He received the Legion of Honour, and although professing to despise it, he always wore the ribbon. He was also chosen one of the Immortals, apropos of which M. Alexandre tells a funny story.
Alexandre was canvassing for him and found great difficulty in managing Adolph Adam, who was from Berlioz as the poles asunder.
First he went to Berlioz, who had flatly refused to make the slightest concession to Adam’s prejudices.
“Come,” said he, “do at least be amiable to Adam; you cannot deny that he is a musician, at any rate.”
“I don’t say he is not; but, being a great musician, how can he lower himself to comic-opera? If he chose he could write such music as I do.”
Undismayed, Alexandre went to Adam.
“You will give your vote to Berlioz, will you not, dear friend? Although you cannot appreciate each other, you will own that he is a thorough musician.”
“Certainly, he is a great musician, a really great one, but his music is awfully tiresome. Why!”—and little Adam straightened his spectacles—“why, if he chose he could compose ... as well as I do. But, seriously, he is a man of some importance, and I promise that, after Clapisson, who already has our votes, Berlioz shall have the next vacancy.”
By a strange coincidence, the next fauteuil was Adam’s own, to which Berlioz was elected by nineteen votes.
In his weak state of health, Berlioz was quite unfit to face the innumerable worries incidental to the production of The Trojans. For seven years it had been his chief object in life, and if, as he said, he could have had everything requisite at his command, with unlimited capital to draw upon—as Wagner had with Louis of Bavaria—all might have been well. But to fight, contrive, temporise and propitiate all at once was more than his enfeebled frame and irascible spirit could stand.