enoist was less happy when he was asked to put some life into
Bellini's _Romeo_ by using earsplitting outbursts of drums, cymbals, and
brass. During the same noise-loving period Costa, in London, gave
Mozart's _Don Juan_ the same treatment. He let loose throughout the
opera the trombones which the author intentionally reserved for the end.
Benoist ought to have refused to do such a barbarous piece of work.
However, it had no effect in preventing the failure of a worthless
piece, staged at great expense by the management which had rejected Les
Troyens.

I was fifteen when I entered Halevy's class. I had already completed the
study of harmony, counterpoint and fugue under Maleden's direction. As I
have said, his method was that taught at the Ecole Niedermeuer. Faure,
Messager, Perilhou, and Gigot were trained there and they taught this
method in turn. My class-work consisted in making attempts at vocal and
instrumental music and orchestration. My _Reverie_, _La Feuille de
Peuplier_ and many other things first appeared there. They have been
entirely forgotten, and rightly, for my work was very uneven.

At the end of his career Halevy was constantly writing opera and
opera-comique which added nothing to his fame and which disappeared
never to be revived after a respectable number of performances. He was
entirely absorbed in his work and, as a result, he neglected his classes
a good deal. He came only when he had time. The pupils, however, came
just the same and gave each other instruction which was far less
indulgent than the master's, for his greatest fault was an overweening
good nature. Even when he was at class he couldn't protect himself from
self-seekers. Singers of all sorts, male and female, came for a hearing.
One day it was Marie Cabel, still youthful and dazzling both in voice
and beauty. Other days impossible tenors wasted his time. When the
master sent word that he wasn't coming--this happened often--I used to
go to the library, and there, as a matter of fact, I completed my
education. The amount of music, ancient and modern, I devoured is beyond
belief.

But it wasn't enough just to read music--I needed to hear it. Of course
there was the Societe des Concerts, but it was a Paradise, guarded by an
angel with a flaming sword, in the form of a porter named Lescot. It was
his duty to prevent the profane defiling the sanctuary. Lescot was fond
of me and appreciated my keen desire to hear the orchestra. As a resul