 his best style, as a mere retailer of Parisian news, " without 
 passion, without blame or praise ; in a word, with the calm 
 insipidity, of an adept of that famous philosophic school 
 which we founded in Rome in the year of grace 1830, 
 and called 'School of Absolute Indifference to Universal 
 Matter.' " Some of his gossip is worth hearing at this distant 
 time. He meets, on the Boulevard, the violinist, Batta, just 
 arrived from London : — 
 
 Berlioz. What are they doing in London ? 
 
 B. Absolutely nothing; they despise music, poetry, drama, 
 everything there, except the Italian Opera, where the Queen's 
 presence attracts a crowd ; all the other musical enterprises are 
 abandoned. ... I arrived too late, and it is the same with Artot, 
 who, despite his success at the Philharmonic, despite the incon- 
 testable beauty of his talent, has a tedious time of it. 
 
 Berlioz. And Doehler? 
 
 B. Doehler is dull also.- 
 
 Berlioz. And Thalberg ? 
 
 B. Thalberg cultivates the provinces. 
 
 Berlioz. And Benedict? 
 
 B. Encouraged by the vogue of his first work, he is writing an 
 English opera. 
 
 Then Batta invites Berlioz to meet him at Charles Hallo's, 
 where they mean to drink beer and make music : — 
 
46 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 M. Halle is a young German pianist, who has long hair, who is 
 tall and thin, who plays the piano magnificently, who understands 
 music before he has read it — that is to say, he is inclined to re- 
 semble thee. I found his countryman, Heller, at his house. 
 Serious talent, vast musical intelligence, rapid conception, and 
 executive power — such are the qualities as composer and pianist 
 with which all those credit him who know him well, and I am of 
 the number. Hall6 and Batta made us hear a Sonata in B flat of 
 Felix Mendelssohn. The learned texture and firm style of this 
 piece was much admired. " He is a great master," said Heller. 
 We chorused the remark as we drank our beer. Then came the 
 Sonata in A major of Beethoven, the first movement drawing 
 from the auditory exclamations, asseverations, cries of enthu- 
 siasm. The menuet and finale only redoubled our intense musical 
 exaltation, the more because champagne was then going round. 
 
 We have already referred to " Benvenuto Cellini." That 
 work went slowly on, was accomplished with difficulty, and 
 would not, the master tells us, have been got through at all 
 but for the kindness of Ernest Legouve : — 
 
 A man who writes an opera should be free from all other work 
 — that is to say, his means of living should be assured him for the 
 necessary time. But this was far from being my case ; I lived 
 from day to day only on the articles I wrote for the papers, and 
 these took up my time almost exclusively. I did my best to give 
 two months to my score in the first flush of the fever with which 
 it inspired me ; the imperative need, however, soon came to drop 
 the pen of the composer, in order to use with all my might that of 
 the critic. This gave me an indescribable heartache. But I could 
 not hesitate. I had a wife and son ; could I allow them to want 
 the necessaries of life ? 
 
 In the midst of this trouble came Legouve' : — 
 
 L. Where is your opera ? 
 
 B. I have not yet finished the first act. I cannot find time to 
 work at it. 
 
 L. But if you had the time ? 
 
 B. Parbleu 1 Then I should write from morning to night. 
 
 L. What do you want in order to be free ? 
 
 B. The two thousand francs which I have not got. 
 
 L. And if some one. ... If some one were to — come, why 
 don't you help me ? 
 
 B. What ! What do you say ? 
 
 L. Well, if one of your friends were to lend you the money? . . , 
 
 B. What friend could I ask for such a sum ? 
 
 L. There is no need to ask for it. I offer it. 
 
HIS LIFE. 47 
 
 Berlioz adds : — 
 
 I leave others to imagine my delight. Legouv6 lent me the 
 money the next day, thanks to which I was able to finish " Ben- 
 venuto." Excellent heart ! Worthy and charming man ! Dis- 
 tinguished writer, artist himself, he had divined my suffering, 
 and, in his exquisite delicacy, he feared to give me pain when 
 offering the means to end it ! 
 
 At length " Benvenuto " was put in rehearsal, but that 
 process turned out to be anything save agreeable to 
 Berlioz. Duponchel, the Director of the Opera, looked 
 upon the composer as a " sort of madman," whose music 
 was a tissue of extravagances, and he avowedly determined to 
 produce the work "not because of its music, which he well 
 knew to be absurd, but because of the drama, which he found 
 charming." The Director's hostility to Berlioz was soon 
 reflected in the attitude of the company, from Habeneck 
 downwards, the orchestra always excepted. However, the 
 opera was played (September 3, 1838), and Berlioz himself 
 tells us with what result. " They awarded the overture 
 an exaggerated success, and hissed all the rest with admir- 
 able unanimity and energy." This judgment, however, 
 the composer did not accept. Fourteen years later, he 
 went through the score, in the light of enlarged experience 
 and more cultured taste, and saw in it a "variety of 
 ideas, an impetuous verve, and a flood of musical colour " 
 which deserved a better, fate. Among the minority of the 
 audience was Paganini, who went away and said, " If I were 
 Director of the Op6ra, I would engage that young man this 
 very day to write three other works ; I would give him his 
 price in advance, and reap a harvest of gold." It may have 
 been that a sense of injustice done prompted the great 
 violinist to the liberal action presently to be noticed. There 
 only remains to add, as regards the production of " Ben- 
 venuto," that the composer, ever grateful to those associated 
 with him in the performance of his works, addressed the 
 subjoined letter to the orchestra of the Opera :* — 
 
 To MM. the Artists of the Optra. 
 
 Gentlemen, — At the moment when my work is about to be 
 
 represented, I feel I ought to thank all the artists who take part 
 
 in its execution for the zeal and the patience brought by them to 
 
 the difficult work of rehearsal. Whatever be the fate of my score, 
 
 * Autograph kindly lent for translation by Julian Marshall, Esq. 
 
48 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 I shall always preserve a remembrance of the proofs of interest 
 and devotion which I have received from MM. the artists of the 
 Opera, and I beg them to accept the expression of my gratitude. 
 
 Hector Berlioz. 
 
 In the December following, Berlioz gave two concerts at 
 the Conservatoire, of which the first no more than covered 
 its expenses. To do better with the second, the master 
 announced his two symphonies, the " Fantastique " and 
 " Harold," and this had the result of attracting Paganini, 
 who, though its suggester, had never heard the last-named 
 composition. At the close of the performance, Paganini 
 went to Berlioz, accompanied by his son, Achille, and the 
 following scene took place : — 
 
 In consequence of an affection of the larynx, which ultimately 
 killed him, he (Paganini) had entirely lost his voice, and only his 
 son, when in a place perfectly silent, could hear or, perhaps, guess 
 at his words. He made a sign to the boy, who, mounting on a 
 chair, placed his ear to his father's mouth and listened at- 
 tentively. Presently Achille got down and turned towards me. 
 " My father," he said, " desires me to assure you, sir, that in all 
 his life he has never received an impression from any concert as 
 from this ; that your music has quite upset him, and that he 
 cannot resist throwing himself at your knees to thank you." At 
 these strange words I made a gesture of incredulity and confusion, 
 but Paganini took me by the arm, and, mustering all his voice, 
 said, "Yes! yes!" drew me into the room where many of my 
 musicians still were, went down on his knee and kissed my 
 hand. 
 
 Stopping in the street to tell this story to M. Bertin, editor 
 of the Debuts, Berlioz caught cold, and was on a sick bed when 
 Achille Paganini came, saying, " My father will be very sorry 
 to learn that you are still unwell, and if he were not himself 
 suffering, he would call upon you. Here is a letter he 
 desired me to bring." As Berlioz was about to unseal it, 
 the boy stopped him: "There is no answer needed; my 
 father told me that you should read it when you were alone." 
 He then hurried away. The letter ran thus : — 
 
 My dear Friend, — Beethoven dead, only Berlioz is able to make 
 him live again, and I, who have tasted your divine compositions, 
 worthy of a genius such as you — I believe it my duty to beg your 
 kind acceptance, as homage on my part, of twenty thousand francs, 
 which will be paid on presentation of the inclosed. Believe me 
 always your affectionate Nicolo Paganini. 
 
HIS LIFE. 49 
 
 Pale and overwhelmed, Berlioz held the letter in his hand 
 as his wife entered the room : — 
 
 She cried, " Allons ! what is it now ? Some new misfortune ? 
 But let us take heart. We have endured the others." " No, no! 
 on the contrary ! " "What then?" "Paganini!" "Well?" 
 " He has sent me— twenty thousand francs ! " " Louis ! Louis ! " 
 cried Henriette, distractedly, running to my son, who was playing 
 in the next room, "come, come here to your father! come and 
 thank the good God for what He has done for your father ! " 
 Then my wife and child, running together, fell prostrate by the 
 side of my bed, the mother praying, the astonished boy by her 
 side joining his little hands. O Paganini ! what a scene ! If you 
 had only been able to witness it ! 
 
 As soon as possible Berlioz wrote to his benefactor in the 
 following terms : — 
 
 O worthy and great artist ! How can I express my thank- 
 fulness ? I am not rich, but, believe me, the approbation of a 
 man of genius such as you touches me a thousand times more 
 than the royal generosity of your present. Words fail me ; I will 
 run to embrace you the moment I am able to quit my bed, where 
 I am still detained. 
 
 Paganini's generous behaviour led to much "envy, hatred, 
 and all uncharitableness " among those who thought Berlioz 
 undeserving, either absolutely or by comparison with them- 
 selves. On the other hand, Jules Janin wrote a glowing 
 article in the Journal des Debats, and sent a private letter to 
 the master, which is of interest as showing the, enthusiasm 
 Berlioz was able to excite in a man like Janin :— 
 
 Dear Berlioz, — I am absolutely bound to tell you of all my 
 happiness on reading this morning the good and beautiful lettre 
 de change et de gloire you have received from the illustrious 
 Paganini. I do not speak of you ; I do not speak only of the 
 fortune which he has given you — three years of leisure, the time 
 to produce masterpieces — I speak of that great name of Beet- 
 hoven by which he has saluted you. And what more noble con- 
 tradiction to give to the small people who have chosen not to 
 recognise your "Cellini" as the brother of " Fidelio " ? Then 
 let Paganini be praised as his good actions deserve, and let him 
 be "henceforth inviolable. He has been great and generous 
 towards you ; more generous than a king, than a minister, than 
 any European artists — the veritable kings of men. He has sus- 
 tained you with his approbation and his fortune ; it is therefore 
 more than ever an obligation to praise this great musician, who 
 
 E 
 
50 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 has taken you by the hand. Dear Berlioz, I embrace you very 
 tenderly, in all the joy of my heart. 
 
 As soon as Berlioz was able to leave his room, he hastened 
 to Paganini's house-: — 
 
 They tell me that he is walking up and down his billiard- 
 room alone. I enter ; we embrace each other without power to 
 say a word. After some minutes, as I faltered out I know not 
 what expressions of gratitude, Paganini, whose words the 
 silence of the room permitted me to hear, stopped me, saying : 
 " Don't speak any more about that. No. Add nothing. It has 
 given me the most profound satisfaction I ever experienced in 
 my life. You will never know what emotions your music excited ; 
 for years past I have not felt anything like it." 
 
 Berlioz then went home, paid his debts, found a good sum 
 left to live upon yet awhile, and set about writing " Rom6o 
 et Juliette." In seven months that great work was com- 
 pleted and introduced to the public by three successive per- 
 formances under its composer's direction. But the man who 
 had made its creation possible was not present : — 
 
 To my great regret Paganini never heard or read it. I hoped 
 always for his return to Paris. I waited, moreover, for the work 
 to be revised and printed to send him a copy, but meanwhile he 
 died at Nice, leaving me, amid so many other poignant sorrows, 
 in ignorance as to whether he would have deemed worthy a work 
 written to please him before all, and with the intention to justify 
 in his own eyes that which he had done for the author. He 
 himself seemed to regret much not knowing " Rom6o et Juliette," 
 and said so in a letter from Nice dated January 7, 1840, where 
 also occurs this phrase, " Now all is done, envy can only keep 
 silent." 
 
 But if envy closed her mouth, criticism did not : — 
 
 Poor dear, great friend! he had- never read, happily, the 
 horrible stupidities written in several Parisian journals about the 
 plan of the work, the Introduction, the Adagio, the Queen Mab, 
 the recitative of Friar Laurence. One reproached me for the 
 extravagance of attempting this new form of symphony ; another 
 found in the scherzo of Queen Mab only a petty grotesque noise, 
 like that of syringes badly greased. A third, in speaking of the 
 love scene of the Adagio, of the piece which three-fourths of the 
 musicians of Europe who know it put at the head of all I have 
 written, declared that I had not comprehended Shakespeare. 
 Frog puffed up with silliness, when thou canst prove that to 
 me. . . . Never did criticisms more unexpected, more cruelly 
 
HIS LIFE. 51 
 
 wound me ; and, as usual, none of the Aristarchs who wrote 
 for or against the work pointed out one of its defects, which 
 I successively corrected later, as I was able to discern them. 
 
 Soon after the composition of " Rom6o et Juliette " 
 Berlioz had further experience of Government patronage. 
 The year was 1840, and the authorities decided to celebrate 
 in a special manner the tenth anniversary of the Revolution 
 of July. Under these circumstances, and with direct regard 
 to the ceremony of reinterring the remains of the "patriots" 
 beneath the column on the Place de la Bastille, M. Rerhusat, 
 Minister of the Interior, commissioned Berlioz to write a 
 symphonic work for the sum of 10,000 francs, out of which 
 he was to pay the cost of copies and performance. No task 
 more congenial could have been set the, master, and he 
 addressed himself with avidity to the composition of a 
 " Symphonie funebre et triomphale " for 200 wind instru- 
 ments. The work was conceived in three parts : first,, a 
 ■funeral march for the procession ; second, an " adieu " ad- 
 dressed to the illustrious dead, as the bodies were lowered 
 into the vault ; third, a movement of apotheosis, or Hymn 
 of Glory. In actual performance, this Symphony made no 
 effect. During the procession, little or nothing of the march 
 could be heard, while, as soon as the last movement began, 
 the National Guards, weary of standing in a burning sun, 
 commenced their .defile to the noise of fifty drums. For this 
 fiasco some compensation was made by the success of the 
 work at a public rehearsal, which led to the engagement of 
 Berlioz and his " 200 " for four concerts, whereat the sym- 
 phony figured largely and brought much money. M. Remusat, 
 unlike his predecessor, paid the sum agreed upon without 
 delay; but out of the 10,000 francs Berlioz received for him- 
 self no more than 2,800. The rest went in expenses. The 
 master was satisfied nevertheless, if only because he had 
 
 made the jealous Habeneck exclaim, " Decidedly that 
 
 has grand ideas." 
 
 In the same year Berlioz went on his first artistic journey 
 — as far as Brussels. This led to a domestic crisis, which 
 should be described in his own words : — 
 
 Under one pretext or another my wife had always set herself 
 against my travelling projects, and if I had listened to her I 
 should not have quitted Paris to this day. A foolish jealousy, 
 for which during a long while I had given no reason, was at the 
 bottom of her opposition. In order to carry out my purpose 
 
 E 2 
 
52 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 I was obliged, therefore, to keep it secret, to smuggle my music 
 and a portmanteau out of the house, and to start suddenly, 
 leaving a letter explaining my disappearance. But I did not go 
 alone : I had a travelling companion, who, since then, has 
 accompanied me in all my excursions. In consequence of being 
 accused, tortured in a thousand fashions, always unjustly, and 
 finding no longer peace and repose at home, I finished, chance 
 aiding, by taking the benefit of a position of which I had only the 
 evils. Thus my life was completely changed. To cut short the 
 story of this episode in my career, and not to enter further into 
 sad details, I will only say that from the day in question, and 
 after squabbles not less prolonged than painful, a separation by 
 agreement took place between my wife and me. I see her often ; 
 my love for her has not changed, and the sad state of her health 
 makes her only the more dear. 
 
 So, while the suffering wife remained in Paris with all her 
 bitter recollections, the husband travelled about in company 
 with her rival. Thus ended love's young dream — the romance 
 of Ophelia and her passionate adorer. 
 
 In the Belgian capital our master gave two concerts with 
 results not altogether satisfactory. His music was attacked 
 by Fetis with great vigour, and out of this grew a somewhat 
 excited controversy on points of detail, as to which Berlioz 
 complacently shows that the author of the " Universal Bio- 
 graphy of Musicians " came off second best. We need not 
 touch the points of dispute here. They belong to the dead 
 past, and not to the living present. Returning to Paris, 
 Berlioz made arrangements for a colossal concert before 
 setting out on a more extended tour; again got into trouble 
 with all about him ; had to encounter a formidable con- 
 spiracy, and to pull his enterprise through a fire hot enough 
 to have consumed it under a less energetic direction. As it 
 was, he made no money, but was called upon to pay 360 
 francs out of his own pocket to meet the balance of costs and 
 receipts. This done, he started on his tour, concerning the 
 fortune of which we find a good deal of information in letters 
 to different persons. 
 
 Before entering upon the experiences of Berlioz as an 
 artist en voyage, notice is deserved by an important letter, 
 dated October 3, 1841, and addressed to Humbert.* From 
 this we find that the composer was at work upon another 
 opera : — . 
 
 * " Lettres Intimes," p. 191. 
 
HIS LIFE. 53 
 
 I am writing, as perhaps you know, a grand score in four acts 
 upon a book by Scribe, entitled "La Nonne Sanglante." . . . 
 Scribe has taken, as it appears to me, a large part of the famous 
 legend, and has, moreover, finished the drama by a terrible 
 denoilment borrowed from a work by M. de Keratry, and of the 
 greatest scenic effect. 
 
 This opera, which was never completed, and the subject 
 of which was subsequently taken by Gounod, appears to 
 have been intended for the next season at the great Paris 
 house, since he refers to himself as " counted on " at that 
 establishment. In the same letter is a characteristic and 
 generous reference to Spontini, who, at the moment, was 
 under a cloud in Prussia : — 
 
 Spontini has returned. I had written to him at Berlin a 
 letter* on the last representation of " Cortez," which nearly threw 
 me into nervous spasms. It has crossed him. . . . He has 
 been, so to speak, chased out of Prussia, for which reason I 
 thought it my duty to write. One should not in such a case 
 neglect the smallest protestation adapted to soothe the ulcerated 
 heart of the man of genius, whatever may be the defects of his 
 spirit and even of his egoism. The temple, perhaps, is unworthy 
 of the god who dwells therein, but the god is god. 
 
 One passage in the letter addressed to Spontini is too 
 curious to be passed over here : — 
 
 If music were not abandoned to charity, there would be in some 
 part of Europe a lyric Pantheon exclusively devoted to the 
 representation of monumental masterpieces, which would be 
 performed at long intervals, with worthy care and pomp, by 
 artists, and heard at solemn artistic festivals by sympathetic and 
 intelligent auditors. 
 
 When Wagner's theatre at Bayreuth . was formally 
 ''inaugurated" in 1876, several writers pointed out that 
 a French composer (Gr6try) had anticipated all that was 
 peculiar in the design of the building. But here we have 
 another French composer expressing the very idea which 
 animated Wagner in erecting the edifice. The German 
 master, indeed, simply carried out the French master's 
 conception — not the only instance, by the way, in which 
 the one has borrowed from the other. 
 
 The letter of October 3, 1841, further shows that Berlioz had 
 
 * Published in " Les Soirees de l'Orchestre," p. 189 ei. seq. 
 
54 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 been engaged in setting the dialogue of " Der Freischiitz " 
 as recitative:* — 
 
 I have written this year, among other things, recitatives for 
 the " Freischiitz " of Weber, which I am about to mount at the 
 Opera without the least mutilation, correction, or castilblazade 
 of any sort, in the piece or in the music. It is a wonderful 
 masterpiece. 
 
 We have a part, at least, of the conversation between 
 composer and impresario (M. Pillet) with reference to this 
 undertaking : — 
 
 B. I am not sure that one ought to add to " Freischiitz " the 
 recitatives you ask of me, but as that is a condition without 
 which it cannot be represented at the Op6ra, and as, if I do not 
 write them, you will confide the task to some one else less 
 familiar, perhaps, with Weber than I am, and certainly less 
 devoted than myself to the glorification of his masterpiece, I 
 accept your offer on one condition : that " Freischiitz " shall be 
 played just as it is, with nothing changed either in drama or 
 music. 
 
 P. That is precisely my intention. Do you think me capable 
 of renewing the scandals of " Robin des Bois " ? 
 
 B. Very good : in that case I will see about the work. How 
 do you intend to distribute the parts ? 
 
 P. I shall give Agatha to Madame Stoltz, Annette to Mdlle. 
 Dobre, and Duprez will take Max. 
 
 B. I say " No." 
 
 P. Why not ? 
 
 B. You will know soon. 
 
 P. Bouche will make an excellent Caspar. 
 
 B. And whom have you for the Hermit ? 
 
 P. Oh ! that's a useless part, which only adds to the length of 
 the work. I intend to take it away altogether. 
 
 B. Only that ? It is thus that you mean to respect " Frei- 
 schiitz," and not to imitate M. Castil-Blaze ! We are far from 
 being agreed. Allow me to retire ; I cannot possibly mix myself 
 up with this new correction. 
 
 P- Mon Dieu! You are thorough in your opinions. Well, 
 we will keep the Hermit — we will keep everything, I give you my 
 word. 
 
 Berlioz found his extreme reverence for the original some- 
 
 * According to the Memoirs, this task was undertaken later — that is to say, 
 after his return from the German tour. The evidence of a letter written at the 
 time must, however, be preferred, especially as the master's memory seems to 
 have served him to indifferent purpose on many occasions when preparing his 
 autobiography. 
 
I1IS LIFE. 55 
 
 what inconvenient, since the " uncut " dialogue, put into 
 recitative, stretched out to an enormous length ; and, as 
 usual, he had great difficulty in making the leading artists 
 show any respect whatever to the composer. Duprez insisted 
 upon such extraordinary transpositions that the part was 
 taken away from him, and Madame Stoltz injured Agatha's 
 second air by singing it in F instead of A flat. " There is," 
 says Berlioz, " a fourth part of real difficulty, another fourth 
 of ignorance, and a good half of caprice in all this unwilling- 
 ness of singers to render their parts as they are written." 
 The inevitable ballet was another obstacle in the way of 
 Berlioz at the Grand-Opera. Powerless to hinder its intro- 
 duction into " Der Freischutz," the master scored for 
 orchestra " L'Invitation a la Valse," but this did not satisfy 
 the dancers, who thought to gain their end by asking 
 Berlioz, through the manager, to add the Ball scene in his 
 " Symphonie Fantastique " and the Fete music from his 
 " Rome"o et Juliette." Of this he would not hear, but ulti- 
 mately consented to introduce selections from " Preciosa " 
 and " Oberon." We may add that during the subsequent 
 absence of Berlioz from Paris, the manager worked his will 
 upon Weber's opera, and so cut it about that Castil-Blaze 
 and " Robin des Bois " lost their bad pre-eminence in favour 
 of Fillet and the new version. On this the indignant author 
 of the recitatives exclaims : — 
 
 And how they perform that which remains ! What singers ! 
 what a conductor ! what lazy sleepiness in the movements ! what 
 discordance in the ensembles ! what a heavy, stupid, and revolting 
 interpretation from beginning to end ! Be, then, an inventor, a 
 torch-bearer, an inspired man, a genius, to suffer torture, spitting, 
 and abuse. Unmannerly hucksters ! While waiting the whip of 
 a new Messiah able to chase you from the temple, rest assured 
 that every one in Europe who possesses the least artistic senti- 
 ment entertains for you the most profound contempt. 
 
 It must be owned that in the lowest depths of anguish 
 Berlioz was able to relieve himself by a vigorous expression 
 of opinion. 
 
