-1865) was more of a musician than Balfe, but his
best-known work, 'Maritana,' is but little superior to 'The Bohemian
Girl.' Maritana, a street singer, has attracted the attention of the
King of Spain. Don Jose, one of the courtiers, determines to help the
King in his amour, in order that he may afterwards use his infidelity as
a means of advancing himself in the favour of the Queen. There is a law
against duelling in the streets of Madrid, and a certain spendthrift
nobleman, Don Caesar de Bazan, has rendered himself liable to death for
protecting a poor boy named Lazarillo from arrest. Don Jose promises the
condemned man that he shall be shot instead of hanged, if he will
consent to marry a veiled lady an hour before the execution, intending
thus to give Maritana a position at court as the widow of a nobleman.
Don Caesar consents to the arrangement, but Lazarillo takes the bullets
out of the soldiers' rifles, so that the execution does not end fatally,
and Maritana is not a widow after all. Don Caesar finds his way to a
villa in the outskirts of Madrid, where he not only has the satisfaction
of putting a stop to the King's attentions to Maritana, but performs the
same kind office for the Queen, who is being persecuted by Don Jose. For
the latter performance he receives a free pardon, and is made Governor
of Valentia. 'Lurline,' an opera constructed upon the Rhenish legend of
the Loreley, has perhaps more musical merit than 'Maritana,' but the
libretto is more than usually indefinite.

Wallace rivalled Balfe in the facility and shallowness of his melody.
Yet with all their weaknesses, his operas contain many tunes which have
wound themselves into popular affection, and in the eyes of Bank-Holiday
audiences, 'Maritana' stands second only to 'The Bohemian Girl.'

Sir Julius Benedict (1804-1885), though German by birth, may
conveniently be classed as an Englishman. Trained in the school of
Weber, he was a musician of a very different calibre from Balfe and
Wallace. His earlier works, 'The Gipsy's Warning' and 'The Brides of
Venice,' are now forgotten, but 'The Lily of Killarney,' which was
produced in 1862, is still deservedly popular.

It is founded upon Boucicault's famous drama, 'The Colleen Bawn.'
Hardress Cregan, a young Irish landowner, has married Eily O'Connor, a
beautiful peasant girl of Killarney. The marriage has been kept secret,
and Hardress, finding that an opportunity has arisen of repairing the
fallen fo