Note 169 — Chapter IX · (continued 2)

M. Gounod, in the duo of the first act of Romeo and Juliet, has found a chromatic ascendant which has some analogy with that of Schubert, but which, in the hands of the French composer, takes quite a different coloring. Sombre in La Jeune Religieuse, it is in Roméo et Juliette sparkling with light. In the line “Vois ces rayons jaloux dont l’orient se dore” (“Behold these envious beams which gild the east”) the brilliant ground-work added by M. Gounod contributes not a little to render the effect of light.