 The tour which now demands attention began badly. At 
 Brussels a promised concert could not be given because a 
 favourite singer had not arrived. The people there professed 
 great annoyance, and their visitor did not soothe them when 
 he said, in his most ironical vein : " Be calm. The concert 
 will not take place, and you will not have the pain of listen- 
 
56 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 ing to my music. That is sufficient compensation, I think, 
 for such a misfortune." Going on to Mayence, Berlioz waited 
 upon Schott, the publisher, who said, " I don't think — you 
 cannot — give a concert here. There is no orchestra, there 
 is ho public, and we have no money." Away to Frankfort 
 flew our master. Some concerts had been arranged for in 
 the Free City, and there would compensation be found. We 
 see the actual result in the course of a conversation with 
 Guhr, director of the theatre — " a little man with bright, 
 piercing eyes ; rapid gestures, brief and incisive words, and 
 a strong habit of swearing." We shall put asterisks in 
 place of Guhr's oaths : — 
 
 G. Oh ! is it you, my dear fellow ? You haven't received my 
 letter, then ? 
 
 B. What letter ? 
 
 G. I wrote to you at Brussels to say. * * * Wait. I can't 
 speak well — a misfortune — 'tis a great misfortune. Ah ! here is 
 our rBgisseur, who will act as interpreter. 
 
 Then he went on, still in French : — 
 
 G. Tell M. Berlioz how much I am upset ; that I wrote asking 
 him not to come ; that the little Milanollos fill the theatre every 
 evening ; that we have never seen such a furore among the 
 public * * * and that we must put aside for the moment grand 
 music and grand concerts. 
 
 R. M. Guhr charges me to tell you, sir, that — • 
 
 B. Don't take the trouble to repeat it. I have understood — 
 too well understood — since he has not spoken in German. ' 
 
 G. Ha ! ha ! ha ! I spoke French * * * without knowing it ? 
 
 B. You know it very well, and I know that I must either 
 return or boldly go on at the risk of elsewhere finding infant 
 prodigies who will give me checkmate. 
 
 G. What am I to do, my dear fellow? These children bring 
 in money. * * * French romances make money; French vaude- 
 villes draw the crowd ! What would you ? * * * I am director ; 
 I cannot refuse money ; but at any rate wait till to-morrow. I 
 will let you hear " Fidelio " with Pischek and Mdlle. Capitaine, 
 and * * * you can give me your opinion about our artists. 
 
 B. I believe them to be excellent, especially under your direc- 
 tion. But, my dear Guhr, why do you swear so much ? Do you 
 think it consoles me ? 
 
 G. Ha ! ha ! that is said en famille. (He intended to say 
 "familiarly.") 
 
 B. Then, since we are en famille, come and drink some Rhine 
 wine ; I forgive you your little Milanollos, and I will remain to 
 
HIS LIFE. 57 
 
 hear " Fidelio " and Mdlle. Capitaine, of whom you seem to be 
 the lieutenant. 
 
 Having renewed at Frankfort his acquaintance with 
 Ferdinand Hiller, Berlioz went on to Stuttgart and saw 
 -Lindpainter about giving a concert in the little capital. 
 Lindpainter received him like a brother, but took up Schott's 
 parable at Mayence : " This is a royal residence, it is true ; 
 but there is neither money nor a public." However, if 
 Berlioz would proceed, he had only to take the Redouten- 
 salle and pay eighty francs into the musicians' pension fund. 
 The artists would rehearse with and play for him gratis. 
 At the concert the Symphonie Fantastique and the Overture 
 to '-' Les Francs Juges " were performed with an effect upon 
 some of the leading connoisseurs such as induced them, 
 on Berlioz' showing, to get rid of the composer without 
 delay : — 
 
 As for Dr. Schilling, I am sure that he found everything exe- 
 crable, and that he felt thoroughly ashamed of having taken the 
 first steps to introduce to Stuttg'art a brigand of my species, 
 vehemently suspected of having violated music, and who . . . 
 would make the chaste muse a sort of gipsy, less Esmeralda 
 than Helen Macgregor. . . . 
 
 So the Stuttgart cognoscenti despatched Berlioz with a 
 letter of introduction to the Baron von BillingTcounsellor of 
 the Prince of Hohenzollern-Hechingen, who held his little 
 court at Hechingen, in the Black Forest. '■ The Prince was 
 devoted to music, and kept a small and somewhat doubtful 
 orchestra about him. But Berlioz, gratified, by a most 
 cordial reception, put up with the orchestra, arranged his 
 works to its capacity; and. when the Prince helped the 
 drummer to count his rests,, when all difficult passages in 
 the trumpet parts were cut out, and when the trombone 
 player was allowed to sound only the notes of which he was 
 sure, the performance went swimmingly, and everybody was 
 pleased. 
 
 After returning to Stuttgart, Berlioz went to Carlsruhe, 
 where it was not convenient to give a concert, the theatre 
 having been taken by an Italian flautist. So, " full of re- 
 spect for the flute," the master journeyed to Mannheim— a 
 " very calm, cold, flat, and square " town, wherein a passion 
 for music was no hindrance to .sleep. Here a concert took 
 place, with the "Harold" Symphony in the programme; 
 
58 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 and then, weary of Mannheim, Berlioz made his way to 
 Weimar through Frankfort, again encountering Guhr. " He 
 recommenced swearing; I quitted him." Weimar, with its 
 recollections of Goethe and Schiller, of Herder and Wieland, 
 suited his poetic temperament, and he wrote to Liszt : " I 
 breathe here." He did more — he flourished at Weimar. 
 His concert, with its Symphonie Fantastique and " Francs 
 Juges " overture, was an immense success; the hall was 
 crowded, the applause long, and royalty sent its high officers 
 charged with compliments. In such a town this success 
 seemed doubly precious. 
 
 From Weimar to Leipzig was an easy journey, but Berlioz 
 hesitated to make it because Mendelssohn was musical 
 dictator there, and their artistic path had diverged so widely 
 since the days when they met at Rome. At length, how- 
 ever, the French composer wrote to his German brother, and 
 received a reply which set all doubts at rest. Mendelssohn's 
 response is worth quoting for its thorough heartiness : — 
 
 My dear Berlioz, — I thank you with all my heart for your nice 
 letter, and because you still preserve a remembrance of our 
 Roman friendship. For myself, I shall never forget it while I 
 live, and I am glad to have the prospect of soon telling you this 
 by word of mouth. It will be my pleasure and duty to do all that 
 I can towards making your stay in Leipzig happy and agreeable. 
 I believe I can assure you that you will be satisfied with the 
 town — I mean with the musicians and the public. Before writing, 
 I have taken care to consult several persons who know Leipzig 
 better than myself, and all confirm my opinion that you will have 
 an excellent concert. The expenses of orchestra, hall, placards, 
 &c, will be ijo crowns ; the receipts may range between 600 
 and 800 crowns. You should be here to settle the programme 
 and do all that is necessary at least ten days in advance. Fur- 
 thermore, the directors of the Subscription Concerts charge me 
 to ask if you will conduct one of your works at the concert to 
 be given on February 22 for the benefit of the poor of the town. 
 I hope you will accept their proposition after the concert you 
 give yourself. I engage you, then, to come here as soon as you 
 can leave Weimar, and shall be glad to shake you by the hand 
 and say " Welcome " in Germany. Do not laugh at my bad 
 French, as you used to do in Rome, but continue to be my good 
 friend, as you were then, and as I shall be always your devoted, — 
 Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy. 
 
 Here let us find room for a parenthesis. In 1864 Berlioz 
 read the first volume of Mendelssohn's published letters, and 
 
HIS LIFE. 59 
 
 penned the following note concerning his, expressions of 
 friendship : — 
 
 I have just seen in the volume of Felix Mendelssohn's letters, 
 published by his brother, in what consisted his " Roman friend- 
 ship" forme. He said to his mother, clearly meaning myself, 
 
 " is a true caricature, without a spark of talent, &c, &c. 
 
 I have sometimes a wish to devour him." When he wrote that 
 letter Mendelssohn was twenty-one, and did not know a single 
 score of mine. I had then only penned a sketch of my Sym- 
 phonic Fantastique, which he had not seen, and it was but a few 
 days before he left Rome that I showed him my just finished 
 overture to " King Lear." 
 
 Berlioz, however, forgot that he had often offended Men- 
 delssohn's conceit — a quality which that composer, when 
 young, nursed very tenderly, and could not bear to have 
 touched. But the Frenchman did not thus act without being 
 provoked. At the first interview of the two musicians, for 
 example, Mendelssohn began talking of some parts of Berlioz' 
 cantata, " Sardanapale," and said, when his new acquaintance 
 expressed. himself displeased with his own work, "I compli- 
 ment you — on your taste. I was afraid you would be satisfied 
 with that allegro. Frankly, it is a very miserable thing." 
 This was rude, to say the least ; but Mendelssohn was even 
 more offensive the next day, when, hearing Berlioz profess 
 admiration for Gluck, he coolly remarked, "Ah! you love 
 Gluck?" as who should say: "How can a musician like 
 you have ideas sufficiently elevated, and a sentiment of 
 grandeur of style and truth of expression lively enough for 
 the love of Gluck ?" Berlioz made no answer at the time, 
 but matured a characteristic scheme for revenging himself 
 on his new acquaintance. Knowing that Mendelssohn would 
 visit a common friend at a certain time, he preceded him, 
 and placed on the piano a MS. copy of an air from " Tele- 
 maco," one of Gluck's little-known Italian operas : — 
 
 Mendelssohn came, looked at the music, took it to be part of 
 some modern Italian opera, and began to play it. At the four 
 last bars, the musical accent of which is truly sublime, I stopped 
 him as he was imitating Rubini in a grotesque fashion, and said, 
 with an air of astonishment, " Ah ! you don't like Gluck ! " 
 " Gluck ! how Gluck ? " " Alas ! my dear fellow, that piece is by 
 him and not by Bellini, as you thought. You see that I know 
 him better than you do, and that I am of your opinion — more 
 than yourself." 
 
6o HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 On another occasion, when Berlioz was praising the me-, 
 tronome, Mendelssohn said, " What do we want with the 
 metronome ? It is a useless instrument, A musician who 
 cannot, on seeing a piece, at once divine its movement is a 
 booby." The next day Berlioz showed his friend the score 
 of the "King Lear" overture. "Give me the time of it," 
 said Mendelssohn, sitting down to play, and was answered, 
 " Wherefore ? Did you not say yesterday that a musician 
 
 who " &c, &c. Retorts like these grievously offended 
 
 the young German's self-esteem, but Berlioz confesses that, 
 while "touchy" to the last degree about music, he could 
 bear any amount of contradiction as regards other matters. 
 Looking at all this, the very friendly letter we have quoted 
 was a welcome surprise : — 
 
 It appeared to show a goodness of soul and an agreeableness 
 of manner which I had not before known in him, and I was not 
 slow to see, on arriving at Leipzig, that these excellent qualities 
 had become his in reality. He had lost nothing at all of the in- 
 flexible rigidity of his artistic principles, but he no longer sought 
 violently to impose them. . . . Only he was always a little too 
 fond of the dead. 
 
 On reaching Leipzig and driving to the Gewandhaus, 
 Berlioz found Mendelssohn busily rehearsing the " First 
 Walpurgis Night," which was about to be produced. He 
 was deeply impressed with the music, and when all was over 
 hastened in a state of rapture to congratulate the composer. 
 The two men met, with the same sad thought in each mind : 
 " A dozen years have passed since we dreamed together on 
 the plain of Rome !" Presently Berlioz asked his friend to 
 make him a present of the baton he had been using. "Will- 
 ingly," replied Mendelssohn, " on condition that you send 
 me yours." The exchange was made, and with Berlioz' 
 wooden sceptre went the following letter : — 
 
 To the chief Mendelssohn. — Great Chief, we have promised to 
 exchange our tomahawks. Behold mine ! It is rough ; thine is 
 plain : only squaws and pale-faces love decorated arms. Be my 
 brother, and when the Great Spirit shall send us to hunt in the 
 land of souls, may our warriors hang our united tomahawks on 
 the gate of counsel. 
 
 With reference to the style of this epistle, there is reason 
 to believe that Berlioz had been reading Fenimore Cooper. 
 Mendelssohn -behaved, we are told, " like a brother " in 
 
HIS LIFE. 61 
 
 the affair of his friend's concert, and would seem to have had 
 his patience tried, since Berlioz was exigent about the 
 orchestra, and offended some people by what was called his 
 " insolent pretension." He wanted twenty -four violins, not 
 sixteen only, and three instruments — to wit, a cor anglais, 
 ophicleide,"and harp — which practically were noMo be found 
 in Leipzig ! What next, and next ? But . it was certainly 
 curious that in musical Leipzig, under the reign of Mendels- 
 sohn, the only cor anglais was so bad that Berlioz preferred 
 giving the part to a clarinet ; the so-called ophicleide was 
 a small instrument ; not at all like the proper thing, while 
 Mendelssohn, when he wanted harps, had to obtain them 
 from Berlin. Berlioz could not do without a harp, and his 
 friend Xepinski sent a M. Richter from Dresden. So far, 
 good; but when an instrument had been hunted up in the 
 city and restrung, it was found that Richter, though a 
 capital musician, could only play the arpeggios usually re- 
 quired in theatrical orchestras. The upshot was that the 
 borrowed instrument went back with thanks, and at the 
 performance its music was played on the piano by Men- 
 delssohn himself. In connection with the state of things 
 thus revealed, it should, of course, be borne in mind that 
 harps were not then so freely used In orchestral music as 
 now. The concert went off very well, and the " Symphonie 
 Fantastique," as usual, set the critics by the ears ; while, at 
 the succeeding performance for the poor, the Offertoire from 
 Berlioz' " Requiem " stirred even Robert Schumann out of 
 his "habitual mutism," and prompted him to say, "That 
 surpasses all." His Leipzig work done, the master fell ill ; 
 recovered, and paid his doctor's account, at the worthy man's 
 request, with an autograph copy of the Offertoire theme. 
 Berlioz was flattered by this incident, but angry with himself 
 for missing a pretty return. He inscribed the manuscript, 
 " A M. le Docteur Clarus." " Carus, not Clarus," said the 
 learned practitioner ; on which Berlioz should immediately 
 have written, but did not, " Patientibus Carus sed Clarus 
 inter doctos." 
 
 From Leipzig the master went to Dresden, where he met 
 Richard Wagner, then Sub-Chapelmaster under Reissiger. 
 His observations upon the composer of " Rienzi" and the 
 "Flying Dutchman" — both then achieved-^show custo- 
 mary discernment and. generosity. Berlioz heard only the 
 second part of "Rienzi," which it was then usual to play in 
 
62 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 two parts, and he hesitated to give an opinion about it. But 
 of the " Flying Dutchman " he said : — 
 
 The work appears to me remarkable for its sombre colour and 
 certain stormy effects perfectly indicated by the subject ; but I 
 am bound to recognise also an abuse of the tremolo, the more to 
 be regretted as I had already noticed it in " Rienzi," and saw 
 that it indicated in the author a certain indolence of spirit, 
 against which he cannot too carefully guard. The sustained 
 tremolo is of all orchestral effects that which soonest tires ; 
 besides, it demands no invention from the composer when 
 accompanied neither, above nor below by a salient idea. Still, 
 whatever the fact on this point, honour is due to the royal 
 thought which, in giving [Wagner] complete and active protec- 
 tion, has, so to speak, saved a young artist gifted with precious 
 faculties. 
 
 After giving two concerts in Dresden, Berlioz returned to 
 Leipzig for the second of his concerts there, subsequently 
 proceeding to Brunswick, at the suggestion of Meyerbeer, 
 and meeting with a success not far short of triumphant. 
 Hamburg having been next visited, with the strange and 
 unexpected result of discovering both an ophicleide and a 
 harpist, the master descended upon the Prussian capital. 
 Here he assisted at a performance of Bach's great " Pas- 
 sion," and was much struck by the " attention, respect, and 
 piety " with which a German audience listens to such a 
 work : — 
 
 Every one followed the words in the book ; there was not a 
 movement in the auditory, not a murmur of approval or censure, 
 not a sign of applause ; one was at a sermon, hearing the gospel 
 chanted ; assisting in silence, not at a concert, but at a Divine 
 service. It is just in this way that such music ought to be 
 heard. Here Bach is adored and believed in without supposing 
 for an instant that his divinity can be called in question. A 
 heretic would excite horror ; it is even forbidden to speak of such 
 a thing. Bach is Bach, as God is God. 
 
 Two successful concerts were given by the master in 
 Berlin, after which he visited Hanover and Darmstadt, and 
 then returned to Paris, with feelings towards Germany which 
 could not be better expressed than in a letter to Mr. G. A. 
 Osborne : — 
 
 Here I am at length, my dear Osborne, at the end of this pil- 
 grimage — the most difficult, perhaps, that a musician has ever 
 undertaken, and the remembrance of which, I feel, ought to pre- 
 
HIS LIFE. 63 
 
 dominate during the rest of my life. I have consulted, like the 
 religious men of ancient Greece, the Delphic oracle. Have I 
 well understood the meaning of its response ? Am I to believe 
 that of it which appeared favourable to my desires ? Are there 
 not deceptive oracles ? The future, the future alone, will decide 
 this. Be the result what it may, I must return to France and 
 address finally my farewells to Germany, that noble second 
 mother of all sons of harmony. But where shall I find words 
 equal to my gratitude; my admiration, and my regrets ? What 
 hymn can I sing which shall be worthy of her grandeur and of her 
 glory ? I only know that, in leaving, I incline myself with 
 respect, and say to her in heartfelt tones, " Vale Germania, alma 
 parens ! " 
 
 Having returned to Paris, our master seems to have had. 
 no resource but his feuilletons. This he bewails most pitifully' 1. 
 We have already seen with how much labour he used the 
 critical pen, but the task of wielding that of a. feuilletonist was 
 agony. On this matter his remarks are worth, quoting at 
 length : — 
 
 The critic (I suppose him honest and intelligent) writes only 
 if he has an idea, if he would throw light upon a question, 
 combat a system, or bestow praise and blame. Then he has 
 reasons which he believes sufficient for expressing his views, and 
 awarding censure or eulogium. The unhappy feuilletonist, 
 obliged to write upon everything within the domain of his 
 feuilleton (sad domain, swamp full of locusts and toads !), desires 
 only to finish the task imposed upon him. He has very often no 
 opinion upon the subjects about which he is compelled to dis- 
 course. They excite neither his anger or his admiration ; they 
 are not. However, needs must that he pretend to believe in their 
 existence, to have a reason for giving them his attention, and 
 taking part for or against. Most of my brethren know how to do 
 this without pain, arid even with a charming facility. For myself, 
 when I set about it I do so with efforts not less prolonged than 
 distressing. I was once shut up in my room for three entire days 
 trying to write a. feuilleton on the Op6ra-Comique, and without the 
 power to begin it. I could not remember the work of which I had 
 to speak (a week after the first performance I had forgotten the 
 name of it for ever), but the tortures ^hat I endured during those 
 three days before achieving the first three lines of my article — 
 certes ! I can recall them well. My head seemed ready to split 
 asunder. I felt as though burning ashes were in my veins. At 
 one time I remained leaning upon my table, holding my head 
 with both hands ; at another I marched with long steps up and 
 down the room, like a soldier doing sentry in a cold of fifty-five 
 
64 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 degrees. I stood at the window looking at the surrounding 
 gardens, the heights of Montmartre, the setting sun — forthwith 
 reverie carried me a thousand leagues from my accursed Op6ra- 
 Comique. And when I returned, and my eyes fell upon the title 
 written at the head of a sheet of paper still white, and obsti- 
 nately waiting the other words with which I was bound to 
 cover it, I felt overwhelmed with despair. I had a guitar 
 leaning against my table — with a single kick I split it. On the 
 mantelpiece two pistols looked at me with their round eyes — I 
 contemplated them a long time. Then I began to strike my 
 head with my fists. Finally, like a schoolboy who cannot do hk 
 lessons, I wept with furious indignation, tearing my hair. The 
 salt water coming from my eyes seemed to solace me a little. I 
 turned the muzzles of my observant pistols to the wall. I felt 
 pity for my innocent guitar and, taking it up, asked of it some 
 ihords, which were given without spite. My son, aged six, at 
 that moment knocked at the door — in consequence of my bad 
 temper I had unjustly censured him that morning. As I did not 
 open, he cried, " Father, wilt thou be friends ? " and I, running to 
 the door, said, " Yes, my son, let us be friends. Come." I took 
 him on my knees, rested his blonde head upon my breast, and both 
 of us went to sleep. I then gave up all hope of beginning my 
 article : it was the evening of the third day. On the morrow I 
 succeeded, I do not know how, in writing I do not know what 
 upon I do not know whom. . . . That is fifteen years ago, and 
 my torture still endures,. Extermination ! And to be always 
 thus ! Let them give me scores to write, orchestras to conduct, 
 rehearsals to direct. Let them make me remain eight hours, ten 
 hours even, bdton in hand, to exercise choristers without accom- 
 paniment, myself taking up their points while beating time, till I 
 spit blood and cramp stops my arm. Let them make me carry 
 desks, double-basses, harps, take down platforms, nail planks, 
 like a commissionaire or a carpenter. Let them next oblige me, 
 by way of repose, to correct engravers' and copyists' faults all 
 night. I have done it ; I do it ; I will do it ; that belongs to my 
 musical life, and I bear all without complaint — without even 
 dreaming of complaint — as the huntsman endures cold, heat, 
 hunger, thirst, the sun, showers, dust, mud, and the thousand 
 fatigues of the chase. But eternally to feuilletonise for a living, 
 to write nothings about nothings, to bestow tedious eulogies upon 
 insupportable sillinesses ; to speak this evening of a great master 
 and to-morrow of an idiot with the same seriousness in the 
 same language ; to employ one's time, intelligence, courage, 
 patience at this work, with the certainity of not being able to 
 serve the art by destroying abuses, removing prejudices, enlighten- 
 ing opinion, purifying public taste, and putting men and things 
 
HIS LIFE. 65 
 
 in their right place— oh ! this is the height of humiliation. 
 Better far be — a republican minister of finance. 
 
 No quotation could possibly throw more light than the 
 foregoing upon the intense susceptibility of Berlioz' organisa- 
 tion. He was like an iEolian harp, so delicately strung, 
 that the faintest breath set him in vibration ; while a dis- 
 turbance that would have barely moved an average man 
 threw him into convulsions. We saw him, some time ago, 
 behaving .like a madman under a love disappointment, but 
 that could to some extent be understood. Not so the torture 
 which wrung from him cries of anguish because of inability 
 to get an article fairly under weigh. We must not suppose, 
 however, that the pain was unreal. "The heart knoweth its 
 own bitterness," and of many forms of human suffering it 
 may truly be said " the stranger meddleth not therein." 
 
 In 1844 came a diversion from feuilkton writing. An 
 industrial exhibition was held that year in Paris, and to- 
 wards the' close of its period Strauss, the dance composer, 
 suggested to Berlioz that the building should be utilised 
 for monster concerts. The idea seemed feasible, and the 
 two musicians proceeded to work it out, after the usual con- 
 test with French officialism, in the shape of a Prefect who 
 saw plots against the State in the most innocent of projects. 
 A thousand and twenty-two executants having been engaged, 
 and the programme drawn up, rehearsals began, and our 
 master was again in his element. He tells us that he met 
 every section of the orchestra separately, and went through 
 the Scherzo of Beethoven's C minor Symphony with thirty- 
 six double basses some eighteen or twenty times. The great 
 day came, and with it a crowd which surged over the bar- 
 riers and filled every available place, delighting the heart of 
 Berlioz with, at all events, an assurance against loss. Then 
 the one thousand and twenty-two began, and we are told 
 that the ensemble was miraculous : — 
 
 The grandest effects were produced by the overture to " Freis- 
 chtitz," the Andante played by twenty-four horns ; by the prayer 
 from " Moi'se," which was encored, and in which the twenty-five 
 harpists, instead of arpeggios in simple notes, played arpeggios 
 formed of chords in four parts, thus quadrupling the number 
 of strings in vibration, and giving the effect of a hundred, 
 harps ;by the " Hymn to France," which was also redemanded, 
 but which I declined to repeat ; and finally by the Benediction of 
 the Daggers from " Les Huguenots," which electrified the 
 
 F 
 
66 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 audience. I had twenty times doubled the soli of this great 
 piece, so that eighty bass voices were employed for the four 
 parts of the three monks and St. Bris. The impression pro- 
 duced upon the executants and the auditors nearest the orchestra 
 passed all experience. As for myself, I was seized, in con- 
 ducting, with such a nervous trembling that my teeth chattered 
 as though I had a violent access of fever. Despite the non- 
 sonority of the building, a musical effect comparable with that 
 has not often been heard, and I was sorry that Meyerbeer could 
 not be present to witness it. The terrible piece, which one 
 might describe as written with electric fluid by a gigantic voltaic 
 battery, seemed accompanied by flashes of lightning and sung by 
 tempests. 
 
