Before I got half-way through the first verse I saw my judge's eye soften. Then I took courage—I felt myself winning the game—I went on boldly, and when I had finished, the Principal said—
"Come, we will go to the piano."
My triumph was certain. I was sure of all my weapons. I sang my little ballad over again, and at length poor Monsieur Poirson, completely beaten, took my face in his hands, kissed me with tears in his eyes, and said—
"Go on, my boy; you shall be a musician!"
My dear mother had acted prudently. Her opposition had been dictated by her maternal solicitude, but the danger of consenting too precipitately to my desire was outweighed by the heavy responsibility of perhaps impeding my natural vocation. The Principal's encouragement robbed my mother's objections of their chief support, and herself of the aid she had most reckoned upon to make me change my mind. The assault had been delivered. The siege had begun. It was time to capitulate. But she held out as long as she could, and, in her dread of yielding too soon and too easily to my prayers, she betook herself to the following plan, as her final resource.
There then lived in Paris a German named Antoine Reicha, who had the highest possible reputation as a theoretical musician. Besides being Professor of Composition at the Conservatoire (of which Cherubini was at that time Director), Reicha received private pupils in his own home. My mother thought of placing me under him to study harmony, counterpoint, and fugue—the elements of the art of composition, in fact. She therefore asked the Principal's permission to take me to him on Sundays during the boys' walking hour. As the time spent in going to and from Reicha's house, added to that spent over my lesson, practically covered the same period as the boys' airing, my regular studies were not likely to be interfered with by this special favour.
The Principal gave his consent, and my mother took me to Reicha's house. But, before she handed me over to him, she thus (as she told me herself long afterwards) addressed him privately—
"My dear Monsieur Reicha, I bring you my son, a mere child, who desires to devote himself to musical composition. I bring him against my own judgment; I dread an artist's life for him, knowing, as I do, the many difficulties which beset it. But I will not ever reproach myself, nor let my son reproach me, with having hindered his career, or spoilt his happiness. I want to make quite sure, before all else, that his talent is real and his vocation true. And so I beg you will put him to the severest test. Place everything that is most difficult before him. If he is destined to be a true artist, no trouble will discourage him; he will triumph over it all. If, on the other hand, he loses heart, I shall know where I am; and shall certainly not allow him to embark on a career, the first obstacles in which he has not energy to overcome."
Reicha promised my mother I should be treated as she wished; and he kept his word, as far as in him lay.
As samples of my boyish talent, I had brought him a few sheets of manuscript music—ballads, preludes, scraps of valses, and so forth,—the musical trifles my boyish brain had woven.