back into public notice: Francisquine,
the wife of Tabarin, irons her petticoats in the players' booth. A
musketeer saunters along, stops and makes love to her. She listens
greedily. Tabarin enters just after she has made an appointment with
the man. Tabarin is drunk--drunker than usual. He adores his wife; he
falls at her feet; he entreats her; he threatens her. Meanwhile the
crowd gathers to see the "parade." Tabarin mounts the platform and
tells openly of his jealousy. He calls his wife; she does not answer.
He opens the curtain behind him; then he sees her in the arms of the
musketeer. Tabarin snatches up a sword, stabs his wife in the breast
and comes back to the stage with starting eyes and hoarse voice. The
crowd marvels at the passion of his play. Francisquine, bloody, drags
herself along the boards. She chokes; she cannot speak. Tabarin, mad
with despair, gives her the sword, begs her to kill him. She seizes the
sword, raises herself, hiccoughs, gasps out the word "Canaille," and
dies before she can strike.

Paul Ferrier and Emanuel Pessard produced a grand opera in two acts
entitled "Tabarin" in Paris in 1885; Alboiz and Andre a comic opera
with the same title, music by Georges Bousquet, in 1852. Gilles and
Furpilles brought out an operetta called "Tabarin Duelliste," with
music by Leon Pillaut, in 1866. The works seem to have had only the
name of the hero in common. Their stories bear no likeness to those of
"La Femme de Tabarin" or "Pagliacci." The Spanish play, "Drama Nuevo,"
by Estebanez, was adapted for performance in English by Mr. W. D.
Howells under the title "Yorick's Love." The translation was made for
Mr. Lawrence Barrett and was never published in book form. If it had
the denouement suggested in Leoncavallo's letter to Sonzogno, the fact
has escaped the memory of Mr. Howells, who, in answer to a letter of
inquiry which I sent him, wrote: "So far as I can remember there was no
likeness between 'Yorick's Love' and 'Pagliacci.' But when I made my
version I had not seen or heard 'Pagliacci.'"

The title of Leoncavallo's opera is "Pagliacci," not "I Pagliacci" as
it frequently appears in books and newspapers. When the opera was
brought out in the vernacular, Mr. Frederick E. Weatherly, who made the
English adaptation, called the play and the character assumed by Canio
in the comedy "Punchinello." This evoked an interesting comment from
Mr. Hale: "'Pagliacci' is the plural of Pagliaccio, which does not