 The nervous excitability of Berlioz may be guessed when 
 he goes on to say : — 
 
 I was in such a state after this scene that it was necessary to 
 suspend the concert for some time. They brought me some 
 punch and clothes, and then, forming on the platform a small 
 chamber with a dozen harps in their cases, I could, by stooping 
 a little, undress and change even my shirt before the public 
 without being seen. 
 
 The concert, though enormously successful, did not pass 
 off without an untoward incident, which Berlioz may be 
 allowed to describe : — 
 
 As for the chorus from " Charles VI.," ... it made a special 
 effect. It awoke the stupid instinct of opposition always foment- 
 ing among the people of Paris, and at the well-known refrain — 
 
 Guerre aux tyrans ! Jamais en France, 
 Jamais l'Anglais ne regnera ! 
 
 three parts of the audience began to sing with the chorus. This 
 was the protest of plebeianism and grotesque nationalism against 
 the policy followed at that time by King Louis-Philippe, and 
 it appeared to justify the attitude of the Prefect of Police towards 
 the festival. 
 
 The result was inevitable. Berlioz soon received an in- 
 vitation to present himself before the authorities, charged 
 with having clandestinely introduced the obnoxious chorus 
 into his programme. Of this he quickly cleared himself; 
 but thenceforth the censorship kept an eye on concert 
 " schemes," and no piece could be performed without its 
 sanction. 
 
 Strauss having followed Berlioz with a concert of dance 
 music, the partners reckoned up their gains, and our master 
 
HIS LIFE. 67 
 
 found himself in possession of 800 francs ! This little sum 
 he was called upon immediately to spend in search of the 
 health which labour and worry had taken away. A medical 
 friend came to see him,, and recoiled at his altered ap- 
 pearance : — 
 
 D. Ah ! ga I What is the matter, Berlioz ? You are as 
 yellow as an old parchment ! All your features bear the expres- 
 sion of fatigue and extraordinary irritation ! 
 
 B. You speak of irritation. What should irritate me ? You 
 attended the festival. You know how it went off. . I have had 
 the pleasure of paying 4,000 francs to MM. les Percepteurs du 
 Droit des Hospices, and I have 800 francs left. What ought I to 
 complain of? Is not this according to rule and order? (The 
 doctor feels his pulse.) 
 
 D. My dear fellow, you are going to have typhoid fever. You 
 must be bled. 
 
 B. Well, don't let us wait till to-morrow. Bleed me. (The 
 doctor bleeds him.) 
 
 D. Now, do me the pleasure to leave Paris at once. Go to 
 Hyeres, Cannes, Nice, where you will, only "go to the south to 
 breathe the sea air, and think no longer of matters that inflame 
 your blood and excite your nervous system, already so irritable. 
 Adieu, and don't hesitate. 
 
 Berlioz took his friend's advice, went to Nice, spent his 800 
 francs, recovered health, and, returning to Paris, resumed 
 his labours not only as the Sisyphus of feuilletonists, but 
 as the conductor of monster concerts, the director of the 
 Th6atre Franconi instituting a series of performances in his 
 Cirque. Concerning this enterprise the master's autobio- 
 graphy is reticent. Owing to acoustical defects the music 
 made but little impression, the expenses were enormous, 
 and the receipts not in proportion — result, failure. So, once 
 more disappointed, and worn out with excessive labour, 
 Berlioz went south to recruit his health, finding the where- 
 withal to pay expenses in the receipts of a concert given at 
 Marseilles and another at Lyons. 
 
 . A hitherto unpublished letter, addressed to M. Ferdinand 
 Lavaine, a well-known professor of the pianoforte at Lille, 
 refers to these Cirque concerts and some other matters 01 
 interest. The letter is dated August 1, the year being 
 omitted according to its writer's bad habit ; but a reference to 
 the Beethoven fetes at Bonn (1845) supplies the omission:* — 
 
 * Autograph, kindly lent for translation by Julian Marshall, Esq. 
 
 F 2 
 
68 HECTOR BERLIOZ \ 
 
 Sir, — Accept my sincere thanks for your kind remembrance 
 and the honour you have done me in dedicating to me your fine 
 " De Profundis." Without doubt I should have found an oppor- 
 tunity to produce at least a portion at one of my Cirque concerts, 
 but that institution, which I thought I had established, will have 
 but one season of existence. It is impossible, on account of the 
 difficulty involved in the position of the hall, to expose it anew to 
 chances so unfavourable as those that the last bad season pre- 
 sented ; and during the spring the arrangements of the Cirque 
 for the equestrian troupe make concerts impracticable. More- 
 over, I do not expecf to be in France during the next musical 
 season. . . . Next October there will be the means here of 
 organising some grand musical enterprises at Lille, such as I 
 have directed at Marseilles and Lyons. We could then produce 
 some of your compositions. It would be necessary to hear them 
 in the theatre. Will you write to me on this point as soon as 
 possible, as I am about to start for Bonn, where I shall perhaps 
 remain three weeks ? Liszt has proposed to me to give a concert 
 with him after the Beethoven,fetes. If we could have at Lille 
 an orchestra of seventy musicians, a chorus of sixty voices, and 
 twenty or twenty-six wind instruments from a military band, one 
 could then hope for a sufficiently good result. The theatre will 
 take 300 francs for ordinary expenses, and divide with me the 
 receipts. This was the arrangement at Marseilles and Lyons 
 and all through Germany. Will you be good enough to ascertain 
 the feeling of the manager on this matter, and as to the chance 
 there may be of getting any receipts ? You will much oblige 
 your entirely devoted, Hector Berlioz. 
 
 33, Rue Blanche, Wednesday, August 1. 
 
 At the period now under review the published letters of 
 the master addressed to his son Louis begin, and these may 
 on no account be neglected, owing to the light they neces- 
 sarily throw upon the writer's innermost feeling and cha- 
 racter. The first is undated, but is supposed to have been 
 written near the end of 1845, at which time Louis was a 
 pupil of the Lycee National, Rouen :* — 
 
 My dear Louis, — Thy mother is a little better, but she is 
 still obliged to keep her bed and refrain from speaking. The 
 least emotion beyond common would be fatal. Wherefore do not 
 write to her such a letter as the last thou didst address to me. 
 Nothing is more distressing than to see thee condemn thyself to 
 inaction and sadness. Thou wilt be eighteen without the power 
 to enter upon any career whatever. I have no fortune ; thou 
 wilt have no estate ; upon what are we to live ? Thou speakest 
 * " Correspondance Ingdite," p. 138. 
 
HIS LIFE. 69 
 
 to me always of being a sailor. Thou hast then the desire to 
 leave me, because, once upon the sea, God knojvs when I shall 
 behold thee again. If I were free, entirely independent, I would 
 set out with thee, and we would go together to tempt fortune in 
 the Indies or anywhere else. But to travel one must be in easy 
 circumstances, and having so little I must remain in France. 
 Besides, my career as a composer fixes me in Europe, and if I 
 left the Old -World for the New I should have to abandon 
 it entirely. I speak to thee now as almost a man. Thou wilt 
 reflect and thou wilt comprehend. To sum up, let what will 
 happen I shall be always thy best friend, and the any one. 
 entirely devoted to thee and full of unalterable affection. I know 
 that thou lovest me, and that consoles me for all. Nevertheless, 
 it would be very sad if at twenty thou wert useless to thyself and 
 to the world. I send thee some envelopes to write" to thy aunts. 
 My sister Nancy speaks to me of thee. I send thee her letter. 
 There is no lack of black wax. How shall I send thee some ? 
 One does not put sticks of wax in the post. Tell me more about 
 thy teeth. Have they carefully cleaned them ? Adieu, dear 
 child. I embrace thee with all my soul. 
 
 For particulars concerning the second visit of Berlioz to 
 the south of France we must turn to his " Les Grotesques 
 de la Musique," where they appear in a short series of letters 
 to "MM. Academicien libre." The master had hopes of a 
 good concert in Marseilles, the town having been, he 
 declares, the first in France to understand Beethoven. 
 " They played and admired the last quartets of Beethoven in 
 Marseilles, while we in Paris were still treating the sublime 
 author of those extraordinary compositions as a madman." 
 In the end he was not disappointed. Nearly 800 persons 
 attended, and Berlioz was for a time the hero of the town. 
 What the people, as distinct from the connoisseurs, said of 
 him he learned one day through the agency of a garrulous 
 omnibus-driver by whose side he sat. The driver had talked 
 largely about Rachel, Felicien David, and other celebrities 
 who had visited the town ; and as Berlioz listened he touched 
 by chance the horn as it swung in its place. 
 
 D. Ah ! that knows you. 
 
 B. What ! why do you suppose horns know me ? 
 
 D. Farceur ! do you think "I am ignorant ? It is you who give 
 the grand concerts of which everybody is speaking. 
 
 B. Ah ! how did you find that out? 
 
 D. Parbleu! M. le Conducteur, who is an amateur and has 
 been to the theatre, told me. 
 
70 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 B. Well, since they speak of my concerts, what do they say of 
 them ? Let me know somewhat of these conversations, you who 
 know all. 
 
 D. Oh 1 I heard them well the other evening when the Trotebas 
 gave you a serenade. The Rue de Paradis was so full nearly up 
 to the Bourse that we asked if there was an extraordinary sale of 
 coffee on, or if Monseigneur the archbishop gave his benediction. 
 Not at all ; they were doing honour to you. Then I heard what 
 the amateurs said during the serenade. There was one, M. 
 Himturn, who had come from Nismes to hear your music, he 
 kept exclaiming, " And the ' Hymn to France ! ' and the Pilgrims' 
 March!!" "What pilgrims?" cried another, "I haven't seen 
 any pilgrims." " And the Cinq Mai ! and the Adagio of the 
 Symphony ! ! " No doubt he adores you out-and-out. Further 
 on, a lady said to her daughter, "Thou hast no heart, Rose; 
 thou canst comprehend nothing of that ; play contredanses." 
 But the most excited were two dealers in log-wood. They made 
 more noise than the Trotebas. " Yes, we must condemn all 
 these vagaries. What ! If he had had his way he would have 
 put a cannon in his orchestra." " Go along; a cannon ? " " Cer- 
 tainly, a cannon ; there is in the programme a piece called Piece 
 de campagne. It was at least a twelve-pounder he wanted to 
 regale us with." " My dear fellow, you don't understand. That 
 which you call a piece de campagne is no doubt the Scene aux 
 Champs, the Adagio of the Symphony. You are playing upon 
 the words of the title." " Well, if there isn't a cannon, there is 
 thunder at least, and at the end one must be a fool not to 
 recognise the rolling of the thunder of God." " Quite right, that's 
 what he wished ; it is very poetic, and moved me much." " Don't 
 tell me — poetic ! If it was a walk in the country that he sought to 
 put in music he succeeded very badly. Is it natural ? Why that 
 thunder? Do I go to my country house when it thunders ? " 
 
 Thus the garrulous coachman, Berlioz listening with eager 
 ears and aching sides to the vox populi at second-hand. 
 
 When preparing a concert at Lyons, where the late 
 M. Georges Hainl rendered valuable assistance, Berlioz met 
 by chance his old guitar-master, Dorant, who had just 
 arrived from Vienne. A pleasant incident resulted. " I am 
 with you," said Dorant; "what instrument shall I play — 
 violin, bass, clarinet, or ophicleide ?" " Ah ! dear master, it 
 is easy to see that you don't know me. You will play the 
 violin. Have I ever too many violins ? Has any one ever 
 enough ?" " Very good ; but I shall be a total stranger in 
 the midst of your great orchestra, where I know nobody." 
 " Make yourself easy, I will introduce you." All having 
 
HIS LIFE. 71 
 
 assembled for rehearsal, Berlioz kept his word to the "dear 
 master." " Gentlemen, I have the honour to present to 
 you a very able professor of Vienne, M. Dorant ; he has 
 among you a grateful pupil — that pupil is myself. You will 
 very soon conclude, perhaps, that I do him little credit ; 
 however, will you receive M. Dorant as though you thought 
 the contrary, and as he deserves ?" A round of applause 
 followed, and Berlioz adds that he experienced a singular 
 emotion in conducting the Marche cm Supplice and Scene aux 
 Champs as performed by, amongst the rest, his old guitar- 
 master, whom he had not seen for twenty years. , Another 
 singular experience at this concert was the playing of the 
 harp part by M. Hainl, who had never before essayed the 
 classic instrument. M. Hainl .succeeded perfectly, but, as 
 the part contained only two notes, and as all the strings near 
 C and G were removed to avoid mistake, the result is 
 scarcely surprising. The Lyons enterprise did not prove 
 remunerative, Berlioz receiving little more than a serenade 
 and two anonymous letters; one full of abuse, the other 
 from a " wqunded amateur," who said, " One can be a great 
 artist and also polite. The mouse can sometimes annoy the 
 lion." 
 
 On returning home our master was requested by the 
 authorities of Lille to compose music for some words written 
 by Jules Janin to celebrate the ' completion of the Great 
 Northern' Railway. Lille, about to put itself en fete, and eat 
 and drink largely, thought, says Berlioz, that a little music 
 would encourage both festivity and digestion. The task was 
 soon accomplished, and in good time the composer went 
 down to the favoured town, rehearsed his piece, and got 
 everything ready for the grand event. At that moment the 
 captain of the artillery of the National Guard requested an 
 interview : — , 
 
 C. I come, sir, to consult you on the subject of the pieces. 
 
 B. Ah ! Is there to be a dramatic performance ? I did not 
 know it ; but it does not concern me. 
 
 C. I beg your pardon, sir, the matter in question is the pieces 
 of cannon ! 
 
 B. Ah ! mon Dieu ! what have I to do with those ? 
 
 C. You have to make an astounding effect in your work. 
 Besides, you cannot help yourself; the cannon are in the pro- 
 gramme, the public expect their cannon, and we must not refuse 
 them. 
 
72 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 B. But how is your chorus made up ? 
 
 C. Our chorus ? 
 
 B. Yes ; your park. What are your pieces, and how many 
 have you ? 
 
 C. We have ten twelve-pounders. 
 
 B. Pooh ! that's very feeble. Can't you give me some twenty- 
 fours ? 
 
 C. Mon Dieu ! we have only six twenty-fours. 
 
 B. Well, give me these six principals and the ten choristers. 
 Next we will arrange all the mass of voices on the bank of the 
 great moat near the -esplanade, as close as possible to the 
 military orchestra on the platform. Monsieur the captain will be 
 good enough to keep his eye upon us. I will have a firework 
 man at my side, and at the moment the princes arrive a rocket 
 will go up, and then you will blaze off the ten choristers succes- 
 sively. Then we shall begin the performance of the piece, and 
 you will have time to reload. Towards the end another rocket 
 will be fired, you will count four seconds, and at the fifth you 
 will be good enough so to strike a grand chord altogether with 
 your ten chorister twelve-pounders, and the six principals of 
 twenty-four, as that the ensemble of your voices shall coincide 
 exactly with the last instrumental chord. Do you understand ? 
 
 C. Perfectly, sir ; that will go of itself. You can count upon it. 
 
 As the officer retired he was heard to say, " 'Tis mag- 
 nificent ; only musicians can have such ideas." 
 
 In due course the time came, the princes (De Montpensier 
 and D'Aumale) arrived ; all Lille was assembled, and Berlioz 
 stood baton in hand with a firework man by his side, when 
 up ran the captain, panting for breath : " For heaven's sake, 
 M. Berlioz, don't give the signal yet ; our men have forgotten 
 the matches, and one has gone to the arsenal for them. Give 
 me only five minutes." Five minutes passed ; then seven, 
 and Berlioz received an intimation that the princes were 
 waiting. " Go on," said he to the pyrotechnist, " and so 
 much the worse for the choristers if they are not ready to 
 light them up." The rocket flew heavenwards, but the 
 cannon held their peace. The captain had not yet found 
 his matches. Still Berlioz hoped for a master-stroke at the 
 final chord. All would be right then, and confidently he 
 gave the signal for the second rocket, which soared into the 
 sky like its predecessor — with no better effect. The cannon, 
 principals and choristers, all remained silent, and the good 
 people of Lille dispersed, says Berlioz, " fully persuaded that 
 the two rockets, of which they had heard the noise and seen 
 
HIS LIFE. 73 
 
 the sparks, were simply a new orchestral effect invented by 
 me, and agreeable enough to the eye." 
 
 A few months after the return of Berlioz from the south 
 of France he set out on a more extended tour, proceeding, 
 in the first instance, direct to Vienna. His remarks upon 
 the state of music in the Austrian capital are scarcely 
 within the scope of this work, but we may reproduce a 
 single brief passage as the opinion of an eminent man upon 
 a state of things which unhappily survives to this day. 
 After referring to the great and growing rarity of dramatic 
 sopranos, Berlioz adds : — 
 
 Not that soprano voices of great power and compass are, like 
 true tenors, diamonds beyond price. No ; good and even well r 
 trained female voices present themselves still ; but what can be 
 done with such instruments if expression, intelligence, and inspi- 
 ration do not animate them ? It is of real and complete dramatic 
 talent that I would speak. We find plenty of cantatrices whom 
 the public love because they sing showy nothings brilliantly, and 
 whom the great masters detest because of inability to interpret 
 their works in a proper manner. They have voice, musical 
 knowledge, an agile larynx ; they want soul, brains, and heart. 
 Such women are veritable monsters, and as formidable to com- 
 posers as, often, they are charming. This explains the weakness 
 with which masters have written rdles full of false sentiment, 
 which seduce the public by the showiness of their appearance ; 
 it explains also the bastard works we see born, the gradual 
 abasement of style, the ruin of true expression, forgetfulness of 
 dramatic propriety, contempt of what is true, grand, and beauti- 
 ful, and the decrepitude of the art in certain countries. 
 
 During his stay in Vienna Berlioz conducted three 
 concerts with marked success. The public applauded him, 
 the press praised him, his friends gave him a supper, 
 together with a baton, and the emperor sent him 1,100 francs 
 and a message: — " Tell Berlioz that I have been much 
 amused." This the master styles a " singular compliment." 
 Of course there were quaint episodes in the Viennese 
 experience. One day, in a public garden, a little man 
 accosted Berlioz : — 
 
 " Monsieur, you are a Frenchman, I am an Irishman ; there 
 is, consequently no national amour propre in ray sentiments, and 
 (seizing the master's left hand) I ask permission to shake the 
 hand that wrote the ' Romeo ' Symphony. You understand 
 Shakespeare." 
 
74 HECTOR BERLIOZ. 
 
 " In that case, sir, yotf have mistaken the hand ; I write 
 always with this." 
 
 Here the Irishman dropped the wrong member, grasped and 
 shook the right one, and went away saying, " O these French- 
 men — these Frenchmen ! They must laugh at everything and 
 everybody, even at their admirers ! " 
 
 By the way, the reputation of Berlioz as a quiz made him 
 somewhat formidable to his Viennese friends, and he tells, 
 with admirable gravity, how Dessauer wished to convert 
 him to some new musical doctrine, but could never get to 
 the point of unfolding it : — 
 
 Every time the opportunity offered for us to causer a, fond, as 
 he said, if I looked him full in the face with my most serious 
 air at the moment of beginning his homily, he fancied that I 
 was laughing at him, and, relapsing into silence, put off my 
 conversion till a better time. 
 
 From Vienna the master went to Pesth, taking with him 
 the Hungarian March now conspicuous in " La Damnation 
 de Faust." This he had written at the suggestion of a 
 Viennese amateur, who said, " If you would please the 
 Hungarians, compose a piece upon one of^their national 
 themes ; they will be charmed with it, and you can give me, 
 on your return, news of their ' Eljen ' and their applause." 
 A great sensation attended the announcement of the march, 
 and the editor of one paper was so moved by curiosity as to 
 find out the residence of the copyist and go carefully through 
 the manuscript. The next day he met Berlioz : — 
 
 E. I have seen the score of your Rakoczy March. 
 
 B. Well! 
 
 E. Well ! I am afraid. 
 
 B. Bah ! 
 
 E. You have announced your theme piano, and we, on the 
 contrary, are used to hearing it played fortissimo. 
 
 B. Yes, by your gipsies. Be easy ; you will have such a forte 
 as you never heard in your life. You have not read it well. In 
 any case it is needful to look after the end. 
 
 Of the performance, Berlioz says : — 
 
 After a trumpet passage based upon the rhythm of the opening 
 bars of the melody, the theme appeared, played piano by the 
 flutes an* clarinets, and accompanied by the strings pizzicati. 
 The public remained calm and silent at this unexpected announce- 
 ment, but when, on a long crescendo, fugal fragments of the theme 
 reappeared interspersed with the heavy boom of the big drum 
 
HIS LIFE. 75 
 
 simulating the report of distant cannon, the hall began to fer- 
 ment with an indescribable noise, and, at the moment when the 
 orchestra, entering upon a furious mtt&e, gave out a long-con- 
 tinued fortissimo, cries and stampings shook the hall ; the con- 
 centrated feeling -of all those excited souls exploded with accents 
 which gave me a shiver of terror ; I seemed to feel my hair 
 stand up, and at the end of that decisive section I was obliged to 
 abandon the peroration of my piece, the tempest of the orchestra 
 being unable to struggle against the blast of a volcano the vio- 
 lence of which nothing could arrest. ... I was greatly agitated, 
 as may be supposed, after a storm of this nature, and was wiping 
 my face in a little room at the back of the theatre, when . . . 
 I saw enter, unannounced, a man poorly dressed, and with a face 
 lighted up in a strange manner. Seeing me, he threw himself 
 towards me, embraced me with ardour, his eyes full of tears, and 
 exclaimed with difficulty, "Ah, sir! sir! I am a Hungarian — 
 poor devil — cannot speak French — a little Italian. Pardon my 
 ecstasy.. Ah ! I understand your cannon. Yes, yes — the great 
 battle — dogs of Germans." Then, striking his breast heavily : 
 " In my heart — I bear you — Ah ! Frenchman — revolutionary — 
 to know how to make the music of revolutions !" I cannot at- 
 tempt to paint the terrible exaltation of this man : his tears, the 
 grindings of his teeth ! It was almost alarming and quite sublime. 
 
 On returning to Vienna after his great success, Berlioz 
 was waited upon by the amateur who had suggested the 
 march. The noise of its frantic reception had reached the 
 capital, and our amateur, frightened rather than pleased, 
 said, " I run to beg you not to say a word about me on this 
 fhatter. If it were known in Vienna that I had contributed 
 in any way to the composition of the march I should be 
 seriously compromised, and it might do. me harm." 
 
