Massenet’s facility was something prodigious.  I have seen him sick in bed, in a most uncomfortable position, and still turning off pages of orchestration, which followed one another with disconcerting speed.  Too often such facility engenders laziness, but in his case we know what an enormous amount of work he accomplished.  He has been criticised as being too prolific.  However, that is a quality which belongs only to a master.  The artist who produces little may, if he has ability, be an interesting artist, but he will never be a great one.

[Illustration:  M. Jules Massenet]

In this time of anarchy in art, when all he had to do to conciliate the hostile critics was to array himself with the fauves, Massenet set an example of impeccable writing.  He knew how to combine modernism with respect for tradition, and he did this at a time when all he had to do was to trample tradition under foot and be proclaimed a genius.  Master of his trade as few have ever been, alive to all its difficulties, possessing the most subtle secrets of its technique, he despised the contortions and exaggerations which simple minds confound with the science of music.  He followed out the course he had set for himself without any concern for what they might say about him.  He was able to adopt within reason the novelties from abroad and he was clever in assimilating them perfectly, yet he presented the spectacle of a thoroughly French artist whom neither the Lorelei of the Rhine nor the sirens of the Mediterranean could lead astray.  He was a virtuoso of the orchestra, yet he never sacrificed the voices for the instruments, nor did he sacrifice orchestral color for the voices.  Finally, he had the greatest gift of all, that of life, a gift which cannot be defined, but which the public always recognizes and which assures the success of works far inferior to his.

Much has been said about the friendship between us—­a notion based solely on the demonstrations he showered on me in public—­and in public alone.  He might have had my friendship, if he had wanted it, and it would have been a devoted friendship, but he did not want it.  He told—­what I never told—­how I got one of his works presented at Weimar, where Samson had just been given.  What he did not tell was the icy reception he gave me when I brought the news and when I expected an entirely different sort of a reception.  From that day on I never intervened again, and I was content to rejoice in his success without expecting any reciprocity on his part, which I knew to be impossible after a confession he made to me one day.  My friends and companions in arms were Bizet, Guiraud and Delibes; Massenet was a rival.  His high opinion of me, therefore, was the more valuable when he did me the honor of recommending his pupils to study my works.  I have brought up this question only to make clear that when I proclaim his great musical importance, I am guided solely by my artistic conscience and that my sincerity cannot be suspected.  One word more.  Massenet had many imitators; he never imitated anyone.