At this time Bizet seems to have come a good deal into contact with Jean Baptiste Faure. They met frequently at the Opéra. "You really must do something more for Bizet," said the baritone to Louis Gallet. "Put your heads together, you and Blau, and write something that shall be _bien pour moi_." "Lorenzaccio," perhaps the strongest of De Musset's dramatic efforts, first came up. But Faure was not at all in touch with it. The rôle of Brutus--fawning Judas that he is--revolted him. He had no fancy to distort as _menteur à triple étage_; so the subject was put by. Then came Bizet one morning with an old issue of _Le Journal pour tous_ in his pocket. "Here is the very thing for us: 'Le Jeunesse du Cid' of Guilhem de Castro; not, mark you, the Cid of Corneille alone, but the inceptive Cid in all the glory of its pristine colour--the Cid, Don Rodrigue de Bivar, in the words of Sainte-Beuve 'the immortal flower of honour and of love.'" _The scène du mendiant_ held Bizet completely. It was to him simple, touching, and great. It showed Don Rodrigue in a new light. Those--and there were many of them--who had already cast their choice upon this legend, had recognised--but recognised merely--in their hero, the son prepared to sacrifice his love for filial duty, and to yield his life for love. But they had not seen in him the Christian, the true and godly soul, the Good Samaritan that De Castro represents. The scene of Rodrigue with the leper, disdained and done away with by Corneille, with which De Castro too was so reproached, was full of attraction for Bizet. His whole interest centred round it. He was impatient and hungered to get at it; and "Carmen," on which he was already well at work, was even laid aside the while. Faure, too, had expressed a sound approval and a hearty interest, and this alone meant much. So Bizet once again was full of hope. There follows a long and detailed correspondence on the subject with Gallet, with which I have not space to deal; but it shows up splendidly the extreme nicety of the musician's dramatic sense.