 Berlioz next visited Prague, where he gave six concerts, 
 and enjoyed the satisfaction of presenting his " Rom6o et 
 Juliette " to Liszt, by whom that work had never before 
 been heard. Again success rewarded his efforts. The public 
 were delighted, and the virtuosi arranged a supper, at which 
 Liszt in their name presented the composer with a silver cup. 
 Hereby hangs a tale which Berlioz may be allowed to tell : — 
 
 Liszt was unanimously chosen to make the presentation speech 
 instead of the chairman, who had not sufficient acquaintance with 
 the French language. At the first toast he made me, in the name 
 of the assembly, an address at least a quarter of an hour long, 
 with a warmth of spirit, an abundance of ideas, and a choice of 
 expressions which excited the envy of the orators present, and 
 
76 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 by which I was profoundly touched. Unhappily, if he spoke 
 well he also drank well ; the treacherous cup inaugurated by the 
 convives held such floods of champagne that all Liszt's elo- 
 quence made shipwreck in it. Bellohi and I were still in the 
 streets of Prague at two o'clock in the morning persuading him 
 to wait for daylight before exchanging shots, at two paces, with 
 a Bohemian who had drunk better than himself. When day 
 came we were not without anxiety about Liszt, whose concert 
 was to take place at noon. At half-past eleven he was still 
 sleeping ; at last some one awoke him, he jumped into a cab, 
 reached the hall, was received with three rounds of applause, 
 and played as, I believe, he had never played in his life before. 
 
 Going on to Breslau, our master, was somewhat disquieted 
 by the coldness of the public at certain concerts which he 
 attended before giving his own. On one occasion complete 
 silence followed a capital performance of Beethoven's " C 
 minor," and Berlioz augured from this a fiasco for himself. 
 " You are mistaken," said an enthusiastic lady amateur, 
 who lacked finesse; " the public admire the chef d'ceuvre of the 
 great master as much as possible, and if they do not applaud, 
 it is out of respect." Berlioz was too keen a humorist not 
 to appreciate this explanation. He adds : — 
 
 I was much afraid of being respected, but happily without 
 occasion, for at my concert the assembly, to whose respect I 
 doubtless had no adequate claim, thought it a duty to treat me 
 after the vulgar usage adopted all over Europe towards popular 
 artists, and I was applauded in a fashion the most irreverent. 
 
 During the whole of this tour our master was busy with 
 his " Damnation de Faust," the libretto of which he had 
 written himself, or rather completed, since portions of a 
 translation of Goethe's lyrics by Gerard de Nerval, set to 
 music by Berlioz twenty years earlier, and two or three 
 scenes by Gandonniere, were incorporated in the work. 
 Berlioz found it easy to be at once poet and composer. He 
 wrote words and music with unexampled facility, taking 
 advantage of every opportunity, in season or out of season, 
 to push on with the task : — 
 
 In an inn at Passau, on the frontiers of Bavaria, I wrote the 
 introduction " Le vieil Hiver " ; at Vienna I composed the " Scene 
 on the banks of the Elbe," the air of Mephistopheles, " Voici des 
 roses," and the Dance of Sylphs. I have already told on what 
 occasion and how I produced in one night, also at Vienna, the 
 march on the Hungarian theme of Rakoczy. The extraordinary 
 
HIS LIFE. 77 
 
 effect. which it produced at Pesth led me to introduce it into the 
 score of " Faust," after taking the liberty to place my hero in 
 Hungary at the beginning of the action, and making him witness 
 the march of a Hungarian army across the plain where he pur- 
 sues his reveries. A German critic has found it very strange 
 that I made Faust travel to such a place. I do not see why I 
 should have refrained from doing so, and I would not have 
 hesitated to lead him anywhere else, provided it were for the 
 advantage of my work. I was not obliged to follow Goethe's 
 plan, and the most eccentric travels can be attributed to such 
 a personage as Faust without in any degree shocking vrai- 
 setnblance. Other German critics having much later revived this 
 singular thesis, and attacked me with violence because of the 
 differences between my book and the plan and text of Goethe's 
 " Faust" (as though.there were not other "Fausts" besides that of 
 Goethe, and as though one could put the whole of such a poem to 
 music without interference with its order), I was silly enough to 
 answer them in the preface to my " Damnation de Faust." I 
 have often, asked myself why these same critics did not reproach 
 me for the book of my symphony " Rom6o et Juliette," so unlike 
 the immortal tragedy. No doubt they refrained because Shake- 
 speare was not a German. Patriotism ! Fetishism ! Cretinism ! 
 At Pesth, when one evening I lost myself in the streets, I wrote 
 the choral refrain of the " Ronde des Paysans " by the light of 
 the gas in a shop window. At Prague I rose in the middle of the 
 night to set down a melody I was afraid would be forgotten — 
 that of the angelic chorus in the apotheosis of Margaret. At 
 Breslau I penned the words and music of the students' Latin 
 song, "Jam nox stellata " ; and on returning to France, having 
 gone to spend some days near Rouen, at the place of the Baron 
 de Montville, I composed the great trio, " Ange adore." " The 
 rest was written in Paris, but always as an improvisation, at my 
 own house, at the cafe, in the garden of the Tuileries, and even 
 on a post of the Boulevard du Temple. I did not seek the ideas ; 
 I let them come to me, and they presented themselves in an 
 order the most unforeseen. ... I look upon the work as one of 
 the best that I have produced, and up till now the public appear 
 to think with me. 
 
 But the public of Paris, at all events, did not so think in 
 December, 1846, when " La Damnation de Faust " was 
 twice produced at the Op6ra-Comique. Only a few hundreds 
 attended, and the result was catastrophe. Berlioz expected 
 a better fate for his work, and says thereanent : — 
 
 Illusion ! Since the first performance of my " Romeo et 
 Juliette " years had rolled away, during which the indifference of 
 
78 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 the Parisian public for all that concerned art and literature had 
 made incredible progress. . . . The good people of Paris — those 
 who go to concerts, those who are credited with troubling about 
 music — tranquilly remained at home, caring as little about my 
 new piece as though I had been an obscure pupil of the Conser- 
 vatoire, and more would have gone to the Opera-Comique on 
 those two occasions had the poorest work in the repertory been 
 represented. Nothing in my artistic career ever more deeply 
 wounded me than this unexpected indifference. The discovery 
 was cruel but useful, and I have profited by it, because I have 
 never since ventured twenty francs upon the Parisian public's 
 love for my music. I sincerely hope I shall never do so in the 
 future [this hope was not realised, by the way], if I live a 
 hundred years. After two days of inexpressible moral suffering, 
 I fancied I saw the means of escape from embarrassment by a 
 tour in Russia. 
 
 Berlioz followed up this idea, and having, by the help of 
 friends, raised a little money, he set out for the capital of 
 the Czar on the 14th of February, 1847. Fifteen days later 
 he reached his destination, and was immediately visited 
 by M. de Lenz (of the " Trois Styles "), who acted as his 
 sponsor in Russian society, and befriended him in many 
 ways. Berlioz now found his expectations more than 
 justified. The result of the first concert was a profit of 
 12,000 francs. " I was saved ! I turned mechanically then 
 to the south-west, and could not help murmuring these 
 words, ' Ah ! dear Parisians ! ' " The second concert proved 
 no less successful, while the first given in Moscow yielded 
 8,000 francs ; and again Berlioz, looking to the south-west, 
 murmured " Ah ! dear Parisians ! " It was at Moscow that 
 an incident took place which led the master to remark upon 
 the curious difficulty experienced by the public in compre- 
 hending a man Who merely writes music and does not play 
 it. The incident, however, was not new : — 
 
 I was nearly insulted at Breslau by a good paterfamilias, who 
 absolutely wished to compel me to give his son some violin 
 lessons. When I strongly protested that it would be by the 
 merest chance if I could play, since I had never handled a bow in 
 my life, he took all my words as so much false money, and saw 
 in them only' a kind of stupid mystification. 
 
 " Sir, you think you are speaking to the famous violinist De 
 Beriot, whose name somewhat resembles mine." 
 
 " Sir, I have read your announcement ; you give a concert in 
 the University Hall the day after to-morrow, thus " 
 
HIS LIFE. 
 
 79 
 
 " Yes, sir, I give a concert, but I do not play the violin at it." 
 
 " What do you do, then ? " 
 
 " I cause the violin to be played ; I direct the orchestra. Go 
 yourself and you will see." 
 
 My man restrained his anger, and it was only on leaving 
 the concert that, by dint of reflection, he could understand a 
 musician presenting himself in public without being an executant. 
 
 The kindred experience in Moscow was on this wise : the 
 only available hall being that of the Assembly of Nobles, 
 Berlioz waited on the Grand Marshal of the Palace of 
 which it formed a part. He was a " respectable old fellow 
 of eighty," and listened with patience to the, musician's 
 request : — 
 
 G . M. What instrument do you play ? 
 
 B. I don't play any. 
 
 G. M. In that case how can you give a concert in the hall ? 
 
 B. I have my compositions performed, and direct the orchestra. 
 
 G. M. Ah ! ah ! that is curious ; I never heard of such concerts. 
 I' will willingly lend you the hall ; but, as you doubtless know, 
 every artist who is allowed to use it must, in return, play, after 
 the concert, at one of the private reunions of the nobility. 
 
 B. The Assembly, then, has an orchestra which it puts at my 
 disposal to perform my music ? 
 
 G. M. Not at all. 
 
 B. Then how can it be heard? Surely it is not expected that I 
 shall pay three thousand francs to the performers required for the 
 execution of one of my symphonies at the private concert of the 
 nobles ? That would be to rent the hall very dearly. 
 
 G. M. Then, sir, I am sorry to refuse you. I cannot do other- 
 wise. 
 
 The old. official persisted in this course even when Berlioz 
 made a second application, supported by a resident French 
 artist. It occurred to him, however, that possibly his know- . 
 ledge of the French language was inadequate, and, upon 
 this, he called in the aid of his wife : — 
 
 Madame la Mar6chale, whose age was nearly as respectable as 
 that of her husband, but whose features were less benevolent, 
 arrived, looked at me, heard me, and cut short the discussion by 
 saying in French, rapidly, clearly, and concisely : — 
 
 " We neither can nor will violate the regulations of the 
 Assembly. If we lend you the hall, you must play an instru- 
 mental solo at our next reunion. If you will not play, we. cannot 
 lend." 
 
 " Mon Dieu ! Madame la Marechale, I could at one time play 
 
80 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 very well on the flageolet, flute, and guitar; choose which of 
 these three instruments I shall use. But, as I have not touched 
 one of them for twenty-five years, I must warn you that I shall 
 play very badly But stop ; if you will be satisfied with a solo on- 
 the drum, I shall probably do better." 
 
 At that moment a superior officer entered the room, and, 
 on learning the difficulty, took Berlioz aside, saying : " Do 
 not insist, M. Berlioz, or the discussion will become very 
 disagreeable for our worthy Marshal. Send me your request 
 in writing to-morrow, and everything shall be arranged. I 
 will make it my business." The result was that Russian 
 rule was violated, "for this occasion only," and Berlioz had 
 not to prove his skill on either the flageolet or flute, guitar or 
 drum. 
 
 Our master follows up his account of these incidents with 
 some reflections upon the curious ideas that come into the 
 heads of young people with regard to music : — 
 
 Without speaking of amateurs who persist in taking useless 
 lessons at an exorbitant price to conquer a barbarous organi- 
 sation upon which the patience and talent of the best masters are 
 wasted, or of those dreamers who are persuaded that they can 
 learn music as they do mathematics, by the intellect only ; and 
 without taking note of the worthy fathers who have an idea to 
 make their sons colonels or composers — one meets with sad 
 examples of monomania among those who appear least liable 
 to an attack. 
 
 Berlioz then proceeds to cite two cases. In the first 
 instance, a young man called upon him in Paris : — 
 
 B. Be good enough, sir, to take a seat. 
 
 V. It's nothing — I am a little— I have — sir, I have come into 
 a fortune. 
 
 B. A fortune ! Let me congratulate you. 
 
 V. Yes ; I have come into a fortune, and I want to know if I 
 shall do well to make myself a composer. 
 
 B. Be good enough to take a seat. Mon Dieu ! sir, you credit 
 me with extraordinary perspicacity. Prophecies based on even 
 important works are often wrong. However, if you can show me 
 a score — 
 
 V. No, I have no score, but I will work hard. I have so much 
 taste for music, you know. 
 
 B. No doubt you have already written something — a symphonic- 
 movement, an overture, a cantata — 
 
 V. An overture? N-n-no; I have not written a cantata either. 
 
 B. Well, have you tried to write a quartet ? 
 
HIS LIFE. 8i 
 
 V. Ah, sir ! a quartet ! 
 
 B. Well, don't try a quartet. It is, perhaps, the most difficult 
 . of all works to treat well, and the masters who have succeeded in 
 it are curiously few. But without going so high, can you show 
 me a simple romance, a waltz — 
 
 V. (offended). A romance! — no, no, I do not make such a thing 
 as that. 
 
 B. Then you have done nothing? 
 
 V. No ; but I will work so — 
 
 B. At any rate you have finished your studies in harmony and 
 counterpoint — you know how to deal with voices and instru- 
 ments ? 
 
 V. As to that — as to that — I know neither harmony, counter- 
 point, nor instrumentation, but you will see — 
 
 B. Pardon me, sir, you are eighteen or nineteen, and it is too 
 late to begin such studies with any good. However, I suppose 
 you know how to read music at sight and can write from dic- 
 tation ? 
 
 V. Do I know how to sol-fa ? Well — no, I don't know the 
 notes even ; I know nothing at all, but I have so much taste for 
 music, and I should so like to be a composer. If you will give 
 me lessons, I will come to your house twice a day — I will work at 
 night ! 
 
 Berlioz, upon this, explained to his visitor the obstacles 
 in his way, and the young man left, like his scriptural proto- 
 type, in a sad mood, but evidently with the intention, to try 
 another master. 
 
 The second case was met with in Moscow, the patient 
 being a Russian of twenty-two : — 
 
 V. Sir, I have an immense passion for music. I have studied 
 all its branches, incompletely, as you may suppose. Moscow 
 offers few opportunites, and. I am not rich enough to travel. My 
 parents have vainly tried to turn me from my course, but a great 
 person here is willing to aid me, and has declared that if a com- 
 petent musician testifies to my real ability he will pay the 
 expenses of my education in Germany and France. Try- me, 
 and then write frankly the opinion you have formed. In any 
 case I shall owe you eternal gratitude. If your opinion is favour- 
 able, it will give me life, for the constraint now put upon me is 
 death ! 
 
 B. Really, sir, I understand what you suffer, and you have all 
 my sympathies. Dispose of me. 
 
 V. A thousand thanks. To-morrow I will bring you the works 
 I wish you to pronounce upon. 
 
 Next day, the young man. returned, pale and sad : — 
 
 G 
 
82 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 V. I have brought you nothing. I passed the night looking at 
 my MSS., and none seemed worthy to show you, and, frankly, 
 none represent of what I am capable. I will begin something 
 that shall be better. 
 
 B. Unhappily, I am soon going back to St. Petersburg. 
 
 V. No matter ; I will send you my new work. Ah, sir, if you 
 Knew what fire burns within me ! . . . They treat me as a fool 
 here, but, believe me, I am not that, and I will prove it to you. 
 
 Berlioz assured the young man of his continued interest. 
 
 " Mon Dieu ! " said I, after he had gone, " are not these the 
 symptoms of an exceptional organism ? Here is perhaps a man 
 of genius." 
 
 Only once was the young Muscovite heard from, and then 
 to say that he had finished nothing, inspiration having quite 
 deserted him. 
 
 During his stay at Moscow Berlioz put "Faust" in re- 
 hearsal, and had a passage of arms with the official censor. 
 That worthy seems to have understood " a little Latin," and 
 when he came to the words of the students' chorus, " Nobis 
 subridente luna, per urben quaerentes puellas eamus, ut eras 
 fortunati Csesares dicamus: Veni, vidi, vici," he shook his 
 official head and concluded, " This will not do at all." Ber- 
 lioz replied that the censor at St. Petersburg had raised 
 no objection, but took nothing by the motion. "The St. 
 Petersburg- censor did what he thought right," said the stern 
 Muscovite ; " but I am not obliged to imitate him. The 
 passage in question is immoral ; it must he suppressed." 
 Berlioz adds : " And it was — in the book. . . . The pro- 
 hibited couplet was sung all the same at the concert, but 
 in such a fashion that nobody understood it." We may 
 observe here that this was not the only occasion on which 
 the words of the students' chorus excited remark. In 1854 
 a Dresden critic solemnly protested against them, on the 
 ground that German students are nice young men, of 
 good manners and behaviour. This called forth hardly 
 less laughter than a subsequent complaint by the same 
 sapient scribe that Berlioz slandered Mephistopheles when 
 he made him tell a lie in order to. bring about the death- 
 ride of Faust. 
 
 On the return of Berlioz to St. Petersburg, preparations 
 were made for two grand performances of "Rom6o et 
 Juliette." In regard to these the imperial intendent was 
 complaisance itself. . "How many rehearsals will you give 
 
HIS LIFE. 83 
 
 me?" asked the master. "How many?" responded the 
 official ; " as many as you like. They shall rehearse every 
 day ; and when you come to me, saying ' All goes well,' we 
 will announce the concert — not before." Berlioz took him 
 at his word, and the performance was " marvellous." 
 
 I recall it as one of the happiest events of my life, the more 
 because I was in such good form that, in conducting, I had the 
 happiness not to make a single mistake — which seldom happens. 
 The great theatre was full. ... I was recalled I do not know 
 how many times. Let me declare, however, that I paid little 
 attention to the public that day, and the effect of the divine 
 Shakesperian poem, which I sang to myself, was such that after 
 the finale I ran, all quivering, to take refuge in a private room, 
 where Ernst found me, shortly after, in floods of tears. " Ah ! " 
 said he, " nerves ! I understand that." Coming to me, he held 
 my head, and let me weep like a hysterical girl for a quarter of an 
 hour. 
 
 Leaving Russia, Berlioz proceeded to Berlin, the King of 
 Prussia having expressed a desire to hear " Faust " and 
 make the_ acquaintance of its author. During his stay in 
 that capital, the master was invited to dine at the palace of 
 Sans Souci, and after the repast all adjourned to the gardens 
 for coffee. Then the king called to the musician : "Eh ! 
 Berlioz, come and give me news of my sister, and tell me 
 about your Russian trip." Presently Frederic William was 
 seen to be shaking with laughter : — ■ 
 
 This hilarity, in which I joined without ceremony, made me 
 all at once an important personage. Several courtiers and 
 officers observed it from the pavilion where they were seated, 
 and saw good reasons for being on terms with a man who could 
 make the king laugh so much, and who laughed with him so 
 familiarly. On returning to the pavilion soon after, I was sur- 
 rounded by grands seigneurs to me perfectly unknown, who made 
 profound salutations while modestly introducing themselves. 
 " Sir, I am the Prince of , and feel happy to make your ac- 
 quaintance." " Sir, I am the Count of ; allow me to con- 
 gratulate you upon the great success you have just obtained." 
 
 " Sir, I am the Baron . I had the honour of seeing you six 
 
 years ago at Brunswick, and am enchanted," &c, &c. I did not 
 understand whence such, honour could so suddenly come to me at 
 the Prussian Court, till I at last recalled the scene in the first 
 act of " Les Huguenots," where Raoul, after having received 
 Queen Marguerite's letter, finds himself surrounded by men who 
 sing to him in canon on all degrees of the scale : " You know 
 
 G 2 
 
84 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 whether I am a sure and faithful friend." They took me for a 
 powerful favourite of the king. What a funny world is that of a 
 Court! 
 
 On reaching France, Berlioz paid a visit to his relatives, 
 and introduced to them his son Louis ; soon, however, 
 returning to Paris, where MM". Roquelain and Duponchel, 
 joint candidates for the direction of the Grand-Op6ra, sought 
 to enlist his influence in their cause, by offering him a joint 
 conductorship with M. Girard. The bait took : Berlioz 
 worked for the two applicants, and they, when duly ap- 
 pointed, proceeded to kick down the ladder by which they 
 had climbed. No place could be found for Berlioz, since 
 Girard would reign alone or not at all, and the indignant 
 master at once accepted an offer from Jullien to conduct a 
 season of opera at Drury Lane Theatre. The agreement 
 between manager and composer was drawn up by Berlioz 
 with his own hand, and runs, in English, as follows :* — 
 
 Between M. Hector Berlioz, composer of music, living in Paris, 
 41, Rue de Provence, and Messrs. Jullien and Company, music 
 publishers, resident in London, 210, Regent Street, has been 
 agreed as follows : — 
 
 M. H. Berlioz engages himself as orchestral conductor of the 
 Theatre Royal Drury Lane, which will henceforth be called the 
 Royal Academy of London, and of which Messrs. Jullien and Co. 
 are -the directors. This year the service of M. Berlioz will last 
 for three months only, from the 1st December, 1847, t0 tne 
 1st March, 1848. The salary allowed to M. H. Berlioz for these 
 three months of service will be four hundred pounds sterling, 
 which Messrs. Jullien and Co. will pay to him in the following 
 manner: one-fourth eight days before the departure of M. Hector 
 Berlioz for London, a fourth at the end of the first month of 
 service, a fourth at the end of the second month, and the last 
 fourth at the end of the third month. 
 
 M. H. Berlioz will not be at liberty to conduct any orchestra in 
 London or in the provinces of England without the consent of 
 M. Jullien, during the whole duration of the present agreement, 
 which is made for six years, terminable from year to year at the 
 option of M. Jullien only, The salary of M. Berlioz for the fol- 
 lowing years will be £133 6s. per month, whatever may be the 
 length of his service ; if it be six months, for example, instead of 
 three, the salary of M. Berlioz for those six months will be £800 
 sterling, and so on. 
 
 A connected agreement is made between M. Berlioz and 
 
 * Autograph, obligingly lent for translation by Charles Hargitt, Esq. 
 
HIS LIFE. 85 
 
 Messrs. Jullien and Co. for concerts under the following con- 
 ditions : — 
 
 M. Hector Berlioz engages to put his music at the service of 
 M. Jullien, to give, during one month, concerts in London or in 
 the English provinces ; these concerts will be conducted by M. 
 Berlioz. Of these concerts there cannot be given less than four 
 or more than eight. 
 
 The concert month shall be determined thus, at the option of 
 M. Jullien : a fortnight before the entry upon his duties of M. 
 Berlioz as orchestral conductor and a fortnight after the close of 
 Drury Lane Theatre,; or the whole of the month preceding the 
 entry of M. Berlioz upon his duties as orchestral conductor; or 
 yet again, the month of May, 1848. 
 
 The salary of M. Berlioz is £400, one quarter of which will be 
 paid to him each week. The travelling expenses from Paris to 
 London and from London to Paris, and the expenses of board and 
 lodging of M. Berlioz in London, will be at the charge of M. Jullien. 
 The present agreement is made for six years, and is terminable 
 only at the will of M. Jullien and Co. During the whole time 
 that this agreement holds good, M. Berlioz will not be at liberty 
 to .give any concert in London or in the provinces of England, 
 whether for himself or others, without the consent of M. Jullien. 
 
 Finally, a third treaty is made between M. H. Berlioz and Messrs. 
 Jullien and Co. for the, composition of an opera in three acts under 
 the following conditions : — 
 
 M. H. Berlioz engages to write a score in three acts on a poem 
 written in French by MM. A. Royer and Vaes. This work will 
 be performed at Drury Lane Theatre in the season of 1849. The 
 libretto of MM. Royer and Vaes should be sent in entirety to 
 M. Berlioz between this and the month of March, 1848, at the 
 ' latest ; and M. Berlioz engages to send the complete score to 
 M. Jullien by, at latest, October 1, 1848. M. H. Berlioz engages 
 to prepare his opera for public representation, that is to say, to 
 direct the rehearsals and superintend the studies during the fort- 
 night preceding the first performance. M. Jullien will have the 
 sole right in England and her colonies of performing and publish- 
 ing the music of the said opera, and for this right engages to pay 
 to M. Berlioz the following sums : — 
 
 1. One hundred pounds on receipt of the score. 
 
 2. One hundred pounds at the first performance. 
 
 3. One hundred pounds at the tenth performance. 
 
 4. One hundred pounds at the fifteenth performance. 
 
 5. One hundred pounds at the twenty-fifth performance. 
 
 6. One hundred pounds at the thirty-fifth performance. 
 
 7. One hundred pounds at the fiftieth performance. 
 
 8. One hundred pounds at the seventieth performance. 
 
86 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 In all the sum of £800. M. Jullien will not have to pay any 
 other fees to M. Berlioz for the performance of this opera in 
 London or in the English provinces ; but if he should give up his 
 theatre, his successor will be bound to pay to M. Berlioz five 
 pounds sterling for every performance, by way of author's rights. 
 The same obligation will be imposed on the directors of the" 
 theatres in the provinces of England. Whichever of the parties 
 shall contravene the clauses of the three agreements as above 
 shall be liable to the other for damages, -to be fixed by competent 
 judges — in London, should it be M. Jullien who does not fulfil his 
 engagements; in Paris, should it be M. Berlioz. 
 
