than forty
attacks of nervous fever or violent convulsions on the part of young
women, fond to excess of music, which have no other origin than the
prayer of the Hebrews in the third act with its superb change of key!"

Thus music saved the scene in Naples. When the opera was rewritten for
London and made to tell a story about Peter the Hermit, the
corresponding scene had to be elided after the first performance. Ebers
tells the story: "A body of troops was supposed to pass over a bridge
which, breaking, was to precipitate them into the water. The troops
being made of basketwork and pulled over the bridge by ropes,
unfortunately became refractory on their passage, and very sensibly
refused, when the bridge was about to give way, to proceed any further;
consequently when the downfall of the arches took place the basket men
remained very quietly on that part of the bridge which was left
standing, and instead of being consigned to the waves had nearly been
set on fire. The audience, not giving the troops due credit for their
prudence, found no little fault with their compliance with the law of
self-preservation. In the following representations of the opera the
bridge and basket men which, en passant (or en restant rather), had
cost fifty pounds, were omitted." [Footnote: Op. cit., p. 160] When
"Moise" was prepared in Paris 45,000 francs were sunk in the Red Sea.

I shall recur in a moment to the famous preghiera but, having Ebers'
book before me, I see an anecdote so delightfully illustrative of the
proverbial spirit of the lyric theatre that I cannot resist the
temptation to repeat it. In the revised "Moses" made for Paris there
occurs a quartet beginning "Mi manca la voce" ("I lack voice") which
Chorley describes as "a delicious round." Camporese had to utter the
words first and no sooner had she done so than Ronzi di Begnis, in a
whisper, loud enough to be heard by her companion, made the comment "E
vero!" ("True!")--"a remark," says Mr. Ebers, "which produced a retort
courteous somewhat more than verging on the limit of decorum, though
not proceeding to the extremity asserted by rumor, which would have
been as inconsistent with propriety as with the habitual dignity and
self-possession of Camporese's demeanor."

Somebody, I cannot recall who, has said that the success of "Dal tuo
stellato" set the fashion of introducing prayers into operas. Whether
this be true or not, it is a fact that a prayer occurs in four of th