Cui first met Balakirev in 1856, and was introduced by him to Dargomijsky. His earliest operatic attempt, a work in one act entitled _The Mandarin's Son_, was a very slight composition in the style of Auber. An opera composed about the same time (1858-1859) on Poushkin's dramatic poem _The Captive in the Caucasus_ was a much more ambitious effort. Many years later--in 1881--Cui considered this work worth remodelling, and he also interpolated a second act. The patch is rather obvious, but _The Captive in the Caucasus_ is an interesting work to study, because it reveals very clearly the difference between Cui's earlier and later styles. Cui's reputation as an operatic composer actually began, however, with the performance of _William Ratcliff_, produced at the Maryinsky Theatre, St. Petersburg, in February 1869, under the direction of Napravnik, on the occasion of Mme. Leonova's benefit. A composer who is also a critic is certainly at a disadvantage in many respects. Cui, who contributed during the 'sixties a whole series of brilliant--and often mercilessly satirical--articles to the Russian press,[43] gave his adversaries an excellent opportunity to attack him for inconsistency when _Ratcliff_ made its appearance. Cui's literary precepts do undoubtedly move somewhat in advance of his practice as a composer, and _Ratcliff_ conforms in very few respects to the creed of the new Russian school as formulated by him in his well-known articles "La Musique en Russie." That is to say, instead of following the example of Dargomijsky in _The Stone Guest_, Cui to a great extent replaces free-recitative by arioso; while at the same time the absence of such broad and flowing melody as we find in the operas of Glinka, Borodin, and Tchaikovsky places _William Ratcliff_ in a position midway between declamatory and lyric opera. Some of the hostile criticisms showered upon this work are not altogether unjust. The subject of Heine's early tragedy, the outcome of his "Sturm und Drang" period, is undoubtedly crude and sensational; even in Plestcheiev's fine translation it was hardly likely to be acceptable to a nation who was beginning to base its dramatic traditions on the realistic plays of Gogol and Ostrovsky, rather than upon the romanticism of Schiller's "Robbers," and kindred dramas. The music is lacking in realistic power and certainly makes no pretensions to fulfil Dargomijsky's dictum that "the note must represent the word." Although the action of _William Ratcliff_ takes place across the border, neither the sentiment nor the colour of the music would satisfy a Scottish composer. But Cui's critics show a lack of perception when they neglect to praise the grace and tenderness which characterise his heroine Mary, and the sincerity and warmth of emotion which occasionally kindles and glows into passion as in the love-duet between William and Mary in the last act.