 Drawn up in duplicate in Paris, the igth'of August, 1847. 
 
 Signed, Hector Berlioz. 
 
 Berlioz entered upon his English career in a very sanguine 
 spirit. He saw everything through rose-coloured spectacles. 
 Writing to a friend in St. Petersburg (November 10, 1847), 
 he said : * — 
 
 Behold me in England with an independent position (financially 
 speaking), and such as I had not dared to dream of. I am charged 
 with the direction- of the grand English Opera, which will begin at 
 Drury Lane in a month ; more, I am engaged for four concerts, 
 composed exclusively of my works, and, in the third place, to 
 write ah opera in three acts for the season of 1848. . . . The 
 director is ready for any sacrifice, and counts only upon the second 
 year. The chorus and orchestra are splendid. As for my concerts, 
 we shall not begin them till January; I believe they will turn out 
 well. Jullien (the director) is a man of audacity and intelligence, 
 who knows London and the English better than anybody, be he 
 who he may. He has already made his fortune, and has it in his 
 head to build up mine. 
 
 Berlioz, writing in his memoirs, bears witness to the ex- 
 cellence of the means which Jullien, " in his incontestable and 
 uncontested quality as a madman," provided for his venture ; 
 but adds that one thing had been forgotten — a repertory. 
 Balfe's " Maid of Honour" was somewhere in prospective, 
 and an English version of " Lucia " had the duty assigned 
 to it of bringing in £400 per night, that mere expenses might 
 be paid pending the arrival of a novelty. For the per- 
 formance of Donizetti's work, Madame Dorus Gras and 
 Mr. Sims Reeves were engaged. " Reeves has a fine natural 
 voice, and sings as well as the frightful English language 
 will allow." But no merit in performance could save an- 
 * " Correspondance Ingdite," p. 148 et seq. 
 
HIS LIFE. 87 
 
 enterprise depending upon "Lucia." The receipts were less 
 than £100 per night, Balfe's opera turned out indifferently, 
 and " in a little while Jullien was completely ruined," while 
 his conductor had only received a month's salary. Upon the 
 details of this failure it is unnecessary to dwell, but we may 
 present a few extracts from Berlioz' London letters with 
 advantage. They show us, for example, that the master 
 once dreamed of taking Mendelssohn's place in English 
 public opinion : * — 
 
 There is here a good position for me to take— that left vacant 
 by poor Mendelssohn. Every one tells me this from morning till 
 night ; while the press and the profession are well-disposed to- 
 wards me. Already the two rehearsals I have given of " Harold," 
 " Le Carnaval Romain,," and two parts of "Faust" have made 
 them open eyes and ears. I am warranted in believing that it is 
 here I ought to make a good position. 
 
 On another occasion he writes : t — 
 
 My music has worked upon the English public like fire upon a 
 train of powder. . . . Everybody of any musical importance in 
 London was at Drury Lane that evening, and many artists of 
 standing came after the concert to congratulate me. They ex- 
 pected nothing like it, but looked for music diabolical, incompre- 
 hensible, hard, without charm. You should see, moreover, how 
 they arraign our Parisian critics. Davison himself wrote an 
 article for the Times, half of which was left out through want of 
 space, nevertheless that which appeared made its mark. But I do 
 not know what he thinks at bottom ; with opinions like his it is 
 needful to wait developments. Old Hogarth, of the Daily News, 
 was in a state of most comical agitation : " All my blood is on 
 fire," he said to me, "never have I been excited in such a way by 
 music," 
 
 In a third letter, we read : J — 
 
 "Thou knowest more or less well the brusque and violent 
 success of my Drury Lane concert. It has disconcerted in a few 
 hours all previsions favourable or hostile, and upset the edifice of 
 theories which each built here upon my music as described by 
 the three-horned critics of the Continent. God be thanked ! the 
 entire English press has spoken with extraordinary warmth, yet, 
 besides Davison and Gruneisen, I knew none of the writers. It 
 is different now ; the chief among them have come to see me, or 
 have written to me, and our relations are frequent and cordial. It 
 
 * "Correspondance Ingdite," p. 158. 
 t Ibid., p. 164. } Ibid., p. 167. 
 
88 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 is long since I experienced such satisfaction as in reading the 
 article in the Atlas, which I sent to Brandus, who has not trans- 
 lated it. The writer is Mr. Holmes, author of a " Life of Mozart " 
 extremely admired here. 
 
 Finally with regard to the coveted English success, the 
 master says : — 
 
 I shall remain here as long as I can, for time is needed to make 
 a place and secure a position. Happily, circumstances are favour- 
 able. Sooner or later that position will arrive, and will be, they 
 tell me, solid. For my musical career I have only to think of 
 England and Russia. 
 
 All this time, however, Berlioz had his Mordecai in 
 England — none other than the Philharmonic Society, which 
 would not do him honour. Speaking of the opening concert 
 of the season, 1848, he says : * — 
 
 Nobody would believe that evening that the Society had, as 
 yet, asked nothing from me for its concerts. It was true, never- 
 theless. Some say they will be forced to do so by the journals 
 ■and by their committee. But I shall deliver myself only with 
 great precautions into the velvet paws of the old baldheads 
 who manage this institution. Here we have a repetition of the 
 manures of the Paris Conservatoire. 
 
 The Philharmonic Society is again referred to in another 
 letter : + — 
 
 The journals here occupy themselves a good deal with me, but 
 the opposition of the committee of the Philharmonic Society is 
 something curious. They are all English composers, and Costa 
 is at their head. They engage Herr Molique ! they play the new 
 symphonies of Herr Hesse and others ; but I inspire them, so it 
 appears, with incredible terror. Beale, Davison, Rosenberg, and 
 some others have put their heads together to compel them to 
 engage me. . . . Here is an old wall which I must knock over, 
 and behind which I find the public and the press wholly with me. 
 
 Another of Berlioz' English experiences was not quite 
 satisfactory. He stood amazed at the lack of discipline 
 among our orchestral players : \ — 
 
 We have not been able to have the complete orchestra at re- 
 hearsal. These gentlemen come when they please and go about 
 their business, some when the work is half, others when it is only 
 a quarter, done. The first day I had no horns at all, the second 
 
 * " Correspondance Infedite," p. 168. 
 t Ibid., p. 170. J Ibid., p. 162. 
 
HIS LIFE. 89 
 
 I had three, the third I had two, who vanished after the fourth 
 piece. You see how they understand subordination in this 
 country. The chorus, however, are nearly as devoted to me as 
 were those of St. Petersburg. ... I have been five days ill in 
 bed with violent bronchitis ; rage and disgust gave it to me. 
 However, there is much to be done here, on account of the 
 public, who are attentive, intelligent, and really devoted to 
 serious Works. 
 
 At the close of the season of 1848 Berlioz returned to 
 Paris, and soon after suffered the loss of his father, to whom 
 he was attached by more than filial bonds. With regard to 
 this event, and also the subsequent death of his favourite 
 sister and his wife, the master has much to say in his me- 
 moirs. Otherwise he is very reticent indeed, and appears to 
 have grown tired of discoursing with himself as the theme. 
 Else we should have been told at full length how, in 1849, he 
 was presented by Baron Taylor with a gold medal struck in 
 honour of " La Damnation de Faust " ; how he produced 
 what is now the second part of " L'Enfance du Christ," 
 palming it off as the work of Pierre Ducr6, an imaginary 
 composer of the sixteenth century; how, in 185 1, he was 
 appointed a juror in connection with the Great Exhibition ; 
 how, in 1852, he revisited this country to conduct the 
 performances of the New Philharmonic Society ; and how 
 " Benvenuto Cellini " failed at Covent Garden in 1853. 
 To some of these matters, however, he makes reference 
 in his letters, and from one addressed to Mr. Ella 
 (published in Les Grotesques de la Musique), we learn all 
 that is necessary concerning his whimsical appearance a la 
 Chatterton and Horace Walpole : — 
 
 My dear Ella, you ask why the mystery, "La Fuite en Egypte," 
 bears this indication: "Attributed to Pierre Ducr6, imaginary 
 chapelmaster." It is by consequence of a fault I committed — 
 a grave fault, for which I have been severely punished, and con- 
 cerning which I always reproach myself. Here are the facts : I 
 found myself one evening at the house of Baron de M., an intel- 
 ligent and sincere friend of art, with one of my fellow-students 
 of the Academy of Rome, the learned architect Due. Everybody 
 played at ecarte, whist, or brelan, save myself. ... I was bored 
 in a manner sufficiently evident, when Due said, turning to me, 
 " Since thou dost nothing, why not write a piece of music for my 
 album?" "Willingly." I took a piece of paper and traced 
 some lines, upon which soon appeared an andantino in four parts 
 for the organ. Recognising in it a certain character of naive 
 
go HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 mysticism, the idea struck me to apply words of the same kind. 
 The organ piece disappeared and became the chorus in which 
 the shepherds at Bethlehem take farewell of the infant Jesus, at 
 the moment when the Holy Family set out for Egypt. Whist 
 and brelan were interrupted to hear my holy effusion, and the 
 company were as much amused by the antique turn of the verse 
 as of the music. " Now," said I to Due, " I shall put thy name 
 at the bottom. I mean to compromise thee." " What an idea! 
 my friends very well know that I am entirely ignorant of com- 
 position." "Ah ! that is a good reason, truly, for not composing; 
 but, since thy vanity refuses to adopt my piece, I will create a 
 name of which thine shall make part. It shall be Pierre Ducr6, 
 whom I institute music-master at the Sainte-Chapelle of Paris 
 in the seventeenth century. That will give to my manuscript 
 all the value of an archaeological curiosity." . . . Some days 
 after, I wrote, at home, the piece called " Repose of the Holy 
 Family," beginning this time with the words, and a small over- 
 ture for a small orchestra in a small innocent style, in F sharp 
 minor without the note sensible. ... A month later, when I 
 thought no more about my retrospective score, a chorus was 
 wanted for the programme of a concert I had to conduct, and it 
 amused me to insert that of the shepherds from my Mystery, 
 leaving it under the name of Pierre Ducre, music-master at the 
 Sainte-Chapelle of Paris (1679). The choristers at rehearsals 
 conceived a lively affection for this ancestral music. " Where 
 did you disinter it ? " they said to me. " Disinter is nearly the - 
 word," I answered without hesitation ; "it was found in an old 
 walled-up chest during the recent restoration of the Sainte- 
 Chapelle." The concert took place; Pierre Ducre's piece was 
 well-rendered and still better received, while the critics praised it 
 the next day and congratulated me on my discovery. Only one 
 expressed doubts concerning its authenticity and age. ... On 
 the following Sunday, Due was at the house of a young and 
 beautiful lady who greatly loved ancient music, and professed 
 much contempt for modern productions of known date. " Well, 
 madame, how did you find our last concert?" "Oh! very 
 mixed, as usual." " And the piece of Pierre Ducr6 ? " "Perfect! 
 delicious ! there is music'! time has removed none of its freshness. 
 It has true melody, of which contemporary composers force us to 
 remark the rarity. It is not your M. Berlioz, in any case, who 
 could even produce its equal." At these words Due was com- 
 pelled to laugh, and had the imprudence to answer, "Alas, 
 madame, it was my M. Berlioz, nevertheless, who composed the 
 Shepherds' Adieu, and who did it in my presence, one evening, 
 on the corner of a card-table." The lady bit her lips, the blush 
 of confusion tinged her face, and turning her back on Due, she 
 
HIS LIFE. 91 
 
 threw out with temper the cruel phrase, " M. Berlioz is an imper- 
 tinent." Judge of my shame, my dear Ella, when Due repeated 
 these words to me. I hastened to make atonement by humbly 
 publishing in my own name that poor little work, retaining 
 however under the title, the words "Attributed to Pierre Ducr6, 
 imaginary chapelmaster," to recall this my culpable freak. 
 
 Concerning the incidents connected with his visit to 
 London in 1852 the master does not speak at such length as 
 of his Ducr6 joke, but it is clear that he triumphed all along 
 the line at Exeter Hall. Writing, March 25, 1852, to a friend, 
 he says of his first concert in Exeter Hall :* — 
 
 I address three lines to thee to let thee know that I obtained 
 last evening an astonishing success, being recalled I know not 
 how many times, and applauded both as composer and conductor. 
 This morning I read in the Times, Morning Post, Morning Herald, 
 Advertiser, and others, such dithyrambs as had never before been 
 written about me. . . . There is consternation in the camp 
 of the Old Philharmonic Society. Costa and Anderson drink 
 their bile out of full glasses. ... I have a famous orchestra, 
 and an admirable entrepreneur (Beale). . . . Since yesterday 
 he has been half-mad with joy. This success is a great event 
 for musical art here and for me. 
 
 On April 30, he writes : t — 
 
 The journals continue to belaud me, except the Daily News, 
 which is contributed to by Mr. Hogarth, an excellent old man 
 who was, till lately, one of my best friends, but who has for some 
 years acted as secretary to the Philharmonic Society. Inde irce. 
 
 There is also X , who plays a kind of small Scudo because 
 
 he has not been able to extract from Beale the scudi he asked for 
 English translations of the new works we produce. But this 
 counts for little ; success is general, and my heart is in the place. 
 At this moment I am getting up the Choral Symphony, which 
 till now has only been lost here. 
 
 Concerning the performance of Beethoven's great work, 
 he reported as follows to his friends : % — 
 
 The Choral Symphony, which had never been better given 
 here, produced a miraculous effect, and my success as a conductor 
 was very great ; they recalled me after the first part of the 
 concert. 
 
 Finally we read : § — 
 
 . . . Our last concert took place on Wednesday, with extra- 
 
 * " Correspondance In^dite," p. 185. 
 t Ibid., p. 187. } Ibid., p. ig^.. § Ibid., p. 195. 
 
92 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 ordinary success ; the crowd was immense, and the receipts large. 
 I was recalled four or five times. . . . After the chorus of 
 sylphs they threw me a laurel crown. ... I shall much 
 regret my splendid orchestra and chorus. What beautiful female 
 voices ! I could have wished thee to hear the Choral Symphony 
 of Beethoven, which we gave for the second time on Wednesday. 
 Truly the ensemble in the immense Exeter Hall was grandiose 
 and imposing. 
 
 In the letter just -quoted reference is made to a certain 
 degree of financial straitness, which accentuates another 
 addressed by the master from London to his son Louis, 
 then an officer in the French navy. The tone of this epistle 
 shows considerable provocation, and is marvellously cold 
 and stern for a man of the writer's temperament :* — 
 
 Thou sayest that thou art becoming a fool. Thou art one. 
 Thou must be either a fool or an imbecile to write me such 
 letters, and it only needed this in the midst of the daily and 
 nightly fatigues I have to endure here. In thy last letter from 
 Havannah I read that thou wouldst arrive with a hundred francs, 
 nevertheless thou owest forty ! ! ! Who told thee to pay fifteen 
 francs duty on a box of cigars ? Couldst thou not throw them 
 into the sea ? . . . I advise thee to measure thy terms when 
 thou writest to me ; that style does not suit me. If thou thinkest 
 that life is strewn with roses, it is time to begin learning the 
 contrary. In any case, and in three words, I have no idea of 
 putting thee into any other position than that thou hast chosen. 
 It is too- late. At thy age one ought to know enough of the world 
 to take a different line of conduct from that thou appearest to 
 follow. When thou hast sent me a reasonable letter in acknow- 
 ledging receipt of the half bank-note, thou wilt receive the rest of 
 my instructions. Till then remain at Havre. Adieu. 
 
 It was only on rare occasions that Berlioz turned this 
 rough side of his nature towards his son. We shall see, 
 by-and-by, how tender he could be under circumstances of 
 the gravest trial. 
 
 The master was not engaged for the second season of 
 the New Philharmonic Society, and in a letter to a friend 
 (December 19, 1853) he gives us a glimpse of the reason : — 
 
 Beale, after having advised me, a month ago, that I should 
 receive my engagement for the next season, wrote, eight days 
 back, that he had retired from the committee because one of my 
 chefs d'orchestre had contrived to secure that I should be dropped. 
 
 * " Correspondance In£dite," p. 188 et seq. 
 
HIS LIFE. 93 
 
 He had been so annoyed last year by the artists, the public, and 
 the press, that he desired, as he said, to obtain for next year 
 a partner less inconvenient. He wished to engage old Spohr. 
 I could not, however, in order to please that gentleman, conduct 
 in defiance of good sense — that is to say, as he conducts him- 
 self. . . . This is fatal, but neither myself nor my friends in 
 London can do anything. They speak, however, of other pro- 
 jects in England — always in England ; and these will soon be 
 decided. Here there is nothing — always nothing. 
 
 The same letter shows us the~master at Weimar, whither 
 he had gone to attend the production of his " Benvenuto 
 Cellini " by Liszt :— 
 
 I will only say to you that this little trip to Germany has been 
 the most charming that I have made in any country. . . . All 
 the orchestra— singers, actors, comedians, tragedians, directors, 
 intendants — dined together at the Town Hall on the night of my 
 departure, representing an order of ideas and sentiments which 
 in France they have no notion of. I finished by weeping like 
 two dozen calves, thinking what chagrin the same " Benvenuto " 
 had been worth to me in Paris. That excellent Liszt was every- 
 thing adorable in the way of goodness, abnegation, zeal, and 
 devotion. The ducal family overwhelmed me with attention in 
 all ways. 
 
 It was probably at this dinner that a piece d'occasion was 
 sung to Raff's music by a select choir of Weimar amateurs. 
 The jeu d'esfirit may be worth quoting : — 
 
 Nostrum desiderium 
 Tandem implevisti : 
 Venit nobis gaudium 
 Quia tu venisti. 
 
 Sicuti coloribus 
 Pingit nobis pictor ; 
 Pictor es eximius 
 Harmonise victor. 
 
 Vives, crescas, floreas, 
 Hospes Germanorum 
 Et amicus maneas 
 Neo-Wimanorum. 
 
 One of the "projects in England" certainly became a. 
 reality: " Benvenuto Cellini " was brought out at Covent 
 Garden Theatre under the composer's own direction. It 
 failed, and Berlioz naturally, because there was undoubted 
 provocation, attributed the result to intrigue, but in the 
 midst of bitterness did not lose a sense of discretion. After 
 
94 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 remarking that the popular operatic composers hated him 
 because his rise inevitably meant their downfall, he adds : — 
 
 I had proof of this fact in London, where a band of Italians 
 made nearly impossible the representation of " Benvenuto Cellini " 
 at Covent Garden. They shouted and hissed from beginning to 
 end, and even sought to prevent the execution of my overture to 
 " Le Carnaval Romain," which prefaced the second act, and had 
 been applauded in London at various concerts, among others at 
 that of the Philharmonic Society a fortnight before. In its anger 
 public opinion, if not mine, placed at the head of this comical 
 cabal Mr. Costa, chef d'orchestre at Covent Garden, whom I had 
 several times attacked in my feuilletons because of the liberties 
 which he takes with the scores of the great masters, cutting 
 them, lengthening them, instrumenting and mutilating them in 
 all ways. If Mr. Costa be guilty, which is very possible, he has 
 known how to put my suspicions to sleep by his eagerness to 
 serve me and to help me during rehearsal. 
 
 The master, nevertheless, was not without consolation in 
 England. The old Philharmonic Society, which looked at 
 him askance in 1852, now came lumbering along in the rear 
 of enlightened opinion, as usual, and devoted half of one of its 
 programmes to his music. Moreover, a committee was formed 
 for the purpose of organising a benefit concert, but unhappily 
 the composer's duties elsewhere called him away before it 
 could take place. The money subscribed by the committee 
 and others was then devoted — in intention, for it does not 
 appear that the matter went beyond — to the publication of 
 " La Damnation de Faust " in English. A propos, we have 
 two letters, written by Berlioz, which cannot fail to be of 
 interest. One is addressed to M. Sainton:* — 
 
 London, July 8, 1853. 
 
 My dear Sainton, — I leave on Saturday next, and have so 
 many things to do to-morrow, that it will be impossible to 
 accept your kind invitation. Excuse me, therefore. I have 
 written to Mr. Costa, begging him to convey my thanks to 
 Messieurs the Artists of the Orchestra at Covent Garden for 
 their gracious offer to assist in the performance at the concert, 
 which cannot now take place. I write also to Beale to thank 
 the members of the committee,. of whom you are one, for their 
 generous and charming idea to publish an English edition of my 
 "Faust." It is impossible to be more delicately good and at 
 the same time more artistic. — Your very devoted, 
 
 Hector Berlioz. 
 • Kindly lent for translation by M. Sainton, 
 
HIS LIFE. 95 
 
 The second appeared in the Musical World of July 19, 1853, 
 as a communication to the editor (Mr. J. W. Davison) : — 
 
 My dear , — The concert cannot take place. The gentlemen 
 
 of the committee organised to get it up have conceived the deli- 
 cate, charming, and generous idea of devoting the sum realised 
 by the subscription opened for the concert to the acquisition of 
 the score of my " Faust," which will be published, with -English 
 text, under the superintendence .of Beale and other members of 
 the committee. It would be impossible to be more cordial and 
 artist-like at the same time, ^nd I rejoice at the result of the 
 performance at Covent Garden since it has been the cause of a 
 demonstration so sympathetic, intelligent, and worthily expressed. 
 Give all the publicity in your power to this manifestation : you 
 will render justice to your compatriots, and at the same time 
 confer a very great pleasure on yours, &c.,. 
 
 Hector Berlioz. 
 
 The third, letter was written to- Mr. Smythson, chorus- 
 - master at Covent Garden :* — 
 
 My dear Mr. Smythson,,— The concert for which Mesdames 
 and Messieurs the Artists of the Chorus of Covent Garden had 
 so generously accorded me their aid cannot take place. I am 
 none the less profoundly touched by the mark of sympathy which 
 the artists have given me on this occasion. Will you thank them 
 for me, and assure them that I am more happy and more proud 
 of that proof of friendship on their part, than though I had given 
 the most splendid concert under ordinary conditions ? Allow me 
 to say also how much I appreciate the trouble you have taken 
 with the study of " Benvenuto Cellini," and to beg you to 
 believe in the distinguished sentiments of your entirely devoted 
 
 Hector Berlioz. 
 
 London, July 8, 1853. 
 
 Defeated at Covent Garden, the master went to Baden, 
 on the invitation of Benazet the famous directeur des jeux, 
 and conducted two concerts, at which portions of "Faust" 
 were given. From Baden he visited Frankfort and gave two 
 others, with' a less happy result. Scarcely had he returned 
 to Paris before such engagements were offered at Brunswick 
 and Hanover as induced him once more, to cross the Rhine. 
 In the capital of the Grand Duchy his success was very 
 great :t — 
 
 Baton of gold and silver presented by the orchestra ; a supper 
 
 * Kindly lent for translation by Mr. Smythson. 
 f " Lettres Mimes," p. 202. 
 
efi HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 of a hundred covers, whereat all the capacities of the town 
 assisted (judge how much they ate), the Duke's ministers, the 
 musicians of the chapel ; a benevolent institution founded 
 bearing my name (sub invocatione sancti, &°c); ovation decreed 
 by the people one Sunday, when they performed the " Carnaval 
 Romain " at a garden concert ; ladies who kiss my hand on 
 leaving the theatre, in the open street ; crowns sent to me anony- 
 mously in the evening, &c, &c. 
 
