e the second piano--he playing the bass. It was
really funny to see him; his eyes were fixed on the music and he counted
audibly and breathlessly all the time, and I heard him muttering
occasionally to himself, "Non ce n'est pas possible," "Non ce n'est pas
cela."

I must say that the Walpurgis Night for a person playing at sight and
unaccustomed to Wagner's music is an ordeal--however, he acquitted
himself extremely well and we got through our performance triumphantly,
but great drops of perspiration were on his forehead. W. was very nice
to him and Mlle. Dubois quite charming, encouraging him very much. Still
I don't think his evening at the chateau was one of unmixed pleasure,
and I am sure he was glad to have that overture behind him.

We saw our neighbours very rarely; occasionally some men came to
breakfast. The sous-prefet, one or two of the big farmers or some local
swells who wanted to talk politics to W. One frequent visitor was an
architect from Chateau-Thierry, who had built W.'s farm. He was an
enormous man, very stout and red, always attired in shiny black
broadcloth. He was a very shrewd specimen, very well up in all that
went on in the country and very useful to W. He had a fine appetite,
always tucking his napkin carefully under his chin when he sat down to
table. He talked a great deal one day about his son, who had a good
tenor voice and had just got an engagement at the Opera Comique. Said he
would like us to hear him sing--might he bring him some day to
breakfast?

He came back two or three weeks later with the young man, who was a
great improvement upon his father. The Paris boulevards and the
coulisses of the opera had quite modified the young provincial. He
talked a good deal at table, was naturally much pleased to have got into
the Opera Comique. As it is a "theatre subventionne" (government
theatre), he considered himself a sort of official functionary. After
breakfast he asked us if we would like to hear him sing--sat down to the
piano, accompanying himself very simply and easily and sang extremely
well. I was much astonished and Mme. A. was delighted, especially when
he sang some old-fashioned songs from the "Dame Blanche" and the "Domino
Noir." The old father was enchanted, a broad smile on his face. He
confided to W. that he had hoped his son would walk in his footsteps and
content himself with a modest position as architect in the country, but
after six months in Paris where he had sent