Page:The Yellow Book - 02.djvu/91

Rh of his achievement. It was for long a very will-o'-the-wisp for him. Now and again he caught it, and it is at such moments that we have him at his best; but he can be said only to have captured it completely so far as we are in a position to tell in "L'Arléienne" and certain parts of "Carmen." His faculty of self-criticism was developed in such an extraordinary degree as to baulk him. He loved this Don Rodrigue and thought it was his masterwork, and that too at the time when "Carmen" must have been well forward. We know then that the loss is not a small one.

It had not been alone the fate of the Opéra House that had stood in the way. That institution had in course taken up its quarters at the Salle Ventadour, and once installed there had proceeded with the rèpertoire. But Bizet's "Rodrigue," although well backed by Faure, was pushed aside for others. The three names that it bore were all too impotent; and when a new work was announced, it was "L'Esclave" of Membre that was seen to grace the bills, and not "Don Rodrigue."

Poor Bizet, disappointed and sore at heart, vanished to hide himself once more by his beloved Seine. This time it was to Bougival he went.

M. Massenet had recently produced his "Marie Madeleine" and, curiously enough, it had been successful. This seems to have spurred Bizet on to emulation. With his usual happy knack of hitting on a subject, he wrote off to Gallet, requesting him to do a book with Geneviève de Paris—the holy Geneviève of legendary lore—for heroine. And Gallet, accommodating creature that he was, forthwith proceeded to construct his tableaux. Together they went off to Lamoureux and read the synopsis to him. He approved it heartily, and Bizet got to work. "Carmen" was then finished and was undergoing the usual stage of adjournment Rh