 At Hanover the same story : — 
 
 On taking my place for the first rehearsal the orchestra received 
 me with fanfares of trumpets and applause, and I found my scores 
 covered with laurels like respectable hams. At the last rehearsal, 
 the King and Queen came at nine a.m. and remained to the end — 
 that is to say, till one p.m. At the concert, immense " hurrahs " 
 and encores, &c. On the the morrow the King sent for me and- 
 commanded another concert which takes place the day after to- 
 morrow. "I did not believe," he said, "that any one could find 
 new beauties in music. You have undeceived me. And how 
 you conduct ! I do not see you [the King is blind], but I feel it." 
 And, as I expressed my happiness in having such a musician- 
 hearer, " Yes " he added, " I owe much to Providence, which 
 gives me the feeling of music in compensation for that which 
 I have lost." 
 
 Returning to Paris, Berlioz fell again a prey to- the pro- 
 found depression which had for some time afflicted him. 
 He longed above all for the recognition and honour of the 
 only city whose favourable verdict is in the esteem of a 
 Frenchman worth having. London and the cities of .Ger- 
 many were very well in their way and not to be despised/ 
 but while Paris frowned the whole world was dark. Out of 
 this state of things arose a condition of irresoluteness that 
 led almost to despair. The master worked slowly on at his 
 " Enfahce du Christ," the novel style of which seems to have 
 interested him ; but he was " tormented " all the time by 
 the idea of a vast opera. " I resist the temptation to realise 
 this project ; and I shall resist, I hope, to the end." Never- 
 theless, out of it came, eventually, that unhappy" Trojens," 
 the failure of which almost broke his heart. Next he was 
 haunted by dreams of a new symphony — literally by dreams, 
 the themes coming to him in his sleep and disturbing the 
 repose for which his mind, then sorely harrassed by the con- 
 dition of his dying wife, craved as a famished man for food. 
 But he had not the heart to follow up these instinctive 
 
HIS LIFE. 
 
 97 
 
 promptings, and his remarks upon himself thereanent are 
 pathetic almost to tears : — 
 
 " Coward ! " will say some young fanatic, whom I pardon in 
 advance for the injury. " One should dare ! one should compose ! 
 one should even ruin oneself! Nobody has a right to chase away 
 thoughts thus, and to force back into nothingness a work which 
 desires to come forth, and which begs for life." Ah, young man 
 who calls me coward, ... I have the conscience to be no 
 more than human, and, while believing myself to be as devoted 
 to the art as thee or any others, I believe also that I honour art 
 in not treating it as a monster hungry for human victims, and in 
 proving that it has left me reason enough to distinguish courage 
 from ferocity. 
 
 The wife of Berlioz died, after a long and painful illness, 
 on March 3, 1854. In contemplation of this event, he con- 
 fesses to a predominant feeling of "immense, frightful, 
 immeasurable, infinite pity." He was confronted by the 
 problem which has remained unsolved since the beginning of 
 the world, and could not "justify the ways of God to man." 
 He thought of her once glory as an artist, of her accident, 
 her failure on reappearing, her inextinguishable jealousy, 
 their separation, the death of all her relatives, her broken 
 heart, her vanished beauty, her destroyed health, her 
 physical sufferings, her loss of movement and of speech, and 
 her long perspective of death and forgetfulness. All these 
 things drove him out of himself, and he exclaims : " Destruc- 
 tion ! fire and thunders ! blood and tears ! my brain curdles 
 in my head as I contemplate these horrors." A few friends 
 attended the " poor Ophelia " to her grave, and Berlioz 
 morbidly contrasted the scanty train with what it would 
 have been had she died twenty-five years before : — 
 
 To-day, while she goes thus, nearly alone, to the cemetery, 
 ungrateful and forgetful Paris growls below there under its 
 smoke ; he who loved her, and has not the courage to follow her 
 to her tomb, "weeps in a corner of a deserted garden ; and her 
 young son, struggling afar off against the tempest, is rocking 
 high up on a mast amid the sombre" ocean. 
 
 A more melancholy and touching letter than that addressed 
 by Berlioz to his son at Calais, on his return from the voyage, 
 has rarely been penned amid the fires that seem always to 
 encompass great souls. It paints a sad picture needing no 
 comment :* — 
 
 * " Correspondance Inedite," p. 206 et seq. 
 
 H 
 
g8 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 Poor dear Louis, thou hast received my letter jof yesterday, and 
 now thou knowest all. I am alone in the great room at Mont- 
 martre, writing to thee by the side of her deserted chamber. I 
 have been again to the cemetery, and placed two crowns upon 
 the tomb — one for thee, one for me. I have lost my head, and do 
 not know why I have returned here. The servants remain for 
 some days ; they are putting everything in order, and I shall take 
 care that there is as much as possible for thee. I have preserved 
 her hair. Do not lose the little pin that I gave her. Thou wilt 
 never know what we suffered for one another, thy mother and I ; 
 and it was just those sufferings which so much attached us to 
 one another. It was as impossible for me to live with her as to 
 leave her. Happily, she saw thee before dying. For myself, I 
 came later, on the morrow of thy departure ; and I entered the 
 house ten minutes after she, without pain, had rendered the last 
 sigh. She was then free. I love thee, my dear son. We spoke 
 of thee much yesterday in this sad garden, with Alexis Bertsch- 
 told. . . . My cares will endure six months longer at least, for 
 I must pay the doctor, and the sale of the furniture will bring in 
 scarcely anything. . . . Adieu ! I embrace thee with all my heart. 
 Love me, as I love thee. 
 
 The boyish recklessness of Louis in money matters was 
 always a sore trouble to his father, from whose scanty score 
 he had to be supplied. Some reference to this matter appears 
 in a letter written a few days (March 23, 1854) after the one 
 just quoted:* — 
 
 Dear friend, thy letter gave me most unexpected pleasure. 
 Thou hast now seventy francs a month, and if thou knowest how 
 to conduct thyself, and to renounce thy method of using money, 
 thou wilt be able, without doubt, to save a part thereof. Tell me 
 if thou thinkest thou wilt be able to redeem the watch which, I 
 fear, was pledged at Havre in the time of thy folly. It was given 
 thee by my father. If thou canst. not recover it, I will buy thee 
 another with the money which I have of thine. I am having 
 made for thee a watchguard with the hair of thy poor mother, and 
 I earnestly desire that thou may'st religiously preserve it. I have 
 also had a bracelet made, which I shall give to my sister; the rest 
 
 of the hair I keep No doubt thou hast read the charming 
 
 things which Jules Janin wrote about thy poor mother in his 
 feuilleton of last Monday. With what delicacy he referred to my 
 work on "Romeo and Juliet," in- citing the words of the funeral 
 march, " Cast flowers," &c. Yesterday's Steele also contained 
 some words, and many other papers that thou knowest not have 
 spoken of our cruel loss. I start next Sunday evening at eight 
 
 " " Correspondance In£dite," p. 208. 
 
HIS LIFE. 99 
 
 for Hanover, where I shall be till April 3 or 4. After that date I 
 do not know where I ought to go, but in any case I shall certainly 
 be at Dresden from April 15 to May 1. Write me as often as 
 possible to let me know how thou art getting on. . . . God grant 
 that my German trip may bring something in. The apartment at 
 Montmartre is not let, and it may be that I shall have to pay 
 another year's rent. Adieu, very dear child ; my love for thee 
 appears doubled since the loss we have sustained. I embrace 
 thee with all my heart. 
 
 A few days later, Louis was ordered to the Baltic with the 
 French fleet, then about to Operate against the Russians ; 
 and this drew another letter from his father, in which the old 
 money trouble again appears :* — 
 
 Take care. It seems to me that thou hast begun again to 
 squander thy money. I have sent thee some twice this last 
 month. Buy a watch, small of cost, but excellent. I have not 
 received a sou since I have been in Germany. They ought to 
 have sent to me here (Dresden) a sum of 400 francs from Han- 
 over, together with the cross that the King has announced for 
 me ; but I have got neither cross nor money. I have written on 
 this matter to three persons, no one of whom answered. . 1 . 
 Adieu, dear child, write to me as often as possible, especially 
 when thou has left France. I embrace thee with all my heart. 
 
 A contemplated trip to Munich seems to have been in- 
 terfered with by the candidature of Berlioz for a chair at the 
 Institute, which he failed to obtain. Paris, it must be said 
 for that fickle city, was consistent in her treatment of our 
 composer. Berlioz, however, took this fresh rebuff with a 
 more philosophic air than usual. Writing to his friend, 
 Auguste Morel, he said (August 28, 1854) :t — 
 
 They urged me to become a candidate, to make the calls and 
 everthing else usual under such circumstances. I did it all ; I 
 saw the academicians one after the other, and, after a thousand 
 brave words, extremely flattering, a warm reception, &c, they 
 elected Clapffeson. Here's to the next vacancy, however. I am 
 resolved to persist with as much patience as Eugene Delacroix 
 and M. Abel de Pujol, who presented themselves ten times, 
 R6ber has shown me every possible mark of sincere sympathy, 
 and the three other musicians of sincere antipathy. L — -- has 
 worked for me with one hand ; I don't know what he did with the 
 other. 
 
 * " Correspondance Inedite," p. 21a. ' 
 j- Ibid., p. 213. 
 
 H 3 
 
HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 Three days later Berlioz wrote on the same subject to 
 Hans von Biilow :* — 
 
 I resigned myself frankly to those terrible visits, to those letters, 
 to all that the Academy inflicts on persons who would intrare in 
 suo docto corpore. (Moliere's Latin) ; and they have selected M. 
 Clapisson. Another time, however, I am resolute on this matter, 
 and will present myself even to the point of death. 
 
 We next find the master taking an unexpected and start- 
 ling step. Whether given up to one of those vagaries which 
 were the bane of his life, or animated by just and generous 
 sentiments, he married, in the early autumn of 1854, Mdlle. 
 R6cio, a lady with whom he had lived for some years. The 
 terms in which he made this known to his son may be 
 quoted : f — 
 
 I have to make known to thee a piece of news which will 
 probably not astonish thee, and which I communicated in 
 advance to my sister and uncle on the occasion of my last visit 
 to the Cote. I have remarried. That connection, by its long 
 duration, had become indissoluble, as thou well understandest ; 
 I could neither live alone nor abandon the person who had been 
 my companion for fourteen years. On his last visit to Paris, my 
 uncle himself was of this opinion, and the first to advise me. All 
 my friends thought with him. Thy interests, as may be believed, 
 are well safe-guarded. I have devised to my wife after me, if I 
 should die first, only a quarter of my little fortune, and this 
 quarter, I know, it is her intention to leave thee. She brings 
 me, by way of dower, her furniture, the value of which is more 
 than we think, but which ought, of course, to return to her, if I 
 die first. . . . My position, more regular, is more agreeable thus. 
 I do not doubt, if thou hast preserved some painful souvenirs, 
 and some harsh feelings for Mdlle. Recio, that thou, for love "of 
 me, wilt hide them in the depths of thy soul. The marriage was 
 accomplished en petit comitS, without noise as without conceal- 
 ment. If thou writest to me on the subject, write nothing that I 
 cannot show to my wife, because I would not for anything have 
 shadows in my home; however, I leave thy heart to tell thee 
 what thou oughtest to do, * 
 
 In the same letter he states that he is getting up a 
 concert for the production of " L'Enfance du Christ," some 
 reference to which, as a past event, appears in the Humbert 
 correspondence : I — 
 
 • " Correspondance In£dite," p. 214. f Ibid., p 217. 
 *} " Lettres Intimes," p. 205. 
 
HIS LIFE. 101 
 
 I burst with joy to make you hear my new work. It had an 
 enormous success. All the press — French, English, German, 
 Belgian — chants Hosannas in every key, and there are two 
 persons here mortified with rage. 
 
 The master's second wedded, life began and his auto- 
 biography ended almost simultaneously. On October 18, 
 1854, ne closed his memoirs with a paragraph so charac- 
 teristic of his intense emotionalism that it eminently deserves 
 translation here : — 
 
 I finish, thanking holy Germany, where the culture of art is 
 preserved in its purity; and thee, generous England; and thee, 
 Russia, which saved me ; and you, my good friends of France ; 
 and you, noble hearts and spirits of all nations whom I have met. 
 It was happiness for me to know you ; I preserve and shall faith- 
 fully cherish the dearest recollections of our intercourse. As for 
 you, maniacs, dogs, and stupid bulls ; as for you, my Guilden- 
 sterns, my Rosencrantzes, my Iagos, my little Osrics, serpents 
 and insects of all species, "farewell, my friends;" I despise you, 
 and I sincerely hope not to die till you are forgotten. 
 
 On January 1, 1865, Berlioz added a " postface " to his 
 autobiography. This, however, does not bridge the interval 
 of eleven years, and we must resort to the letters for informa- 
 tion as to much that has happened during that time. In 
 one of those addressed to Humbert, the master makes a 
 confession of his political faith :* — 
 
 You have quickly reassured me ; for myself, I am a thorough 
 Imperialist ; I shall never forget that our Emperor delivered us 
 from the dirty and stupid Republic. All civilised men ought to 
 remember that. He has the misfortune to be a barbarian in the. 
 matter of art, but of what kind? He is a barbarian-saviour; 
 and Nero was an artist. There are spirits of all colours. 
 
 On March 2, 1855, we find him writing from Paris to M. 
 Tajan-Rog6 stating that he had just returned from Weimar 
 and Gotha, where the public had embarrassed him with all 
 that which, in Europe, constitutes success. Some particulars 
 of the last concert given in the classic town of Goethe and 
 Schiller are decidedly interesting : — 
 
 I had a monster programme (" L'Enfance du Christ " — the 
 Symphonie Fantastique — " Le Retour a la Vie "). This last 
 work, which you do not know, and of which I wrote the words as 
 well as the niusic, is a lyric melodrama. The sole actor, who 
 
 • " Lettres Intimes," p. 266. 
 
102 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 plays the rdle of the artist, does so before the curtain, which is 
 lowered and conceals behind it an amphitheatre where the band, 
 chorus, and chief singers are placed. The pieces of music are 
 melodies and harmonies, heard by the artist in fancy alone 
 but by the audience in reality, a little dulled by the curtain 
 acting as a kind of " mute." I was recalled four times after this 
 work, which I wrote twenty-two years ago, when vagabondising 
 among the -woods of Italy. 
 
 The same letter contains an indication of his future 
 movements : — 
 
 I must stir myself during the eight days I am passing in Paris, 
 being engaged to give three concerts at Brussels from the 15th 
 to the 25th of this month. Then, on April 6, 1 must give another 
 here, at the Opera-Comique, with M. Perrin's united forces ; 
 organise the first performance of my " Te Deum," at St. 
 Eustache, on March 1 ; and then start for London, where I am 
 engaged by the New Philharmonic Society. 
 
 References appear in other letters to the ".Te Deum" of 
 which mention is here made. Addressing his friend, Morel, 
 Berlioz says : — 
 
 Behold me now plunged in the " Te Deum," and it is at such 
 a moment that your absence appears to me strange. 
 
 Again, to Richard Wagner :* — 
 
 I sincerely wish I were able to send you the scores for which 
 you do me the pleasure to ask ; unhappily, my publishers have 
 not given me any for a long time. But there are two, or even 
 three, the " Te. Deum," " L'Enfance du Christ," and " Lglio " 
 (lyric monodrama), which will be out in a few weeks, and those, 
 at least, I shall be in a position to send you. 
 
 Writing to his son on April 27, 1855, he says :t — 
 
 We had the first orchestral rehearsal [of the "TeDeum"] 
 yesterday at St. Eustache, with the six hundred children. To- 
 day I try the ensemble of my two hundred artist-choristers. The 
 thing goes well. It is colossal. . . . There is a finale grander 
 than the " Tuba mirum " of my Requiem. 
 
 The performance of this work duly took place, and Morel 
 wrote to Berlioz asking for particulars as to its character 
 and effect. The master replied, on June 2 :$ — 
 
 I will only say that the effect produced upon me was enormous, 
 and the same with my executants. In general, the unmeasured 
 
 * " Correspondance In£dite," p. 225. 
 t Ibid., p. 227. + Ibid., p. 228. 
 
HIS LIFE. 103 
 
 grandeur of plan and style has struck them prodigiously, and you 
 may believe that the " Tibi omnes " and the "Judea," in two 
 different- manners are Babylonian, Ninevitic pieces, which will 
 be found more powerful still when heard in' a place less large 
 arid sonorous than the church of St. Eustache. 
 
 He adds : — 
 
 On Wednesday I start for England. Wagner, who conducts 
 the Old Philharmonic Society in London (a post which I was 
 obliged to refuse through being engaged to the other), is beaten 
 down by the attacks of all the English press. But he remains 
 calm, they say, assured that in fifty years he will be. the master 
 of the musical world. 
 
 The English campaign proved satisfactory. On July 21 
 he wrote to Morel :* — 
 
 I have made a brilliant excursion to London, where I got on 
 better and better. I shall return there this winter, after a tour 
 I have projected in Bohemia and Austria, if we are not at war 
 with the Austrians. 
 
 This same year (1855) witnessed the production of a 
 Cantata, " L'lmperiale " written for performance at the 
 distribution of prizes in connection with the Paris Exhibi- 
 tion, and subsequently repeated several times to such good 
 purpose that the master received 8,000 francs as his share of 
 the proceeds. He owed this distinctly to Prince Napoleon,, 
 whose gracious treatment of him is handsomely acknowledged 
 in a letter containing the further expression: "The Emperor 
 detests music like ten Turks." Our master's account of the 
 performance of " L'lmperiale," as it appears in the " post- 
 face " of his memoirs, possesses a special interest : — 
 
 The Prince Napoleon had proposed to me to organise a vast 
 concert in the Exhibition Palace for the day on which the Em- 
 peror would make the solemn distribution of prizes. I accepted 
 this rough task, while declining pecuniary responsibility. A bold 
 and intelligent entrepreneur, M. Ber, presented himself. He 
 treated me generously, and this time the concerts (there were 
 several "after the official ceremony) brought me nearly 8,000 
 francs. I had placed in a raised gallery, behind the throne, 
 eleven hundred musicians, who, however, were very little heard. 
 On the day of the ceremony the musical effect was of such small 
 importance that in the middle of the first piece (the cantata 
 " L'Imp6riale," which I had written for the occasion) they obliged 
 me to stop the orchestra at the most interesting moment, because 
 
 * " Correspondence Ine'dite," p. 230. 
 
io4 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 the Prince had his speech to deliver, and the music lasted too 
 long. On the morrow the paying public were admitted, and we 
 received 75,000 francs. . . . That day the performance was not 
 interrupted, and I could light the match of my musical firework. 
 I had brought from Brussels a mechanician known to me, who 
 set up an electric metronome with five branches. By a simple 
 movement of a finger of my left hand, I was thus able to mark 
 the time to five different and widely sundered points in the vast 
 space occupied by the executants. Five sub-conductors received 
 my indications by the electric wires, and communicated them 
 to the sections over which they had control. The ensemble was 
 marvellous. Since then most lyric theatres have adopted the 
 electric metronome for the direction of choirs behind the scenes, 
 and when the chorus-masters can neither see the beat nor hear 
 the orchestra. 
 
 For several years from this time Berlioz abated the 
 frequency of his public demonstrations, and for the most 
 part remained in Paris quietly engaged upon "Les Troyens," 
 which he hoped would be his crowning work. In 1856 he 
 became a member of the Institute, taking the chair vacated 
 by the death of Adolphe Adam, and thus realising one of the 
 dreams of his life. " He organised, each year," says M. 
 Bertrand, "a festival at Baden, and there brought out his 
 ravishing opera ' Beatrice et Benedict ' ; the youth of the 
 town of Raab sent him a congratulatory address ; the artists 
 of the Paris Conservatoire made him an ovation a little while 
 after the production of ' Tannhauser ' ; the theatre at Bor- 
 deaux played his ' Rom6o et Juliette ' — this was all, or nearly 
 all." For the rest, he merely supervised the rehearsals of 
 " Alceste " at the Grand-Op6ra. We need not, however, 
 content ourselves with this bare outline of seven years' com- 
 parative calm, since the master's letters enable us to make 
 acquaintance with numerous and interesting details. 
 
 In 1856 Miss Dolby desired to give an orchestral concert 
 in Paris, and M. Sainton sought the counsel and co- 
 operation of Berlioz to that end. In reply he received 
 the following letter : — 
 
 19, Rue de Bourtault, January 16, 1856. 
 My dear Sainton, — At the end of this month I go to Germany, 
 and do not exactly know how long I shall remain there. More- 
 over, several propositions have been made to me for Belgium in 
 the month of March, and if the terms I have demanded for the 
 Belgian concerts be met I shall accept the offers. It is therefore 
 very probable that I shall not be in Paris during the month of 
 
HIS LIFE. ios 
 
 March. Save for that, you cannot doubt the pleasure I should 
 have had in putting myself entirely at Miss Dolby's disposal, 
 and in organising and directing her concert. I have received 
 much politeness and many marks of good-fellowship from 
 English artists, wherefore I should rejoice at the opportunity of 
 being useful (but without any terms whatever) to a person so 
 distinguished in all respects as Miss Dolby. I shall in any case 
 secure the Salle Herz for the Thursday following March 9. Here 
 is, almost exactly, the cost of a concert such as that Miss Dolby 
 desires to give: The hall, with lights, 300 francs; orchestra of 54 
 musiciaris, 800 francs ; bills and tickets, 250 francs ; droit des 
 pauvres, 100 francs ; care of instruments, 32 francs ; M. Goffier 
 or M. Belloni, organiser of the concert, 100 francs ; Tilmant, 
 conductor (the only one that I can advise you to take)— I know 
 not his terms. I doubt whether Prudent will play, and whether 
 the Director of the Opera will allow Roger to sing. But when 
 Miss Dolby is here to take measures herself she will obtain what 
 she desires more easily. As for you, my dear Sainton, no doubt 
 a great success awaits you, and your name will give much 
 attraction to Miss Dolby's programme.. Lefort is well enough 
 liked by the public. 
 
 I have given you the figure which the orchestra of my 
 concerts cost me ; among others, that which I give on the 25th 
 of this month (for a repetition). I do not know if Tilmant can 
 obtain at that price his Opera-Comique orchestra. That will be 
 perhaps a little dearer. . . . These, my dear Sainton, are all the 
 details that I can give you upon the sad subject of concerts in 
 Paris. I do not go to London this year. Beale has written to 
 say that we have no chance of success, owing to the Lind fever, 
 which makes all other musical enterprises impossible. I have 
 heard nothing about the Philharmonic in Hanover Square. 
 Whom have they engaged as conductor ? Tout a vous. 
 
 Hector Berlioz. 
 
 His passion for Gluck seems to have survived the lapse of 
 years. Writing to Theodore Ritter (January 12, 1856), he 
 says :* — 
 
 As for me, I shall never forget that your artistic instinct has, 
 without hesitation, recognised and adored with transport that, 
 for you, new genius. Yes, yes, depend upon it, whatever the 
 men of half-feeling and half-science, those who have only part 
 of a heart and a single brain lobe, may say, there are two great 
 superior gods in our art, Beethoven and Gluck. The one reigns 
 over the infinitude of thought, the other over the infinitude of 
 passion ; and though the first be strong above the second, there 
 • " Correspondance Infedite,'' p. 233. 
 
106 HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 is nevertheless so much of the one in the other that these two 
 Jupiters make but a single divinity, in whom our admiration and, 
 worship ought to be absorbed. 
 
 On May 23, 1856, we find the master writing to his friend 
 Morel, entreating his good offices for Louis Berlioz, who 
 desired to leave the imperial navy and enter the merchant 
 service. This letter contains also a reference to his state of 
 health, in which we may see the beginning of the end :* — 
 
 I am greatly occupied and, to tell the truth, very unwell, 
 without being able to discover what is the matter with me. • A 
 strange illness — I sleep in" the streets, &c. ; however, perhaps it 
 is the effect of the spring. 
 
