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How Ulric Gallet was sent unto Picrochole. At the same hour departed the good man Gallet, and having passed the ford, asked at the miller that dwelt there in what condition Picrochole was: who answered him that his soldiers had left him neither cock nor hen, that they were retired and shut up into the rock Clermond, and that he would not advise him to go any further for fear of the scouts, because they were enormously furious.
Some time after my Henri VIII, in which Vaucorbeil had imposed another collaborator on me, Ritt asked me for a new work. We were looking about for a subject, when Gallet came to my house and timidly, as if fearing a rebuff, proposed Benvenuto Cellini.
As Déjanire, cast in a new form, has again appeared in the vast frame of the Opéra stage, I may be allowed to recall my recollections of my friend and collaborator, Louis Gallet, the diligent and chosen companion of my best years, whose support was so dear and precious to me. Collaboration for some reason unknown to me is deprecated.
With that the good man Gallet held his peace, but Picrochole to all his discourse answered nothing but Come and fetch them, come and fetch them, they have ballocks fair and soft, they will knead and provide some cakes for you.
Camille du Locle, who was the manager of the Opéra-Comique at the time, could not put on Le Timbre d'Argent, and while he waited for better days, which never came, to do that, he offered me a one-act work. He proposed Louis Gallet as my collaborator, although I had not known him until then. "You were made to understand each other," he told me.
So it is easy for one who knows Dumas's dramas to find traces of his handiwork in Benvenuto Cellini. It was not particularly easy to make an opera out of the play, and Gallet and I worked together at it with considerable difficulty. We soon saw that we should have to eliminate the famous scene of the casting of the statue.
There is neither hope nor remedy, said Gallet; the man is quite out of his wits, and forsaken of God. Yea, but, said Grangousier, my friend, what cause doth he pretend for his outrages? He did not show me any cause at all, said Gallet, only that in a great anger he spoke some words of cakes. I cannot tell if they have done any wrong to his cake-bakers.
For the conveyance and passing of all which was sent Gallet, who by the way as they went made them gather near the willow-trees great store of boughs, canes, and reeds, wherewith all the carriers were enjoined to garnish and deck their carts, and each of them to carry one in his hand, as himself likewise did, thereby to give all men to understand that they demanded but peace, and that they came to buy it.
To use the dancer he had engaged du Locle had Gallet and Guiraud improvise a short act, Le Kobold, which met with great success. The dancer was exquisite. Then du Locle lost interest in Le Timbre d'Argent and then came the failure of the Opéra-Comique. During all these tribulations I was preparing Samson, although I could find no one who even wanted to hear me speak of it.
Gallet wrote a sonnet in Alexandrine verse for Sabatino's declaration of his love. I was unable to set this to music, for the twelve feet embarrassed me and prevented my getting into my stride. As I did not know what else to do, I took the sonnet and by main force reduced the verse to ten feet with a cæsura at the fifth foot.
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