art to the music of the Italian stage, considering the period of her career at which they were achieved, are as remarkable as anything in her history. The season of 1853 saw merely a repetition of some of her most favourite performances. In 1854 was committed one of those mistakes which great artists are so constantly making. They begin by saying “Good-bye” too soon, and the danger is that they end by saying the last words of parting a little too late. Farewell performances were announced, and at a farewell benefit—on which a divided performance was given, and the singer sustained one Italian part and one French, the first act of “Norma” being played, followed by three acts of “Les Huguenots”—Madame Grisi took leave of her English public midst a scene of extraordinary excitement: the prices were doubled, the house crowded to excess, the applause was as enthusiastic as it was prolonged. But in 1855 the lady was singing again! The pangs of parting might have been spared. In 1856—the Royal Italian Opera, the scene of her greatest triumphs, destroyed by fire—she was singing at the Lyceum, and again in 1857, where, it may be mentioned, she appeared in yet another new part, that of Leonora in Verdi’s “Il Trovatore.” The years 1858-9-60 have each seen the lady’s successes won over again. In the former year she opened New Covent Garden Theatre with her performance of Valentine, as in 1847 she had opened John Kemble’s altered house with her Semiramide. The facts of the farewell season of 1861 are freshly before the reader.
Glance now at a list of the operas in which Madame Grisi has sustained characters, with the number of times she has played in each in London. “La Gazza Ladra,” 47; “Anna Bolena,” 38; “Otello,” 36; “Il Don Giovanni,” 82; “La Donna del Lago,” 21; “L’Assedio di Corinto,” ll; “Semiramide,” 41; “Il Barbiere,” 38; “La Sonnambula,” 18; “Marino Faliero,” 8; “I Puritani,” 92; “Prova d’un Opera,” 21; “Norma,” 79; “I Briganti,” 5; “Il Matrimonio Segreto” (Caroline), 10; “Malek Adel,” 7; “Ildegonda,” 2; “Parasina,” 6; “Nozze di Figaro,” 22; “Falstaff,” 4;“Lucrezia Borgia,” 97; “Il Giuramento,” 9; “Il Matrimonio Segreto” (Lisetta), 9; “Fausta,” 2; “Roberto Devereux,” 6; “Don Pasquale,” 29; “Cenerentola,” 3; “Don Carlos,” 5; “Corado d’Altamura,” l; “Il Pirata,” 6; “I Lombardi,” ll; “I due Foscari,” 3; “La Favorita,” 26; “Les Huguenots,” 78; “Roberto il Diavolo,” 12; “Il Flauto Magico,” 3; “Le Prophete,” 9; “Il Trovatore,” 13.
Some 900 and odd nights are thus accounted for, spread over twenty-seven operatic seasons! For so many years has Madame Grisi been singing in London, on an average of about thirty nights a year. There may well be some pain at parting with an artist who represents so large a share in the entertainment of a generation! There need be a fond leave-taking of one, who, apart from being a beautiful woman and a great singer, has toiled so honestly and zealously for her public. Whenever Madame Grisi trod the stage, her audience might be sure of heart-and-soul work for their entertainment. There was no apathy, no caprice, no sluggishness that sometimes seems to weigh down other singers like a heavy cloak. No sparing of self when our prima donna was upon the scene. There has never been a more conscientious public servant. And look over her long list of parts. Is it possible to point to any one living singer as capable of sustaining these as our prima donna sustained them? Some of them, it would seem, must even leave the lyric stage with her. Examine the names of those who have ventured upon, or been forced into her répertoire, during the last ten years, say. Norma has been played by Jenny Lind, Parodi, Fiorentini, Cruvelli. Lucrezia Borgia, by Cruvelli, Parodi, Frezzolini, Barbieri Nini, Albertini, Johanna Wagner, Titiens. Donna Anna has had for representatives, Castellan, Viardot, Parodi, Fiorentini, Medori, Cruvelli, Rudersdorff, Rosa Devries, Spezia, Titiens. As Elvira in “I Puritani,” Castellan, Lind, Frezzolini, Sontag, Bosio, La Grange, Parepa, Ortolani, Penco, have appeared. Which of these vocalists has torn a leaf from Madame Grisi’s laurels? Which has in any way diminished her identity in the public mind with these characters? No, at her theatrical demise her mantle must be divided amongst many; there is no one entitled to it in its integrity. Some characters will fall as of right to Viardot, some to Titiens, to Penco, to Carvalho; much of her younger répertoire to Patti; but there is no one who can establish a claim to all of them.
The habitués of the opera must seek what consolation they may. They will look a long while for a successor to their prima donna who will cause her to be forgotten. For few can hope to unite her gifts from nature and art. London knows no living singer who can so possess her audience as Madame Grisi possessed them. Who can so awe and win, who can so startle by her passion, and charm by her espiéglerie; can be so great in tragedy, so graceful in comedy. And she has sung for twenty-seven seasons in London! Is she to be blamed that she was loth to part from her patrons? And on the whole Time has been kind. They who took leave of a great artist in 1854, found they were still saying good-bye to a great artist in 1861. It was the same Giulia Grisi, of the beautiful face, of the silver voice, of the perfect art.
AN ARTIST’S RAMBLE ALONG THE LINE OF THE PICTS’ WALL.
PART III.
