‘L’Attaque du Moulin’ was received with more general favour than ’Le Reve.’  In it Bruneau shows an inclination to relax the stern principles of his former creed.  The action is often interrupted by solos and duets of a type which approaches the conventional, though for the most part the opera follows the Wagnerian system.  The result of this mixture of styles is unsatisfactory.  ‘L’Attaque du Moulin’ has not the austere sincerity of ‘Le Reve,’ and the attempts to bid for popular favour are not nearly popular enough to catch the general ear.  Bruneau has little melodic inspiration, and when he tries to be tuneful he generally ends in being merely commonplace.  The orchestral part of the opera, too, is far less satisfactory than in ‘Le Reve.’  There, as has already been pointed out, the monotony and lack of colour were to a certain extent in keeping with the character of the work, but in ‘L’Attaque du Moulin,’ where all should be colour and variety, the dull and featureless orchestration is a serious blot.  ‘Messidor’ (1897) and ‘L’Ouragan’ (1901) had very much the same reception as the composer’s earlier operas.  The compact little phalanx of his admirers greeted them with enthusiasm, but the general public remained cold.  ‘Messidor,’ written to a prose libretto by Zola, is a curious mixture of socialism and symbolism.  The foundation of the plot is a legend of the gold-bearing river Ariege, which is said to spring from a vast subterranean cathedral, where the infant Christ sits on his mother’s lap playing with the sand which falls from his hands in streams of gold.  Intertwined with this strange story is a tale of the conflict between a capitalist and the villagers whom his gold-sifting machinery has ruined.  There are some fine moments in the drama, but the allegorical element which plays so large a part in it makes neither for perspicacity nor for popularity.  ‘L’Ouragan’ is a gloomy story of love, jealousy, and revenge.  The scene is laid among the fisher-folk of a wild coast—­presumably Brittany—­where the passions of the inhabitants seem to rival the tempests of their storm-beaten shores in power and intensity.  It contains music finely imagined and finely wrought, and it is impossible not to feel that if Bruneau’s sheer power of invention were commensurate with his earnestness and dramatic feeling he would rank very high among contemporary composers.  In ‘L’Enfant Roi’ (1905), a ‘comedie lyrique’ dealing with bourgeois life in modern Paris, which plainly owed a good deal to Charpentier’s ‘Louise,’ the composer essayed a lighter style with no very conspicuous success, but his latest work,’Nais Micoulin’ (1907), a Provencal tale of passion, revenge and devotion seems to contain more of the elements of lasting success.

Bruneau’s later works can hardly be said to have fulfilled the promise of ‘Le Reve,’ but they unquestionably show a fuller command of the resources of his art.  He is a singular and striking figure in the world of modern music, and it is impossible to believe that he has spoken his last word as yet.  His career will be watched with interest by all who are interested in the development of opera.