When I was ten, my teacher decided that I was sufficiently prepared to give a concert in the Salle Pleyel, so I played there, accompanied by an Italian orchestra, with Tilmant as the conductor. I gave Beethoven"s _Concerto in C minor_ and one of Mozart"s concertos in B flat. There was some question of my playing at the Societe des Concerts du Conservatoire, and there was even a rehearsal. But Seghers, who afterwards founded the Societe St. Cecile, was a power in the affairs of the orchestra. He detested Stamaty and told him that the Societe was not organized to play children"s accompaniments. My mother felt hurt and wanted to hear nothing more of it.