These concerts were both successful and the young composer passed from deepest anxiety to exuberant delight.  He wrote to the same friend;

“The Tempest is to be played a second time at the opera.  It is new, fresh, strange, grand, sweet, tender, surprising.  Fetis wrote two splendid articles about it for the Revue Musicale.—­My marriage is fixed for Easter, 1832, on condition that I do not lose my pension, and that I go to Italy for one year.  My blessed Symphonie has done the deed.”

The next January Berlioz went home to his family, who were now reconciled to his choice of music as a profession, and deluged him with compliments, caresses and tender solicitude.  The parents had fully forgiven their gifted son.

“There is Rome, Signore.”

It was true.  The Eternal City lay spread out in purple majesty before the young traveler, who suddenly realized the grandeur, the poetry of this heart of the world.  The Villa Medici, the venerable ancient palace, centuries old, had been reserved by the Academie of France as home for her students, whose sole obligation was to send, once a year, a sample of their work to the Academie in Paris.

When Hector Berlioz arrived in Rome he was twenty-seven, and of striking appearance.  A mass of reddish auburn hair crowned a high forehead; the features were prominent, especially the nose; the expression was full of sensitive refinement.  He was of an excitable and ardent temperament, but in knowledge of the world’s ways often simple as a child.

Berlioz, who was welcomed with many humorous and friendly jests on his appearance among the other students, had just settled down to work, when he learned that his Ariel—­otherwise Marie Moke—­had forsaken him and had married Pleyel.  In a wild state of frenzy he would go to Paris at once and seek revenge.  He started, got as far as Nice, grew calmer, remained at Nice for a month, during which time the Overture to “King Lear” was written, then returned to Rome by the way of Genoa and Florence.

By July 1832, Berlioz had returned to La Cote Saint Andre for a home visit.  He had spent a year in Italy, had seen much, composed a number of important things, but left Rome without regrets, and found the familiar landscape near his home more fascinating than anything Italy could show.

The rest of the summer was spent in the beautiful Dauphiny country, working on the “Damnation of Faust.”  In the fall he returned to Paris.  The vision of his Ophelia, as he used to call Miss Smithson, was seldom long absent from his thoughts, and he now went to the house where she used to live, thinking himself very lucky to be able to find lodging there.  Meeting the old servant, he learned Miss Smithson was again in Paris, and would manage a new English theater, which was to open in a few days.  But Berlioz was planning a concert of his own compositions, and did not trust himself to see the woman he had so long adored until this venture was over.  It happened,