At this point Yulia Mihailovna would certainly have forbidden Lyamshin her house, but that very evening the whole circle brought him to her with the intelligence that he had just composed a new piece for the piano, and persuaded her at least to hear it. The piece turned out to be really amusing, and bore the comic title of “

The Franco-Prussian War .” It began with the menacing strains of the “ Marseillaise ”:

“ Qu’un sang impur abreuve nos sillons. ”