By 1856, when Richault published Salut, Cendre du Pauvre! (Hail, ashes of the poor), Alkan had become a confirmed recluse, retreating into a deepening fantasy realm whose grandeurs would become evident—for those prepared to deal with their stupendous technical demands—the following year with Richault's issue of the Études in minor keys Op. 39. But a number of pieces from the same period show Alkan adding to this demesne in curious ways—for instance, in the keen satire of the Capriccio alla soldatesca and its companion piece Le tambour bat aux champs (both 1859), the bizarrerie of the Petites fantaisies (3) (1857), or the rudely humorous dislocations of the Minuets (3) (1859), which seem to call the minuet itself into question. Amid these jeux, fraught with sly "inside" jokes, Salut, Cendre du Pauvre! is—if enigmatic—musically straightforward. Somber rolled chords in the bass herald a spellbinding lament, an extended meditation giving way to a grim processional, before the lament returns as a prayer carried by harped chords to the ethereal treble. Though not as dramatically etched, its mourning rising to elegy recalls Liszt's Funérailles. The title proclaims this a "paraphrase" of, presumably, a like-titled poem by Gabriel-Marie-Jean-Baptiste Legouvé (1764 - 1812), though this has not been traced. Its dedication to Prince Nicolas Troubetzkoï likewise remains merely suggestive.

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