L'Abbé Constantin

An old country curé loses his patrons when the château is sold to Americans, and prepares to hate them — then meets the two young women who have bought it. Halévy wrote the words the nineteenth century sang: with Meilhac he made the libretti for Offenbach and for Carmen. This 1882 novel was the gentlest thing he did, sold enormously, and got him into the Académie.