 Further references to this malady will appear later; mean- 
 while let us hear the master as he discourses to various 
 correspondents on more cheerful themes. His aversion from 
 the fugued "Amen," so common in religious composition 
 and so well burlesqued in " La Damnation de Faust," led 
 him to speak very clearly to the Abbe Girod, who had written 
 a work on Church music :t — 
 
 No doubt one might write a good fugue of a religious character 
 to express the pious wish "Amen." But it ought to be slow, 
 full of feeling, and very short, because, however well one may 
 convey the sense of a word, that word cannot be, without ridi- 
 cule, repeated a great number of times. Instead of this reserve 
 and expressive purpose, fugues on the word "Amen" are all 
 rapid, violent, turbulent, and resemble nothing more than a 
 drinking chorus mixed up with peals of laughter, as each part 
 vocalises upon the first sellable, "a . a . a . a . men," which pro- 
 duces a most grotesque and indecent effect. These traditional 
 fugues are merely senseless blasphemies. 
 
 A letter to M. Bennet (January 26, 1857) contains any- 
 thing but a complimentary remark about Handel, whom the 
 writer styles a " barrel of pork and beer," but is chiefly 
 remarkable for a touching paragraph which permits us to 
 see how blank and bare life sometimes appeared to this 
 ardent and disappointed man :J — 
 
 It is well that my letter has reached its end. The pale sun- 
 light that illuminated my window when I began writing to you 
 has gone, and I feel cold at heart and see everything grey, and I 
 
 * " Correspondanca In£dite," p. 235. 
 I Ibid., p. 238. % Ibid., p. 247. 
 
HIS LIFE. 107 
 
 am about to stretch myself upon my couch, and there close the 
 eyes of spirit and body in order to see nothing, but to rest as 
 senseless as a tree without leaves dripping with rain. 
 
 The true spirit of the man blazes out, moreover, in the 
 subjoined extract from a letter to Hans von Biilow (January 
 20, 1858) :*— 
 
 Your faith, your ardour, your hatreds even, delight me. Like 
 you, I still have terrible hatreds and volcanic ardours ; but, as to 
 faith, I firmly believe that there is nothing true, nothing false, 
 nothing beautiful, nothing ugly. Don't believe a word of this ; 
 I libel myself. No, no, I more than ever adore that which I find 
 beautiful, and, to my mind, death involves nothing more cruel 
 than this : no longer to love, no longer to admire. It is true 
 that, when dead, one does not know that one no longer loves. 
 But a truce to philosophy — in other words, a truce to stupidities. 
 
 A propos to Dr. Biilow we find in a letter of the master to 
 his son (January 24, 1858) some observations having a 
 general as well as a personal interest, especially at this time 
 when a certain school of amateurs would number Berlioz 
 among its lights :t — 
 
 I received some days ago a long letter from M. de Biilow, one 
 of Liszt's sons-in-law, he who married Mdlle. Cosima. He in- 
 formed me that he had given a concert in Berlin at which were 
 performed with great success my overture to " Cellini " and the 
 little vocal piece " Le Jeune Patre Breton." This young-man is 
 one of the most fervent disciples of that senseless school known 
 in Germany as the school of the future. They will take no 
 denial, but absolutely insist that I am their chief and standard- 
 bearer. I say nothing, I write nothing, I simply let them alone: 
 men of sense will know how to discern what is the truth. 
 
 In this connection may fitly be cited some remarks upon 
 the production of "Tannhauser" at the Op6ra in 1861, 
 under Wagner's direction. Writing to his son (February 21), 
 Berlioz says :$ — 
 
 One cannot get rid of that " Tannhauser " music ; the last 
 general rehearsal was, I am told, atrocious, and lasted till one 
 o'clock in the morning. . . . Liszt is coming to uphold the 
 school of charivari. I shall not write the article on " Tann- 
 hauser," and have begged D'Ortigue to undertake the work. . . . 
 I have never had so many windmills to fight as this year ; I am 
 
 * " Correspondance Inedite," p. 252. 
 t Ibid., p. 258. J Ibid., p. 277. 
 
io8 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 surrounded with madmen of all kinds. There are moments when 
 rage suffocates me. 
 
 On March 5 he writes :* — 
 
 Our musical world is much agitated by the scandal which the 
 representation of " Tannhauser " will produce. I meet only with 
 men who are furious, and the Minister went away from rehearsal 
 the other day in a state of rage. The Emperor is not satisfied, 
 yet there are some genuine enthusiasts even among Frenchmen. 
 Wagner is evidently insane : he will die, as Jullien died last year, 
 in a transport of madness. Liszt has not come, and will not -be 
 at the first performance. He seems to anticipate a catastrophe. 
 As I have already said, I shall not write the article thereupon, 
 but leave it to D'Ortigue. I mean to protest by my silence, free 
 to pronounce later on if they push me to it. 
 
 The performance of Wagner's opera was noticed, in a 
 letter to Madame Massart (March 14), as follows :t — 
 
 Ah ! God of heaven, what a representation ! What shouts of 
 laughter ! The Parisian showed himself yesterday in a new light. 
 He laughed at a bad musical style, he laughed at the antics of 
 orchestral buffoonery, he laughed at the naivetes of an oboe ; and 
 he now understands that there is a style in music. As for the 
 horrors, they were splendidly hissed. 
 
 Subsequently Berlioz informed his son : — 
 
 The second representation of " Tannhauser " was worse than 
 the first. . . . The press is unanimous in exterminating him 
 [Wagner]. For myself, I am .cruelly avenged. 
 
 It is now time to turn from these desultory matters to 
 the last great achievements of our master's life — the compo- 
 sition and production of " Beatrice et Benedict " and " Les 
 Troyens." In the postface of his memoirs Berlioz says, 
 with regard to the first of these works, that it was written 
 "at the request" of M. Benazet for his theatre at Baden. 
 The letters, however, contain several references to " Beatrice 
 et Benedict " before the subjoined words appear (January 2, 
 1861):— 
 
 B6nazet is here. He has engaged me for Baden. I have 
 promised him my one-act (sic) opera for his new theatre now 
 building at Baden. 
 
 From this it would seem that the master laboured at the 
 smaller work without the stimulus of a " commission," and, 
 perhaps, as a relief from the ponderous weight of. the fiigger. 
 
 * " Correspondance InSdite," p. 278. f Ibid., p. 279. 
 
HIS LIFE. 109 
 
 In July of the same year he mentioned the work to Hum- 
 bert? as taken from Shakespeare's "Much Ado about 
 Nothing," adding, " It will prudently call itself ' Beatrice 
 and Benedict.' In any case, I answer that there is not . 
 ' much ado.' " But there was considerable ado at Baden, 
 where " Beatrice et Benedict" was produced under the com- 
 poser's direction on August 9, 1862. Of the performance 
 and its attendant circumstances Berlioz wrote to the same 
 intimate friend as follows (August 21, 1863) :t — 
 
 I have come from Baden, where my opera " Beatrice et 
 Benedict " has just obtained a great success. The French, 
 Belgian, and German press are unanimous in praising it. . . . 
 Unhappily, you were not there ; the evening would have re- 
 called to you that of " L'Enfance du Christ." The cabalists, 
 the insulters, remained in Paris. A great number of writers and 
 artists, however, made the journey. The performance, conducted 
 by myself, was excellent. . . . Will you believe it ? — I suffered so 
 much from my neuralgia that day that I took no interest in 
 anything ; and when I took my place before that public — Russian, 
 German, and French — to direct the first representation of an 
 opera, written, words and music, by myself, I did so without 
 feeling the least emotion ! A result of that curious coldness was 
 that I conducted better than usual. I was much more moved 
 on the second occasion. . . You would laugh if you could read 
 the stupid eulogies which criticism gives me. It was found out 
 that I possess melody ; that I can be joyous and even comic. 
 The history of the astonishment caused by " L'Enfance du 
 Christ " is repeating itself. Seeing that the brutal instruments 
 were not in the orchestra they discovered that I made no noise. 
 What patience would be necessary if I were not so indifferent ! 
 
 The initial success of the opera was followed up. At the 
 instance of the Grand Duchess, a German version was played 
 at Weimar some months later, with an equally gratifying 
 result to Berlioz, who conducted the first two performances, 
 and was overwhelmed with attentions. But all this did not 
 prevent the composer from making very considerable and 
 important changes in his work. As late as June, 1863, we 
 discover, from a remark in one of his letters, that he was 
 still amending it in view of its reproduction at Baden. 
 Upon "Les Troyens," however, he rested all his hopes. 
 The importance he attached to this work cannot be exag- 
 gerated. He intended it as his greatest, and seemed to feel 
 
 * " Lettres Intimes," p. 228. f Ibid., p. 235. 
 
no HECTOR BERLIOZ: 
 
 that it would prove his last, effort for the lyric stage. Hence 
 the continued references to "Les Troyens" in his letters, 
 and the minute details with regard to it in his postface. 
 Respecting the conception of the work, he says : — 
 
 Being in Weimar ... at the house of the Princess of Witt- 
 genstein ... I was brought to speak of my admiration for Virgil 
 and my idea of a grand opera on the Shakespeare model, having 
 the second and fourth books of the iEneid as its subject. I added 
 that I knew well what chagrins such a work would' necessarily 
 cause me, on account of which I could never attempt it. The 
 Princess replied, " From your passion for Shakespeare and your 
 love of the antique something grand and new should result. 
 Come, you must write this opera, this lyric poem, call it and 
 arrange it as you please. You must begin ft and finish it." As 
 I continued to excuse myself, " Listen to me," said the Princess 
 — " if you are frightened at the trouble it will and ought to cause 
 you, if you are feeble enough not to brave all for Dido and 
 Cassandra, never present yourself at my<house again ; I will see 
 you no more." 
 
 On this, Berlioz went back to Paris, and addressed him- 
 self to the great task, his. whole soul, as well as all his 
 hopes, being in it. For proof of this we need only turn to 
 the letters. He writes to Morel (May 23, 1856):* — 
 
 I have undertaken an opera in five acts, the whole of which I 
 write, words and music. I have reached the third act of the 
 poem, having- yesterday finished the second. This is between 
 ourselves. 
 
 To the same (September 9, 1856) :t — 
 
 I declare to you that the poem, which I have read to several 
 persons, is a very great success. I believe that you also will find 
 it good. 
 
 To M. Bennet (January 26, 1857) :% — 
 
 111 as I am, I push on. My score forms itself as stalactites 
 form themselves in damp grottos, and almost without my know- 
 ing it. At this moment I am finishing the instrumentation o 
 the monster finale of the first act, which up till now has, on 
 account of its dimensions, given me serious uneasiness. . . . 
 See how easily you draw me on to talk of my work. Ah! I'have 
 no illusions — no ; and you make me laugh with that old story 
 about a " mission to fulfil." What a missionary ! But there is 
 
 * " Correspondance Inedite," p. 236. 
 f Ibid,, p. 237. X Ibid., p. 240. 
 
HIS LIFE*. in 
 
 in me an inexplicable mechanism, which works in despite of 
 reasoning, and I let it work because I am not able to hinder it. 
 
 To Morel (April 25, 1857) :*— 
 
 In our little world my poem is at present making a success. I 
 have read it twice before two competent tribunals, one at M. 
 Edouard Bertin's, the other at my own house. They pronounced 
 it "good. At one of the Tuileries soirees lately, the Empress 
 spoke to me about it a good deal. Later I will go and read it to 
 their Majesties, if the Emperor has an hour to spare. 
 
 To Hans von Billow (January 20, 1858) :t — 
 You have no true idea, my dear Billow, of the flux and reflux 
 of contrary feelings which have agitated me since I began this 
 work. At one time it is a passion, a joy, an emotion worthy of 
 an artist of twenty years. Then it is a disgust, a coldness, a 
 repulsion from my task which frightens me. I never doubt. I 
 believe, and I cease to believe ; then I rebelieve, and as the up- 
 shot I continue to roll my rock. Another great effort, and we 
 shall arrive at the summit of the mountain, the one bearing the 
 other. 
 
 These quotations, which might be extended to great length, 
 show how "Les Troyens "possessed our master's mind during 
 the three years and a half occupied in its composition. At 
 last the work was finished, and Berlioz then took the bold 
 step of writing a letter to the Emperor asking permission to 
 read the poem at court. He was dissuaded by M. de Moray- 
 from sending it, but on one occasion, when at the palace, he 
 ventured to address Napoleon III., and obtained permission 
 to forward the book for imperial inspection. Berlioz soon 
 learned the wisdom of the counsel "Put not not your trust in 
 princes." The Emperor never read the poem, and, although 
 the Minister of State spoke fair words, nothing was done. In 
 a letter to Humbert (November 19, 1858) Berlioz describes 
 one of his interviews with the Minister (Walewski) :% — 
 
 Yesterday I went to the Ministry of State and the hurssier of 
 the Minister introduced me without a letter of audience when he 
 saw on my card " Membre de l'Institut." ... I spoke to him 
 about the "Troyens," and of the hostile part taken by the 
 director of the Opera against that work, of which he knows not 
 a line or a note. His Excellency said to me a lot of ambiguous 
 things. " Certainly— your great reputation gives you rights, 
 arid well justifies pretensions. But a grand opera in five acts !- 
 
 f Ibid., p. 255. 
 . 213. 
 
 • " Correspondarice InSdite," p. 242. 
 I " Lettres Intimes," p. : 
 
H2 HECTOR BERLIOZ i 
 
 It is a terrible responsibility for a director ! I will see ; I have 
 already heard your work spoken about." " But, Monsieur le 
 Ministre, it is possible to mount the ' Troyens ' neither this 
 year nor next : the theatre of the Opera is not in a condition to 
 undertake such an enterprise — you have not the necessary 
 material. The actual Opera is incapable of such an effort." 
 " However, in general, one should write for the means which one 
 has. I will consider what can be done." 
 
 Berlioz believed that he had the Emperor on his side, but 
 Napoleon III. always made up his mind with difficulty and 
 "he loved music too little to intervene directly and energetic- 
 ally." At length, by force of accumulated interest, " Les 
 Troyens "was formally accepted for the Opera, immediately 
 upon which another difficulty arose. Count Walewski, whOj 
 as Minister of State, could sanction or decline the expenditure 
 necessary for the mise en scene, took offence at the composer's 
 refusal to superintend the preparation of Gluck's " Alceste" 
 on account of the alterations necessary to suit the voice of 
 Madame Viardot. This obstacle was eventually removed by 
 a sort of compromise, and then Berlioz, after being required 
 to make some changes in his work, had to wait his turn 
 with Gounod and Gevaert before him. How severely his 
 patience suffered appears from a reply he made to the 
 Empress, when her Majesty once asked the probable time 
 of producing " Les Troyens " — " I do not know much, 
 "madame, but it dawns upon me that one must live a 
 hundred years in order to be played at the Op£ra." In 
 February, 1862, we find him writing that Walewski, pleased 
 with the work he had done on "'Alceste,." had ordered the 
 director, Royer, to put " Les Troyens " on the stage im- 
 mediately after Gevaert's opera. In March of the following 
 year, therefore, the master hoped to see the great day 
 arrive. Yet in February he wrote to Humbert without 
 explanation : — 
 
 I have definitely broken with the Opera for " Les Troyens," 
 and accepted the propositions of the director of the Lyrique 
 (Carvalho). He is engaged at this moment in makingup the 
 company, orchestra and chorus. The rehearsals will begin in 
 May next, so that the work may be performed in December. 
 
 Owing to various hindrances, June arrived before Berlioz 
 had "read" his work to the artists, by which time, more- 
 over, he had found it necessary to play the last three acts 
 only (" Les Troyens a Carthage "), dividing them into five 
 
HIS LIFE. 
 
 113 
 
 and introducing them by a prologue specially written. At 
 length, on November 4, 1863, the first performance took 
 place, and on the following day the master wrote to 
 Humbert : — 
 
 Magnificent success ; profound emotion of the public"; tears, 
 unceasing applause, and one hiss when my name was announced 
 at the end. 
 
 But the " magnificent success " of this sanguine and 
 impassioned spirit soon dwindled down till there was hardly 
 anything left for the opera but the interest which sarcasm 
 and ridicule kept alive. As for the critics, many of whom 
 had felt the composer's keen lash, some of them treated" 
 "Les Troyens" with more passion than justice. Berlioz, 
 ■however, had his compensations. Letters poured in upon 
 him; strangers stopped him in the street to shake his hand, 
 and, although Carvalho cut the opera remorselessly after its 
 initial performance, " Les Troyens a Carthage " ran for 
 twenty-one nights. It should be added that for twenty- 
 two days Berlioz was confined to his room by an access 
 of his nervous malady, brought on through the worry of 
 rehearsal. In this condition he wrote to M. Alexis Lwoff, 
 who had spoken to him about another opera : — 
 
 I thank you for the offer you have been good enough to make 
 me of. a subject for an opera, but I cannot accept it, my intention 
 being decided to write no more. I have still three scores which 
 the Parisians do not know, and I shall never find circumstances 
 favourable enough to make them known. " Les Troyens " was 
 finished four years ago, and only the second part, " Les Troyens 
 a Carthage," has been represented. There remains to produce 
 " La Prise de Troie." I will never write again save for a theatre 
 where I am blindly obeyed without remark — where I am the 
 absolute master. And that will probably never be met with. 
 
 The bitterness of the composer's spirit is but slightly 
 shown here. That only a part of his great opera should be 
 performed, and performed indifferently, amid the sneers of 
 enemies and the careless jokes of a public incapable of appre- 
 ciating a great purpose, was a mortal blow. It struck him 
 to the heart, and we do not wonder that he wrote some time 
 after : — 
 
 I am in my sixty-first year ; I have no more hopes, or illusions, 
 or vast conceptions ; my son is nearly always far from me ; I am 
 alone ; my contempt for the imbecility and untruth of men, my 
 hatred of their atrocious ferocity, have grown to a head, and hour 
 
 I 
 
n 4 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 by hour I say to Death : " When thou wilt." What, then, is he 
 waiting for ? 
 
 Although the fate of " Les Troyens a Carthage " pro- 
 foundly disappointed Berlioz, twenty-one representations 
 put him in a position to snap the chains which bound him 
 to the Debats and its hated feuilletons. At this the master 
 rejoiced with joy inexpressible. As we have seen, he always 
 detested the journalist's work, for which, indeed, he was in 
 some important respects unfitted, and now he threw away 
 the critical pen with a wild shriek of liberty. Hear him : — 
 
 At last ! at last ! at last ! After thirty years of bondage, I am 
 free ! I have no more feuilletons to write, no more platitudes to 
 justify, no more mediocrities to praise, no more indignation to 
 repress, no moijs deceptions, no more comedies, no more cowardly, 
 complaisance. I am free ! I am no longer obliged to enter 
 opera-houses, or to speak of them, or to hear them spoken of. . . . 
 Gloria in excelsis Deo, et in terra pax hominibus voluntatis ! ! 
 
 Referring to the same subject in a letter, he says : * — 
 ' I have left the Journal des D&bats. Nothing can be more 
 comical than the disappointment and wrath of the men who, for 
 three months, have been paying court to me. They have lost 
 their trouble, they are robbed, &c. 
 
 Berlioz thoroughly enjoyed his freedom. 
 
 I have not put my foot inside a lyric theatre for two months. 
 I have seen neither " Moi'se " nor " La Fianc6e du Roi de Garbe," 
 nor the marvels of the Italiens, nor the new ballet, nor anything. 
 
 But with leisure came ennui, heightened by the lassitude 
 attendant upon disease.. In truth Berlioz was at this time 
 an object of pity. His second wife had followed Henrietta 
 Smithson to the grave, dying suddenly of heart-rupture ; and 
 perhaps there is not in all literature a more terrible de- 
 scription than that given by the master of the scene at 
 Montmartre, when the remains of the Irish actress were 
 disinterred in order to be placed in a family grave purchased 
 for and presented to Berlioz by his friend, M. Alexandre, 
 the manufacturer of harmoniums. We forbear to reproduce 
 a picture that could only have been drawn at a moment of 
 morbid excess. It would shock the most callous reader. 
 Enough that Berlioz saw his wives laid in the same tomb, 
 and remarked that they rested tranquilly, awaiting the hour 
 when he should join them. 
 
 * " Correspondance In£dite," p. 306. 
 
HIS LIFE., 115 
 
 In August, 1864, the' master, a chevalier of the Legion of 
 Honour since 1839, was created an officer of that order, and 
 shortly after, being unable to bear longer the solitude of a 
 city from which all his friends had temporarily departed, he 
 set out for his native South. The expedition may have been 
 vaguely entered upon, but was soon controlled by a purpose 
 of the most characteristic description — none other than that 
 of seeking out the lady (Estelle Gautier) to whom, as a boy, 
 he had been warmly attached, and who was indeed his first 
 love. Some years earlier he had endeavoured to renew 
 the acquaintance at Meylan ; but the lady, now known as 
 Madame F., discouraged his advances, acting throughout 
 with great judgment and feeling. Free once more, and in 
 the neighbourhood of her new residence (Lyons), Berlioz 
 resolved upon another effort. At Lyons, therefore, he wrote, 
 begging an interview, and delivered the letter himself, wait- 
 ing at the door for an answer. The reply being favourable, 
 our master soon stood in the presence of his early love, who 
 received him with a " sweet dignity," holding the letter, 
 apparently unread, in her hand : — 
 
 She. We are old acquaintances, M. Berlioz ! . . . [Silence.) 
 We were two children ! . . . (Silence.) 
 
 He. Will you read my letter, Madame ? It will explain to you 
 my visit. 
 
 (Madame F. reads the letter, and places it on the mantelshelf.) 
 
 She. So you have been again to Meylan ; but, no doubt, it 
 was by accident that you were there? You have not travelled 
 expressly ? 
 
 He. Oh ! madame, can you think that ? Do I want an acci- 
 dent to see again . . . ? No, no, I had long desired to return. 
 (Silence.) 
 
 She. You have had a very exciting life, M. Berlioz. 
 
 He. How do you know that, madame ? 
 
 She. I have read your biography. 
 
 He. Which? 
 
 She. A volume by M6ro I think. I bought it some years ago. 
 
 He. Oh ! do not attribute to M6ro, one of my friends, an artist, 
 and a man of esprit, that collection of fables and absurdities, the 
 true author of which I suspect. I shall have a genuine biography 
 — that which I have written myself. 
 
 She. Oh ! no doubt. You write so well. 
 
 He. It is not the worth of my style to which I made reference, 
 madame, but to the truth and sincerity of my story. As for my 
 sentiments towards you, I have spoken without restraint in that 
 book, but without naming you. (Silence.) 
 
 12, 
 
n6 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 She. I have obtained also some particulars respecting you from 
 one of your friends, who married a niece of my husband. 
 ***** 
 
 She. As for my life, it has been very simple and very sad. I 
 have lost several of my children ; I have brought up others. My 
 husband died when they were still young. I am much touched 
 by, and very thankful for, the sentiments you have preserved to- 
 wards me. 
 
 He. Give me your hand, madame. 
 
 Profoundly agitated, Berlioz kissed the hand extended to 
 him and left the house, to walk about the streets of Lyons as 
 feverishly as he had roamed those of Paris when smitten with 
 his Ophelia. Doing so, he met M. Strakosch, the brother-in- 
 law and then manager of Mdlle. Adelina Patti, from whom 
 he received and conditionally accepted an invitation to dine, 
 in the evening, with the prima donna. This, however, - did 
 not abate the fever raging in his blood. He could neither 
 read, write, nor sit still. His legs took him mechanically 
 to the neighbourhood of Madame F.'s house, and, when 
 there, he bethought him to invite her to share his box at the 
 opera. But the lady was out. He went again, and met her 
 on the stairs, in company with two German friends. She 
 had a letter of polite refusal in her hand, and was on her 
 road to the master's hotel. Again despair for Berlioz, but 
 he carried off the letter, accounting it an " inestimable trea- 
 sure." Then he went to dine with Patti, and "the ravishing 
 diva, according to her custom, ran and offered to my lips her 
 virginal forehead." More, she accompanied him to the rail- 
 way station, with her brother-in-law, and there flung herself 
 upon his neck and embraced him. But what was all this to 
 the mature lover of a mature woman ? 
 
