Today I went to the general rehearsal of Megaye because Coates suggested that I have a look at Lambin's scenery. Well, I liked the Buddhist shrine very much, although everyone tells me that Lambin is an old-fashioned and routine artist who is currently, for some reason, trying to project himself into the contemporary world. The music of this opera is a zero, but what followed, Cui's The Mandarin's Son, was not worth a tuppeny damn. All the same, what fun it would be to write a comic opera! And again there came into my head an idea for an opera I had thought about one day in Italy: Jules Verne's La fantaisie du docteur Ox. Yes indeed, none other than Jules Verne. I would make it full of ensembles, wailings and gnashings of teeth, and lots of rushing about on stage.