[Footnote 85: _Mémoires_, II, 365.]

[Footnote 86: "This composition contains a dose of sublimity much too
strong for the ordinary public; and Berlioz, with the splendid insolence
of genius, advises the conductor, in a note, to turn the page and pass
it over" (Georges de Massougnes, _Berlioz_). This fine study by Georges
de Massougnes appeared in 1870, and is very much in advance of its
time.]

Then there is the freedom of his rhythms. Schumann, who was nearest to
Berlioz of all musicians of that time, and, therefore, best able to
understand him, had been struck by this since the composition of the
_Symphonic fantastique_,[87] He wrote:--

"The present age has certainly not produced a work in which similar
times and rhythms combined with dissimilar times and rhythms have
been more freely used. The second part of a phrase rarely
corresponds with the first, the reply to the question. This anomaly
is characteristic of Berlioz, and is natural to his southern
temperament."

Far from objecting to this, Schumann sees in it something necessary to
musical evolution.

"Apparently music is showing a tendency to go back to its
beginnings, to the time when the laws of rhythm did not yet trouble
her; it seems that she wishes to free herself, to regain an
utterance that is unconstrained, and raise herself to the dignity
of a sort of poetic language."