His existence at this time, which was shared by another student, his friend Carbonnel, was a very miserable one, their meals consisting on certain days of vegetables and dried fruits. He gave lessons in solfeggio at a franc a lesson, and even applied for the position of chorus singer at the _Théâtre des Nouveautés_. But artistic pleasures counterbalanced the material privations, and his heart danced for joy whenever he could go to the _Opéra_ or to the _Odéon_ and hear some masterpiece by Spontini, Gluck or Weber; his fourth god, Beethoven, was not revealed to him till two years later, when Habeneck founded the _Société des concerts du Conservatoire_ for the dissemination of the works of that prodigious genius. He continued however in the classes of Lesueur and Reicha, so that he was able to pass the preliminary examination for the concours of 1828. The subject given out by the board of examiners was a scene from _Orpheus torn to pieces by Bacchantes_, and Berlioz’s music was declared by the judges as _impossible to be played_. His only response was to prepare for its performance at the concert to be given at the Conservatoire, the superintendent of the Beaux-Arts, M. de Larochefoucauld, to whom he had been recommended, having placed that hall at his disposal, notwithstanding the violent protestations of the director, Cherubini. But chance favored the self-love of the members of the Institute, for Berlioz was obliged to give up his plan, on account of an indisposition of the singer Alexis Dupont. It would have been strange indeed, if Berlioz, with his ardent imagination and brain always on fire, had allowed the romantic movement to pass by without attaching himself to it with all the fury and passion which he threw into everything. He soon became one of the leaders of the new school, poor enough in musicians, counting only himself and Monpau, whereas it abounded in writers and artists. Like all his comrades in romanticism, even exceeding them all, Berlioz was an enthusiastic and constant visitor at the _Odéon_, where some of Shakespeare’s plays were then being given by a company of English tragedians. Here he received a double blow; from Shakespeare who floored him, as he said, and from Miss Smithson who intoxicated him. It was to attract the attention of the beautiful tragedienne that he organized, with his overtures to _Waverley_ and _Francs-Juges_ and his cantata of _la Mort d’Orphée_, a concert which she never heard anything about. It was also this idea of reaching her through the medium of music which inspired him to write his _Fantastic Symphony_, in which he put himself in the scene with his beloved, and which, in fact, was to end by gaining him Miss Smithson’s heart.