"It is said that a king of France in the presence of the body of a powerful seigneur of his court could not help saying, 'How tall he was!' So he who rests here before us seemed tall to us, being of those whose height is only realized after death. "To see him pass in life so simple and calm, in his dream of art, who of us, accustomed to feel him kindly and forbearing always at our sides, has seen that he was so tall that we had to raise our eyes to look him fairly in the face." Here my eyes filled with tears and my voice seemed to die away strangled with emotion. Nevertheless I contained myself, mastered my grief, and continued my discourse. I knew that I should have time enough for weeping. It was very painful to me on that occasion to see the envious looks of those who already saw in me my master's successor at the Conservatoire. And as a matter of fact, this is exactly what happened, for a little afterwards I was summoned to the Ministry of Public Instruction. At the time the Minister was my confrère at the Institute, Rambaud the eminent historian, and at the head of the Beaux-Arts as director was Henri Roujon, since a member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts and the permanent secretary. The directorship of the Conservatoire was offered me. I declined the honor as I did not want to interrupt my life at the theater which took my whole time. In 1905 the directorship was offered me again, but I refused for the same reason. Naturally, I tendered my resignation as professor of composition at the Conservatoire. I had only accepted and held the situation because it brought me in touch with my Director whom I loved so much. Free at last and loosed from my chains forever, during the first days of summer my wife and I started for the mountains of Auvergne. CHAPTER XXII WORK! ALWAYS WORK! At the beginning of the preceding winter, Henri Cain proposed to Henri Heugel a text for an opera based on Alphonse Daudet's famous romance _Sapho_. He went to Heugel in order that I might the more certainly accept it, for he knew the influence my publisher had with me. I had gone to the mountains with a light heart. There was to be no directing the Conservatoire and no more classes; I felt twenty years younger. I wrote _Sapho_ with an enthusiasm I had rarely felt up to that time.