 How much would I have given to receive these marks of 
 affection from Madame F., and to be treated with cold politeness 
 by Mdlle. Patti? During all the prattling of that melodious 
 Hebe, it seemed to me that a marvellous bird with diamond 
 eyes fluttered about my head, perching on my shoulder, thrusting 
 its beak in my hair, and, with fluttering wings, singing the most 
 joyous of songs. I was ravished, but not moved. . . . The aged 
 woman, sad and obscure, to whom art was unknown, possessed 
 my soul, as she did formerly, and as she will to my dying day. 
 
 Paris, whither he now returned, could not, any more than 
 Patti, charm away the master's agitation. His thoughts re- 
 mained with Madame F., and to her he wrote (September 26, 
 
HIS LIFE. 117 
 
 1864) a passionate letter, from which the subjoined is an 
 extract : — 
 
 Oh ! madame, tnadame, I have only one object in this world — 
 to gain your affection. Let me try to win it. I will be sub- 
 missive and reserved ; our correspondence shall be as infrequent 
 as you desire, and it need never become to you a fatiguing task : 
 a few lines from your hand will suffice. My visits to you can 
 be but rare, but I shall know that our thoughts are no longer 
 separated, and that, after so many sad years, during which I 
 have been nothing to you, I have at- last the hope of becoming 
 your friend. And. a friend so devoted as I shall be is rare. I 
 will surround you with tenderness so profound and so sweet, 
 and with an affection so perfect, as that the feelings of the man 
 may be mistaken for the naive emotions of a child. Perhaps you 
 will find in this a charm ; perhaps at last you will say to me 
 *' I am your friend." 
 
 Madame F. promptly replied with, as she expressed it, her 
 hand upon her heart, and in terms that inspire the most 
 profound respect. Her letter was, in fact, a touching appeal 
 to be let alone, such as even Berlioz, with all his strange 
 passion, could not have read unmoved. A short extract will 
 suffice as an indication of its character : — 
 
 I am nothing but an old, very old woman (for, monsieur, I 
 am six years your senior), with a heart .shattered by days passed 
 in anguish, with physical and moral pains of all kinds, which 
 leave to me, as regards the joys and feelings of this life, no more 
 illusions. I lost my best friend twenty years ago, and since then 
 I have not sought another. . . . Since the fatal hour when I 
 became a widow, I have broken all ties, and said adieu to 
 pleasures and distractions in order to devote myself entirely to 
 my home and my children. This has been my life for twenty 
 years. It is to me a habit the charm of which nothing can 
 destroy ; for in that heart-intimacy I find the only peace possible 
 during the days I have yet to pass on earth. 
 
 This pitiful entreaty had not the desired effect. Berlioz 
 returned to the charge, professing to be satisfied with the 
 assurance of " affectionate sentiments," but asking for the 
 lady's address in Geneva, whither she was about to re- 
 move : — 
 
 But your address! Your address! As soon as you know it 
 yourself, send it to me, for mercy's sake. If your silence 
 indicates a pitiless refusal and a formal, purpose to interdict 
 the most distant relation between us ; if you thus put me rudely 
 
n8 HECTOR BERLIOZ . 
 
 on one side, as one does dangerous or unworthy creatures, you 
 will bring to a climax unhappiness which it would have been so 
 easy for you to assuage. Then, madame, may God and your 
 conscience pardon you ! I shall remain in the cold night, where 
 you will have plunged me, suffering and desolate. 
 
 The answer was a short note promising the address, and 
 subsequently one or two letters passed, announcing, on 
 Madame F.'s part, the marriage of her son, but containing, 
 on the part of Berlioz, passionate acknowledgments of some- 
 thing lying behind this act of ordinary politeness. Presently 
 the bride and bridegroom called on the master in Paris, and 
 received from him so much attention that the mother's 
 heart was touched, and the correspondence continued : calm, 
 friendship on the one side ; on the other, passion not always 
 restrained. So it remained ; but almost the last words in 
 the master's memoirs are words of hope for more intimate 
 relations : — 
 
 Little by little, perhaps, despite her fear of new friendships, 
 she will find her affectionate sentiments growing slowly. Already 
 I am able to appreciate an amelioration of my life. The past 
 has not entirely passed. My heaven is not yet empty. With 
 an expectant eye I contemplate my star that, in the distance, 
 appears to smile upon me. 
 
 From the tone of his letters, it appears that Berlioz soon 
 lost the comfort that had come to him thus. We see again 
 the poor nervous, disappointed, broken-down man, shutting 
 himself up in his room in Paris, refusing solace, and railing 
 at the world. To Madame Ernst he writes :* — 
 
 I am passing one of those days when I wish that the world 
 were a bomb full of powder, to which I might put a light for 
 amusement. 
 
 He had many such days, and, like Job among the ashes, 
 refused to be comforted. From time to time, moreover, his 
 son was a cause of renewed trouble. In 1865 Louis wished 
 to marry without adequate means, and his father wrote :t — 
 
 Thou art thirty-two, and at that age a man ought to know the 
 realities of life or he will never know them. Thou needest money, 
 and it is not I who am able to give thee any. I have enough to 
 make both ends meet, and that is all. I was like thee when I 
 married thy mother, but with more to complain of, since I had 
 not the salary thou hast, and my parents, with whom I had 
 
 * " Correspondance In£dite,'' p. 311. •)■ Ibid., p. 317. 
 
HIS LIFE. 119 
 
 broken, would give me nothing. I will leave thee that which my 
 father left me, and something more ; but I cannot tell thee when 
 I shall die. . . . Believe that if, at this moment, thou wert married 
 and hadst children, thou wouldst be a hundred times more unhappy 
 than thou art. Profit as much as thou canst by my example. It 
 was a series of miracles (Paganini's present, my Russian tour, 
 &c.) which took me out of the most horrible misery. But miracles 
 are rare, or, indeed, they would be miracles no longer.. To live 
 alone, money is needed ; to live with a wife requires three times 
 more; to live with a wife and family requires eight times more. 
 That is as certain as that two and two make four. 
 
 In August, 1865, Berlioz travelled to Geneva, in hope of 
 Seeing Madame F., and was kindly received by that lady 
 and her family, who, however, acted with discretion. Here- 
 upon the master wrote to a friend :■ — 
 
 I have not for one instant found myself alone with her : I have 
 only been able to speak of other things; and that gives me an 
 agitation ofthe heart which kills me. What can I do ? I have 
 not the shadow of a reason ; I am unjust, stupid. ... I tremble 
 even now in thinking of the moment when I must go away. The 
 country is charming: the lake is very pure, beautiful and pro- 
 found ; but I know something more profound still, more pure, and 
 more beautiful. 
 
 All this while the health of Berlioz was in a wretched 
 state, and his letters contain frequent reference to nervous 
 sufferings. His feelings on musical subjects remained, 
 nevertheless, as strong as ever, and he was as ready as ever 
 to express them. A propos, a letter addressed (December 1, 
 1865) to M. Asger Hamerick— a young Norwegian com- 
 poser, with whom he had been intimate in Paris — deserves 
 quotation : — 
 
 Your musical passion touches me deeply, and although I no 
 longer interest myself in art, so much is it insulted by our 
 horrible world, I cannot see without warm sympathy a young 
 artist having noble illusions such as yours. You remind me of 
 what I was forty years ago, especially by your ardent love 
 of music, your belief in the beautiful, your energetic will, and 
 your indomitable perseverance. Live, believe, loyey and work. 
 Despise the vulgar, but act as though you despised them not, 
 leaving them to believe that you are of their friends, of then- 
 flatterers even. They are so stupid that they will not doubt you. 
 Then, when you have become strong, powerful, a master, and 
 they see themselves subdued, they will applaud you, crying, " I 
 always said so." I am continually tortured by my neuralgia. . . . 
 
120 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 Death is very slow, the capricious old fellow ! They perform 
 some parts of my symphony " Romfio et Juliette" at the next 
 concert of the Conservatoire. How will the insolent and idiotic 
 public receive them ? 
 
 In September, 1866, Berlioz was engaged at the OpeYa, 
 superintending the studies of Gluck's " Alceste," and in 
 December of the same year we find him in Vienna, whence 
 he writes to M. Reyer:* — 
 
 " La Damnation de Faust " was performed yesterday in the 
 vast hall of the Redoute, before an immense audience, and with 
 astonishing success. To tell you of the recalls, encores, tears, 
 flowers, and applause of that matinie would be ridiculous on my 
 part. . . . To-morrow I am invited by the Conservatoire, who 
 wish me to hear my " Harold " Symphony, under the direction 
 of Helmesberger. What can I say to you ? It is the greatest 
 musical joy of my life, and you must pardon me if I dwell upon 
 it so long. 
 
 On returning to Paris, the master formed plans for other 
 tours, ill as he was, and often obliged to keep his bed. He 
 made arrangements with Ferdinand Hiller to conduct a 
 concert at Cologne, observing in his letter :t — 
 
 I shall go to the Royal Hotel, where I have several times 
 stayed. I shall thus be more free to rest in bed as long as I 
 please, for I am one of the most bedridden men alive. It is true 
 that I live very little. Despite the musical delights of my stay 
 in Vienna, the journey thither and the numerous rehearsals 
 which I found necessary almost killed me. 
 
 In a subsequent letter to Hiller we read :%— 
 
 You speak like the doctors. " 'Tis neuralgia In like 
 
 manner, when Madame Sand spoke to her gardener about a 
 wall that had given way, she was answered. " Oh ! that's 
 nothing, madame : the frost has caused it." " Yes, but we 
 must rebuild it." ■ " Oh ! it's nothing ; it's the frost." " I don't 
 deny that, but the wall fs down." " Don't torment yourself, 
 madame ; 'tis the frost." 
 
 Scarcely had the master returned to Paris before fate 
 struck a hard and cruel blow at what was left to him of 
 happiness and life. On June 30 he wrote to Humbert :§ — 
 
 A terrible sorrow has fallen upon me. My poor son, the 
 
 * " Correspondance Inddite," p. 334. f Ibid., p. 336. J Ibid., p. 337. 
 § " Lettres Intimes," p. 306. 
 
HIS LIFE. 121 
 
 captain of a large ship at thirty-three years, has died at 
 Havannah. 
 
 In July he 'again addressed his " dear incomparable 
 friend," revealing to us in touching language the keenness 
 of his mental and bodily sufferings :* — 
 
 I write to you a few words as you desire, but do wrong to make 
 you sad. I suffer so much from the return of my intestinal neu- 
 ralgia that it is as much as I am able to keep alive. I have hardly 
 the necessary intelligence to busy myself with the affairs of my 
 poor Louis. . . . One of his friends, happily, assists me in that. 
 Thanks for your letter, which did me good this morning. Suffer- 
 ings absorb all. You will pardon me ; I well know how stupid 
 I am. I care only for sleep. 
 
 In September, 1867, Berlioz went to Nens for bathing, 
 He took five baths, and at the fifth the doctor, hearing him 
 speak, felt his pulse, saying, " Go away at once ; the waters 
 are not good for you. You are about to have laryngitis, 
 and you must go to a place where care can be taken of your 
 throat. It is no light thing." The master started the same 
 evening for Vienne, and put himself in charge of some 
 relatives there, remaining nearly always in bed. Thence he 
 wrote : — 
 
 At last my natural voice has, in part, come back ; the throat 
 affection has gone, but my neuralgia has returned more ferocious 
 than ever. 
 
 On his return to Paris, the Grand Duchess Helena of 
 Russia, always an admirer of Berlioz' music, -invited him to 
 St. Petersburg to conduct six concerts, promising to pay all 
 expenses,, lodge him at the Michael Palace, and pay him 
 15,000 francs. - So good an offer was not to be lost, even by 
 a man with one foot in the grave ; and on November 15 the 
 master started for the northern capital, previously declining 
 the proposition of an American, who wished to engage him 
 for the United States the next year, at a charge of 100,000 
 francs. Of his fortune in Russia we gather something from 
 a letter addressed (December 15, 1867) to M. Edouard 
 Alexandre :t — 
 
 I am overwhelmed with attentions, from the Grand Duchess 
 to the least member of the orchestra. . . . The public and the 
 press show extreme ardour. At the second concert I was recalled 
 six times after the Symphonie Fantastique, which was executed 
 
 » " Lettres Intimes," p. 306. f " Correspondance Inedite," p. 342. 
 
i22 HECTOR BERLIOZ : 
 
 in an astonishing manner, the fourth movement being encored. 
 What an orchestra ! What precision ! What an ensemble ! I 
 do not know if Beethoven ever heard his music performed in 
 such a way. I am bound to tell you that, despite my sufferings, 
 when I reached my desk and saw myself surrounded by so 
 sympathetic a throng, I felt reanimated, and conducted, perhaps, 
 as never before. 
 
 Writing later to Madame Massart, he said :* — 
 
 They have come from Moscow to seek me, and I shall go 
 there after the fifth concert here, the Grand Duchess having 
 given permission. Those- people of the mezzo-Asiatic capital 
 have irresistible arguments. 
 
 Berlioz was in Moscow on the last day of the year, and 
 thence wrote to his friend Damcke :t — 
 
 I have accepted an engagement to conduct two concerts. Not 
 finding a hall large enough for the first, they resolved to give it 
 in the Riding School, a place as large as the central hall of the 
 Palais d'Industrie in. the Champs Elysees. The idea, which 
 seemed to me foolish, has resulted in the most incredible success. 
 There were five hundred executants and, according to the police, 
 twelve thousand five hundred auditors. I will not attempt to 
 describe to you the applause for the Fete in " Rom6o et Juliette " 
 and the Offertory of the " Requiem." I experienced mortal 
 anguish when this last piece — which they would have on account 
 of its effect at St. Petersburg — began. In hearing that choir of " 
 three hundred voices always repeating its two notes, I pictured 
 to myself the crowd becoming bored, and I feared that they 
 would not allow me to finish. But the audience understood my 
 idea ; attention was redoubled ; the expression of resigned 
 humility had seized them. At the last bar, immense acclamation 
 burst from all parts, and I was four times recalled. This was 
 the grandest impression that I had produced in my life. 
 
 On returning to St. Petersburg, Berlioz appears to haye 
 suffered much from the climate, and felt a longing for the 
 day when he should set out for Paris. In a letter to Madame 
 Massart we read :% — 
 
 After having seen you in Paris, I will go to St. Symphorien 
 and thence to Monaco, to bathe myself in the violets and sleep 
 in the sun. I suffer so much, dear madame, and my troubles 
 are so constant that I know not what will happen. I would not 
 die, however ; I have wherewith to live. 
 
 * " Correspondance In£dite," p. 345. 
 f Ibid., p. 346. { Ibid., p. 349. 
 
HIS LIFE. 123 
 
 Nevertheless, sentence of death was passed upon Berlioz 
 soon after his return to Paris. The^ reaction from his 
 Russian excitement was terrible, and at last he was per- 
 suaded to consult Dr. Nelaton, who, after examining him, 
 said, "Are you a philosopher?" "Yes." "Well, call to 
 your aid the courage of philosophy, for you will never be 
 cured." Accepting this as a decree of fate, Berlioz turned 
 again towards his beloved south — towards the flowers and 
 the sun. Even there, dying as he was, a harsh fate pursued 
 him. For a little while something of youthful animation 
 filled his soul. The glorious scenery, the blue waters of the 
 tideless sea, recollections of former days spent amid the same 
 surroundings, made the mind of the master young again, 
 and he essayed to wander once more amongst the rocks and 
 terraces, regardless of a feeble body. Let the consequences 
 be told in his own words :* — 
 
 I went to Monaco to seek the sun, and, three days after my 
 arrival, I walked among the rocks running down to the sea, and 
 was cruelly punished for my temerity. I fell among the stones, 
 head first, upon my face, and lost much blood ; so much that I 
 remained alone stretched upon the earth, and was not able to 
 return to the hotel, all bloody, till a long time after. I had taken 
 a place in the omnibus for Nice, and resolved, nevertheless, to go 
 on the morrow. I set out, and, scarcely arrived, wished to behold 
 again the terrace on the border of the sei, of which' I had always 
 cherished a lively remembrance. I went there ; I could not com- 
 mand a good view of the water ; I desired to change my seat for 
 a better one ; I rose, and in about three paces fell again on my 
 face and my blood poured out. Two young men who passed 
 raised me with difficulty, and conducted me to the H6tel des 
 Etrangers, hard by, where I lived. They undressed me, and put 
 me to bed, and there I remained eight days without seeing either 
 a doctor or anybody save the domestics.. Ah ! ma foil I can 
 write no more. To-morrow — I have no more strength. Bonsoir. 
 After eight days' retirement, I felt a little better, and, with my 
 face all knocked about, I took the train for Paris. My mother-in- 
 law and my servant cried out on seeing me. This time I went to 
 a doctor, and he treated me so well that after a month and some 
 days I could walk a little by holding on to the furniture. 
 
 A month later (May, 1868) he writes to Morel, excusing 
 himself for not doing so earlier :t — 
 
 My two falls, one at Monaco, the other at Nice, have taken 
 
 • " Correspondance Inddite," p. 351. f Ibid., p. 353. 
 
124 HECTQR BERLIOZ. 
 
 away all my strength. At present the marks are nearly effaced, 
 but my malady has returned, and I suffer more than ever; I have 
 only cruel things to write to you. 
 
 Shortly afterwards Berlioz made his last journey — this 
 time to Grenoble, for the purpose of assisting at an Or- 
 ph6onic Festival. Thenceforward the sands of his life 
 rapidly ran out, and on the morning of Monday, March 8, 
 1869, his troubled spirit passed away. 
 
 The master's obsequies were celebrated at the Church of 
 the Trinity on the Thursday following, with much solemnity. 
 The Institute sent a deputation ; the pall-bearers were 
 Doucet, Guillaume, Ambroise Thomas, Gounod, Saint- 
 Laurens, Perrin, and Baron Taylor; and the band of the 
 National Guard played selections from the Symphony in 
 honour of the victims of July. Upon the coffin were the 
 crowns given by the Cecilian Society, the Hungarian youth, 
 the Russian nobility, and the final laurels of Grenoble. So 
 the body of Hector Berlioz passed to its rest in the tomb of 
 his Ophelia ; he himself supplying an epitaph — the words 
 with which he began and ended his memoirs : — ■ 
 
 Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player 
 That struts and frets his hour upon the stage 
 And then is heard no more ; it is a tale 
 Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, 
 Signifying nothing. 
 
 His friends may have mourned for themselves, but hardly 
 for him. Surely if ever a man needed rest it was this man, 
 tried and torn ; always at the mercy of life's tempests. 
 Time after time he had called for death, for of the world his 
 too sensitive soul was a-weary ; and, when death came, no 
 doubt he found it — 
 
 A quiet haven, where his shattered bark 
 Harbours secure till the rough storm is past. 
 Perhaps a passage, overhung with clouds 
 But at its entrance ; a few leagues beyond 
 Opening to kinder skies and milder suns, 
 And seas pacific as the souls that seek them. 
 
HECTOR BERLIOZ. 
 
 CATALOGUE OF HIS WORKS.* 
 
 -Op. I. Ouverture de " Waverley." 
 
 Op. 2. Irlande. Neuf melodies pour une et deux voix sur des traductions de 
 
 Thomas Moore. 
 Op. 3. Ouverture des " Francs Juges." 
 Op. 4. Ouverture du " Roi Lear." 
 Op. 5. " Grande Messe des Morts" (Requiem). 
 Op. 6. " Le.5 Mai." Chant sur la mort de l'Empereur Napoleon pour voix de 
 
 basse avec chceurs et orchestre. 
 Op. 7. " Les Nuits d'EteV' Six melodies pour une voix avec orchestre ou piano. 
 Op. 8. " Reverie et Caprice." Romance pour le violon avec orchestre ou piano. 
 Op. 9. " Le Carnaval Romain." Ouverture caracteristique. 
 Op. 10. Grand traite' d'instrumentation et d'orchestration modernes, avec 
 
 supplement, " Le Chef d'Orchestre." 
 Op. 11. " Sarah la Baigneuse." Ballade a trois choeurs avec orchestre. 
 Op. 12. " La Captive." Reverie pour mezzo-soprano avec orchestre. 
 Op. 13. " Fleurs des Landes." Cinq melodies pour une voix avec piano. 
 Op. 14. " Episode de la Vie d'un Artiste." Symphonie fantastique en cinq 
 
 parties. 
 Op. 14 bis. " Lelio, ou le Retour a la Vie." Monodrame lyrique, 2e partie de 
 
 l'episode. 
 Op. 15. Grande symphonie funebre et triomphale pour grande harmonie 
 
 militaire avec un orchestre d'instruments a cordes et un chceur ad libit. 
 Op. 16. " Harold en Italic" Symphonie en quatre parties avec un alto principal. 
 Op. 17. " Romeo et Juliette." Symphonie dramatique avec chceurs, solos de 
 
 chant, et prologue en recitatif choral. 
 Op. 18. " Tristia." Trois chceurs avec orchestre. (" Meditation Religieuse," 
 
 "Ballade sur la Mort d'Ophglie," " Marche Funebre.") 
 Op. ig. " Feuillets d'Album." Trois morceaux de chant avec piano. 
 Op. 20. "Voxpopuli." Deiix grands chceurs avec orchestre. (" La Menace des 
 
 Francs," " Hymne a la France.") 
 Op. 21. Ouverture du " Corsaire." 
 
 * From Grove's " Dictionary of Music and Musicians." Article " Berlioz," by Edward 
 Dannreuther. 
 
126 
 
 Op. 22. " Te Deum " a trois choeurs avec orchestre et orgue concertantr. 
 
 Op. 23. " Benvenuto Cellini. ' Opera en trois actes. Paroles de Leon de 
 
 Wailly et Auguste Barbier. (Partition de piano. Paris, Choudens.) 
 Op. 24. " La Damnation de Faust." Legende dramatique en quatre parties. 
 Op. 25. " L'Enfance du Christ." Trilogie Sacree. 1. " Le Songe d'Herode." 
 
 2. " La Fuite en Egypte." 3. " L'Arrivee a Sais." 
 Op. 26. " L'Impenale." Cantate a deux choeurs et orchestre. 
 " Le Temple Universal." Choeur a quatre voix et piano. 
 " Priere du Matin." Chceur a deux voix et piano. 
 " La Belle Isabeau." Conte pendant l'orage avec choeur. 
 " Le Chasseur Danois." Pour voia de basse avec piano. 
 " L'Invitation a la Valse " de Weber. Orchestration. 
 " Marche Marocaine " de L. de Meyer. Orchestration. 
 " Recitatives " pour " Le Freischutz.'' 
 " Beatrice et Benedict." Opera en deux actes imite' de Shakespeare. Paroles 
 
 de Hector Berlioz. (Partition de piano. Paris, Brandus.) 
 " Les Troyens." Poeme lyrique en deux parties: (1) "La Prise de Troie.' 
 
 (2) " Les Troyens a Carthage." (Partition de piano. Paris, Choudens.) 
 
 WORKS IN MUSICAL LITERATURE. 
 
 Voyage Musical. . . . Etudes sur Beethoven, Gluck,et Weber, 2 Vols. Paris, 1844.' 
 
 Les Soirees de l'Orchestre ; 1853. 
 
 Les Grotesques de la Musique ; 1859. 
 
 A Travers Chants ; 1862. 
 
 Memoires Comprenant ses Voyages, etc., 1803-1865. Paris, 1870. 
 
 Historiettes et Scenes Musicales- 
 
 Les Musiciens et la Musique.