“They found out that the 11th was my birthday and sent me delightful presents. In the evening I was asked to a banquet of a hundred and fifty guests where, as you may imagine, I was well toasted. Both public and press are most eulogistic. At the second concert I was recalled six times after the Symphonie Fantastique, which was executed with tremendous spirit and the last part of which was encored.
“What an orchestra! what ensemble! what precision! I wonder if Beethoven ever heard anything like it. In spite of my pain, as soon as I reach the conductor’s desk and am surrounded by these sympathetic souls, I revive and I believe am conducting now as I never did before.
“Yesterday we did the second act of Orfeo, the C. minor Symphony and my Carnaval Romain. All was grandly done. The girl who sang Orfeo in Russian had an unequalled voice and sang well too.
“These poor Russians only knew Gluck from mutilated fragments, so you may imagine my pleasure in drawing aside the curtain that hid his mighty genius.
“In a fortnight we are to do the first act of Alcestis. The Grand Duchess has ordered that I am to be implicitly obeyed; I do not abuse her order, but I use it.
“She has asked me to go some day and read her Hamlet, and the other day I happened to speak to her ladies-in-waiting, in her presence, of Saint-Victor’s book and now they are all rushing off to buy and admire Hommes et Dieux.
“Here they love the beautiful; they live for literature and music; they have within them a constant flame that makes them lose consciousness of the frost and the snow.
“Why am I so old, so worn-out?
“Good-bye all. I love you and press your hands.”
To M. and Mme Massart.